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The city of Huntsville has ruled that an abortion facility will remain open and be able to relocate next door to a middle school, although the waiver it is using to get around city ordinances was granted to another owner for another kind of business 16 years ago.

In a controversial 3-2 decision, the Huntsville Board of Zoning Adjustment on Tuesday night voted to uphold a city manager’s previous decision to issue a building permit to a local abortion clinic that wants to relocate to a larger facility across the street from a middle school. In response, local pro-life activists have threatened to sue, arguing that a conditional zoning waiver granted to the building’s original owners in 1998 should not apply to the abortionists, who plan to use it for a totally different purpose.

“We do not want to see women injured by abortion, and we don’t want to see children’s lives ended,” Life Legal Defense Foundation President Dana Cody told LifeSiteNews.

Cody noted that the Alabama Women's Center for Reproductive Alternatives abortion facility had already been caught violating health and safety standards numerous times. One abortionist on staff had spent 23 consecutive weekends in jail on domestic charges and has been the subject of 14 legal complaints, including two criminal cases in 1998 and 2008.

“The fact that they’re trying to relocate without abiding by the law in Alabama, without obeying regulations, that means that women are at risk. It’s that simple. We saw that with the [Kermit] Gosnell case,” Cody said. “Since that time, more and more substandard clinics have been allowed to remain open.”

“We don’t understand why local authorities don’t make the clinic abide by the law like everyone else,” Cody said. “Why do abortion clinics always get a pass?”

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Dalton Johnson, who owns the Alabama Women's Center for Reproductive Alternatives abortion facility, purchased the building after a new state law requiring abortion businesses to meet the same heath and safety standards as other ambulatory surgical centers forced him to shut down his previous location in June.

Because the new facility was previously used as a medical clinic, it may be possible to upgrade the building to meet the stricter standards, but Johnson will still have to apply for a new license. However, since abortion clinics are considered surgical centers and not medical offices, there has been contentious debate about whether the previous zoning waiver can be applied to Johnson’s business, or whether Johnson should have to apply for a new waiver himself.

“We believe [the original waiver] was conditional,” the Rev. James Henderson told WAAY-TV. “In fact, it states that it was conditional, and that when that use ended, it expired and a new one would have been required. Of course, we know that nobody wants an abortion clinic across from a middle school.”

Henderson told the zoning board they would violate their own bylaws if they applied the waiver to Johnson’s business.

“I think you have to consider the intent of the individual who said this was going to be an outreach to the community, a real positive thing,” said Henderson. “There was no discussion [by the zoning board in 1998] of an abortion clinic. It's clearly stated here in the minutes that it's approved 'for this use only.'”

Henderson, who chairs the Alabama Christian Coalition, has led the fight to block the facility from relocating since Manager of Planning Services Jim McGuffey first approved the building permit in June. Now that his appeal has been denied by the zoning council, Henderson has vowed to sue the city with the help of attorneys at Life Legal Defense Foundation.