An evangelical church has sued the University of Maine System after it was initially selected to buy the system’s Hutchinson Center in Belfast, but then saw that offer rescinded and lost out to another bidder in the second round of proposals.
Calvary Chapel Belfast filed the lawsuit on Tuesday, just a few days after the UMaine System announced that it’s now planning to sell the Hutchinson Center to another organization, Waldo Community Action Partners.
In its complaint, the church accused the UMaine System of religious discrimination, arguing that its revocation of the initial sale offer was a response to public criticism that followed it.
The church accused the system of violating its First and 14th Amendment rights, as well as its civil rights. The church also claimed the system breached an “implied-in-fact” contract and caused harm by not honoring its “promise.”
The church is seeking a temporary restraining order to halt the sale of the Hutchinson Center to Waldo CAP.
Samantha Warren, a spokesperson for the University of Maine System, pushed back on the claims in the lawsuit. While the system is still reviewing the complaint, it “strongly disagrees with any allegations of discrimination.”
Warren said that all organizations were allowed to submit proposals for the Hutchinson Center and that they were scored by the same criteria.
“The proposal selected provided the most favorable terms for our public university consistent with the evaluation criteria, including a purchase price that was nearly double that of any other offer,” Warren said.
Warren noted that the other two bidders for the center have until the end of this week to appeal the sale to Waldo CAP, but neither has yet done so.
Calvary Chapel Belfast had hoped to use the center to offer larger services, expand its homeschool co-op, develop a literacy program for the special needs community, and expand its addiction recovery efforts, according to its complaint.
The church named as defendants the UMaine System, its board of trustees, and multiple administrators.
The UMaine System has previously said that it rescinded the offer to sell the Hutchinson Center to Calvary Chapel Belfast after realizing that the criteria used to evaluate the first round of proposals did not adequately consider the costs the system would have to pay to lease back an internet access hub at the site.
In the second round of bids, Waldo CAP offered the highest purchase price of $3.06 million, compared to an offer of $1.1 million from Calvary Chapel Belfast.
The two organizations had both offered to pay $1 million for the purchase during the first round of bids.