Transcript: Using Reasonable Accommodations and Modifications to Avoid Eviction
Presented by Michelle Uzeta, Senior Counsel at Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund
April 21, 2023


>> TINA PINEDO:  Hello, everyone.  Welcome to Using Reasonable Accommodations and Modifications to Avoid Eviction.  My name is Tina.  I am tech support today. And I will review some Zoom accessibility features first. This is a Zoom webinar.  All attendees are muted and cameras are disabled. Today our presenter will not appear on screen.  The slide and an ASL interpreter, Tammy, appear on the screen.  There will be a Q&A at the end of the webinar and also an evaluation form link sent to you all. Live captioning and tech support is available.  Select "show captions" in the Zoom meeting control bar to enable the captions.  And select the "show caption" menu for the full transcript. I am tech support and I'm here for you.  My phone number is 510-225-7726.  You can text or call me if you experience any technical difficulties or chat and use the Q&A to let us know. I will now turn it over to Michelle Uzeta. 


>> MICHELLE UZETA:  Thank you, Tina.  Hi, everyone.  My name is Michelle Uzeta.  I am Senior Counsel at the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund.  DREDF is a national law and policy center focused on disability justice work. We are also a support center for qualified legal services providers in the State of California.  And I want to welcome you to the webinar today, where we're going to be talking about reasonable accommodations and modifications and how they can be used not just to avoid eviction, but to avoid adverse housing actions, generally. I was asked to advise people that MCLE credit has been approved for this presentation, as well as the presentation for the last two weeks.  We were delayed in getting that approval, but certificates will be going out in the next day or so to folks that have attended. I'm also sorry to report that my co-presenter, Naomi Sultan, from Mental Health Advocacy Services notified me about an hour ago that she was unable to participate in today's webinar. Videos for the webinar will be up on the DREDF website as quickly as possible.  We do work on getting captioning and the transcript up to make sure that those videos are fully accessible before posting them, so if you have colleagues or others who could benefit from the presentation, please let them know. Others who haven't been on these webinars previously, a reminder, feel free to use the chat and share information to one another.  I ask that you restrict any posts in the Q&A box to actual questions.  Time permitting, at the end of the presentation I will try to address some of the questions. And then at the end of this presentation, I will send out the materials.  And everybody who is registered and attended will have my contact information.  As we are a support center, you're encouraged to reach out to me if you have any questions involving housing and disability; happy to connect with any of you to brainstorm on cases you're working on or to collaborate on things moving forward. And with that said, I really appreciate everybody spending this lovely Friday, an hour of your time, with us here. Next slide. 


First I'd love for people to use the chat box to just let me know, are you an attorney, an advocate, housing provider, tenant, or other?  Because I would love to know who is in the audience. Today's presentation is going to be broken into three parts.  The first couple of slides are going to provide an overview of the obligation of housing providers to provide reasonable accommodations and reasonable modifications in housing. And then I will be discussing some of the more common issues that tenants face.  And then we'll have a couple of hypos to put things in real-life perspective. Next slide.  


So the Fair Housing Act requires housing providers to make reasonable accommodations and reasonable modifications.  And this slide has the citations to both the statute and the regulations regarding that obligation. Next slide.  


The Fair Employment and Housing Act also contains an affirmative obligation to provide reasonable accommodations and modifications.  And below, at the bottom of this slide is a citation to the California regulations that address those things. And reasonable modifications, the provisions of the regulations on reasonable modifications is new as of a couple years ago. A couple of things before we move on that I should note that apply to both accommodations and modifications, is that they can be requested at any time during a tenancy or even to a prospective tenant.  Even after unlawful detainer proceedings have been initiated, a tenant still has the ability to ask for an accommodation or modification if needed and housing providers must entertain those requests. Accommodations and modifications do not have to be requested in a particular manner or use particular words. A landlord cannot require forms or special procedures.  Although I'll note that oftentimes, it is a good idea to document accommodation requests and accommodations that have been granted.  Because if a management company changes or ownership changes, you want to have some record that there was a request and the request was granted. It's also a good idea to document and date requests, because if you have to go to court or some other enforcement mechanism to have your rights enforced, it's good to have documentation from a self-advocacy standpoint. Another thing I'd note is that landlords like to claim fraud oftentimes when tenants request an accommodation after a lease has been entered into.  This is just a meritless argument. Landlords may prefer that a tenant indicate that they need accommodations on a rental application, but it can't be required. Again, the general rule is you can request accommodations at any time during the tenancy. Next slide. 


