CHAPTER 41

in Act to amend and reenact § 57-12, as amended, of the Code of
Virginia, relating to the quantity of real and personal estate trustees
for religious purposes may hold.

[H 80]
Approved February 138, 1962

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:

. That § 57-12, as amended, of the Code of Virginia, be amended and
eenacted as follows:

§ 57-12. Such trustees shall not take or hold at any one time more
nan four acres of land in a city or town, nor more than seventy-five acres
utside of a city or town and within the same county; provided that the
ity or town council of any city or town may by ordinance authorize such
rustees to take and hold in such city or town not exceeding ten acres of
ind at any one time if such acreage is to be devoted exclusively, and is
ubsequently so devoted, to a church building, chapel, offices exclusively
sed for administrative purposes of the church, a Sunday-school building
nd playgrounds therefor, and parking lots for the convenience of those
ttending any of the foregoing, and a church manse, parsonage or rectory;
nd they shall not take nor hold at any one time, money, securities or other
ersonal estate exceeding in the aggregate, exclusive of the books and fur-
iture aforesaid, the sum of two million dollars; provided, that where two
r more religious congregations, churches or religious societies shall merge
r consolidate, such religious congregation, church or religious society so
lerged or consolidated, shall have three years’ time within which to dis-
ore of its land in excess of that which it is permitted to hold under this
ection.

_ Nothing herein contained shall affect the validity of any land within
, city or town legally acquired by a church to be exclusively used for a
church manse, parsonage or rectory between the effective date of § 57-12
of the Code of Virginia as amended in Chapter 309 of the 1954 Acts of
Assembly and the effective date of this section, provided the total amount
of land owned by a church within a city or town does not exceed ten acres.

This section, as amended, shall not be construed as applying to any
property which is the subject of litigation at the time of or prior to the
effective date hereof; and shall not, in any such litigation, be construed as
evidencing any change in any legislative policy respecting any matter or
matters covered by this article.