Pets or service animals?
Dogs, chickens and a miniature horse overran a panel of fair housing specialists, dominating discussion of disability rights at a regional housing forum.
ENID — Dogs, chickens and a miniature horse overran a panel of fair housing specialists, dominating discussion of disability rights at a regional housing forum.
They were service animals, or alleged to be, by rental tenants claiming they had been discriminated against by a landlord’s failure to accommodate their disability.
Property managers were loaded with questions at the workshop, organized at Central National Bank Event Center by the Oklahoma City-based nonprofit Metropolitan Fair Housing Council of Oklahoma and the city of Enid.
Investigators look into increasing numbers of animal-related claims as more people assert a medical need for assistance, including emotional support, by all kinds of animals, not just dogs.
Dogs? No surprise. But only specially trained dogs are recognized as service animals by the Americans with Disabilities Act. Fair housing law does not limit service animals to dogs.
The chickens were for a woman’s emotional support in a neighborhood that banned them. The horse lived in an apartment with its owner for the same reason.
Animals rise
Disputes over service animals are part of the general rise, as the population ages, in claims of disability-related civil rights violations under federal fair housing law and the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Officials here said 70 percent of complaints in Oklahoma are related to disability, with most of the rest connected with race or color.
Few cases of any kind considered by the council lead to official filings with the Department of Housing & Urban Development.
Of nearly 1,000 “intakes” last year, all but about 80 were resolved with negotiations among a tenant, landlord and council representatives, said Mary Daniels Dulan, executive director.
“Of course, there’s always a knucklehead out there who’ll say, ‘Come get me.’ It’s not us. But HUD will,” she said.
Fuzzy definitions
Complaints swirl in an area of civil rights law and rental housing where property rights, business interests and civil rights and violations hinge on official definitions of fuzzy words such as “reasonable accommodation” and “reasonable modification.”
“Reasonable accommodation,” according to HUD, is “a change in rules, policies, practices, or services so that a person with a disability will have an equal opportunity to use and enjoy a dwelling unit or common space.
“A housing provider should do everything s/ he can to assist, but s/he is not required to make changes that would fundamentally alter the program or create an undue financial and administrative burden. Reasonable accommodations may be necessary at all stages of the housing process, including application, tenancy, or to prevent eviction.
HUD’s example: “A housing provider
would make a reasonable accommodation for a tenant with mobility impairment by fulfilling the tenant’s request for a reserved parking space in front of the entrance to their unit, even though all parking is unreserved.
“Reasonable modification,” according to HUD, is “a structural modification that is made to allow persons with disabilities the full enjoyment of the housing and related facilities,” usually made at residents’ expense.
HUD’s example: “allowing a person with a disability to install a ramp into a building, lower the entry threshold of a unit, or install grab bars in a bathroom.”
Not pets
Words like “reasonable,” “undue” and “burden” are often defined case by case, but when it comes to service animals, one thing is clear: They’re not pets, so any property owners’ “no pets” policy is irrelevant.
Pet deposits aren’t allowed, but any property damage due to a service animal can be deducted from a security deposit, said Shafeeq Islam, the council’s enforcement and training director.
Someone’s service animal is “an extension of that person,” Islam said.
But, a property manager complained, no rental unit, once animals are allowed in, can be cleaned well enough for a new tenant with allergies.
Demanding new flooring and drywall probably wouldn’t be reasonable, but insisting on deep cleaning, repainting and replacing carpet might
be, said Patrick L. Banis of the Region VI Office of Fair Housing and Equal Opportunity in Fort Worth, Texas.
‘Good faith effort’
Tenants don’t always get what they want. Banis said they can be let out of their leases so they can move, if they ask for something an owner can’t provide — such as an exemption from a dog ban that would violate a local vicious dogs ordinance.
“If it’s not within your power to grant it, you can’t grant it,” he said.
He added, “Good faith effort” comes into play.
Another property manager asked: What if a service animal isn’t covered by an owner’s insurance?
Paying extra for a rider or separate policy might create an undue financial burden, but maybe not, depending on the size of the rental business and its revenue, said Ge’Andra Johnson, council staff attorney and legal program director.
The conference attracted people from across the housing business, not just property owners and managers. It was time, said Stephanie Moffitt-Carr, Enid’s Community Development Block Grant director.
“We are kind of an underserved area here in northwest Oklahoma — it’s an hour and a half, two-hour drive to the Oklahoma City metropolitan area,” she said. “We do have issues of people not knowing the law, and they’ll break the law out of ignorance, not just because they’re being bad people. So if they know the law ... we can minimize things that are happening discriminationwise.”