Wiccans Sue for Tax-Exempt Status in Fla.
Nov. 1 -- Wiccans are associated with witchcraft and white magic, but there’s one organization they can’t cast a spell against: the Florida Department of Revenue.
The Wiccan Religious Cooperative of Florida can, however, file a lawsuit, and that’s what it did on Halloween, accusing the state’s taxation agency of improperly denying the group a religious exemption from the state sales tax.
The problem, according to the state, is that whether or not it considers Wicca a religion, the group does not meet all of Florida’s standards to get a tax break.
Among those requirements is having a permanent address and a building where worshippers gather regularly. Or, as state law puts it, exemptions are available to “churches, synagogues and established religious institutions at which nonprofit religious services and activities are regularly conducted and carried on.”
“The statute says we can extend certificates for religious, customary, nonprofit activities, but [the organization] has to have an established physical place for worship,” says David Bruns of the Florida Department of Revenue.
To the state, that means renting or owning a space for regular religious services, he says, adding that courts have upheld that interpretation on several occasions
The Wiccans say that interpretation — besides denying their members a break on the 7 percent sales tax on religious books and other materials — denies their rights.
Tax-Exempt on Federal Level
They note the Wiccan Cooperative is tax-exempt on the federal level, where the standard is that a group must qualify as an organization that is “advancing religion,” as well as qualify as a charitable or educational organization. “The Wiccans have a federal tax exemption, but how the state laws are set, [the cooperative] needs to rent or own a permanent space,” says Heather Morcroft, a Wiccan and the attorney representing the cooperative. “To us this is impermissible.”
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