First Lutheran Church, the current home for the Listening House, a drop-in day center for homeless and low-income residents, joined its tenant Friday in suing the city of St. Paul. The church wants to force the city to lift 14 restrictions imposed by the St. Paul Planning Commission on Oct. 20.

“We engaged an attorney to help us only after it became clear that the likely outcome of this dispute was a one-sided ordinance that, if enforced, would essentially require us to end our partnership with Listening House and seriously infringe on our religious beliefs,” the church said in a press release.

The church is being represented by Attorney Evan Berquist of Cozen O’Connor, a Minneapolis law firm, and has filed suit in the U.S. District Court.

Listening House, which currently operates out of the church’s basement in the Dayton’s Bluff neighborhood, filed a lawsuit April 2 with the Ramsey County District Court .

The suit is the culmination of an ongoing battle between the center and its neighbors. The city, while supportive of the work done by the center, tried to strike a compromise by imposing restrictions on the center to help make it more neighbor-friendly.

The church feels the restrictions go too far and infringe on its rights, specifically the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act which prohibits municipalities from using land use regulations to unduly interfere with the rights of churches.

The day center relocated to the basement of First Lutheran Church in June 2017 after its former lodgings within Mary Hall on downtown St. Paul’s Ninth Street were torn down.

Since then, neighbors have complained of public urination and defecation, loitering and individuals appearing visibly intoxicated in the street.