The St. Anthony City Council is expected to vote Tuesday on a zoning request for a proposed community center and mosque.
The Tibyan Center, a multipurpose center planned for the former Bremer Bank building on Lowry Avenue near Stinson Parkway, would include a mosque, hosted events and youth programming and classes as well as office space available for rent by businesses and organizations.
The site at 2401 Lowry Ave. NE. is part of a planned unit development district, previously expected to be a 76-unit multi-family project which did not move forward. Applicants making changes to a planned unit development ordinance, such as what was originally approved for the site when it was to be developed into housing, are expected to apply for an amendment under the St. Anthony Zoning Ordinance.
Religious services are identified as a principal use in St. Anthony’s zoning ordinance.
Applicants for the center presented to the city planning commission in August. Residents at the meeting generally expressed support for the center, but also included concerns with increased parking needs for visitors of the center, and had questions about soil conditions.
The planning commission approved a staff recommendation at the August meeting, moving it to the city council, on the conditions that an environmental study and traffic and parking evaluation would be conducted.
Since the end of May, after the Tibyan Center announced plans for the building, it has been vandalized and broken into seven times in two months, according to the Minnesota Chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. CAIR officials asked law enforcement to investigate whether the incidents were motivated by bias. Additional security measures have been added to the property, according to the applicants.
The Tibyan Center is still in its application phase, according to city planner Stephen Grittman.
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