The Tucson City Council will consider whether to sue the University of Arizona over a proposed 1,000-bed dorm north of campus.

The council will meet behind closed doors Tuesday, May 23, to discuss the matter with city attorneys. At issue is whether the city believes the university has the legal authority to ignore local zoning laws even if the proposed multi-story dorm and secondary structures are not in the university’s planning boundaries.

A larger concern is a possible precedent the project could set: allowing the university or any other state entity to build whatever it wants on privately owned land.

The proposed six-story dorm would span an entire city block between East Drachman and Mabel streets and North Fremont and Santa Rita avenues, north of East Speedway. The University of Arizona only owns a portion of the proposed development. The location is outside the UA’s campus boundaries.

The Austin, Texas-based American Campus Communities, one of the largest student housing developers in the country, owns one of the two city blocks that is part of the proposal.