The Legal Aid Society and Lowenstein Sandler LLP filed a federal class action lawsuit in United States District Court for the District of New Jersey against the City of Newark on behalf of New Yorkers who moved or seek to move from a New York City homeless shelter to an apartment in Newark using rent subsidies funded by New York City’s Special One-Time Assistance (SOTA) program, reports POLITICO New York.

Plaintiffs also sue the City of New York seeking, among other relief, to require the City to establish and adhere to minimum SOTA apartment inspection guidelines.

“You might expect this from small towns or the outgoing president of the United States but this is not what you would expect from a major city. [The ordinance is] both an infringement on the right to travel of that person and also discrimination on the basis of source of income,” said Joshua Goldfein, Staff Attorney with the Homeless Rights Project at The Legal Aid Society.