A reasonable accommodation is a change in a rule, policy, practice, or service that may be necessary to allow a person with a disability the equal opportunity to use and enjoy a dwelling.  And that definition is consistent across state and federal law. Next slide. 


Some examples of reasonable accommodations include adjusting the rent due date to accommodate receipt of public benefits. Allowing someone to transfer to a quieter unit because noise aggravates their disability. Or waiver of a no pet policy to accommodate a service dog or comfort animal. Next slide. 


A reasonable modification is a physical change to a dwelling or common area. Let's go ahead one slide and then I need to go back. Some examples include ramps, flashing doorbells for someone who is deaf or hard of hearing; grab bars in bathrooms; or even something like sound-proofing. Can you go back one slide, please? Determining who pays really depends on the type of housing.  So, if a reasonable accommodation -- or modification is necessary, and, again, we're talking about physical changes to the environment, if you're in private fair market housing, the obligation to pay generally falls on the tenant, which I know seems horribly unfair, but that's the way the law is set up. In public housing, on the other hand, the cost is the responsibility of the public entity that is providing the accommodation. If you can make an argument that the ADA applies, the Americans with Disabilities Act, then the cost would also be on the housing provider. The ADA covers places of public accommodation and requires that accommodations be made, barriers be removed at the expense of the public accommodation. So how this might work in practice is you often have private nursing home or assisted living facilities, private shelters, private housing linked to an educational institution.  Those would all be considered public accommodations under the ADA.  So you could use the ADA to argue that barriers should be removed at the cost of that housing provider. The other note I have on this slide is that restoration is not always required.  Restoration refers to whether you can require a tenant to remove modifications that have been approved when they move out, meaning make the premises like they were before. It's important to remember that this can only be required to modifications made to an individual's unit.  If an individual made a change to a common area, they don't have to restore that.  So if a curb was cut, for example, to allow somebody to get from their car to their unit on move out, the landlord cannot say I want you to restore the curb. The other thing to remember is that even in in-unit changes, you can only require restoration if it's reasonable to do so.  And here they really look at whether leaving the modifications in place are going to interfere with the next tenant's use and enjoyment of the housing. And another note on reasonable modifications is that if there are modifications made to a common area that the landlord is ordinarily required to maintain, then the landlord would be required to maintain the modification; that would not fall on the tenant. Two slides ahead, please. In order to show that you have a legal right to a reasonable accommodation or modification, you have to show three basic things.  The first is that the accommodation or modification is necessary; the second is that it's reasonable; and the third is that there is a nexus or connection between the disability, the change that you're requesting, and your ability to use and enjoy your housing. Next slide. 


In determining what is reasonable, there is a burden-shifting approach in the Ninth Circuit, which includes California.  So the party requesting the accommodation or modification bears the initial burden of showing that the request is reasonable. Once that showing is made, the burden will shift to the housing provider to disprove reasonableness. The housing provider is required to grant the requested accommodation or modification unless they can prove that the request is not reasonable. Next page. 


So, establishing reasonableness.  You look at is the request reasonable on its face?  Is it something that can be done?  Is it ordinarily or in the run of cases?  Is it a type of an accommodation that people with disabilities often get? So things like waiver of a pet, no pet policy, or installing a ramp, those are types of things that happen all the time.  Those are things that are going to be presumptively reasonable. Next page. 


Disputing reasonableness, there's really only two things that a landlord can point to to dispute reasonableness.  And one first is that it's going to be an undue financial or administration burden -- administrative burden.  Factors that are looked at are the costs, the benefit to the tenant, financial resources of the provider, and the availability of equally-effective, less expensive alternatives. And I would note that some costs or financial burden on the provider is to be expected, even with regard to policy changes. The second weight that a landlord could dispute reasonableness is that the request would constitute a fundamental alteration, meaning does the request alter the essential nature of the operations? This doesn't -- it shouldn't really come up, but an example of this is, you know, a tenant who asks their landlord to drive them to the busstop.  That has nothing to do with housing; that would be a fundamental alteration, it's not something that makes sense and not something that a landlord would have to pay -- or have to provide. I'll note that a landlord does not get to dispute reasonableness just because they would prefer that the tenant utilize a different accommodation or modification.  The basic idea is that people with disabilities know best what accommodation or modification will work for them, so that request should be granted unless the landlord can show that it would be unreasonable. Next page. 


So, what does "necessary" mean?  Well, here's what it means:  Does the provision of the accommodation or modification promote equal opportunity for the individual to use or enjoy his housing?  Or will it enhance the individual's quality of life by lessening the effects of their disability? Next slide. 


Then the third factor is whether you can establish a nexus.  There has to be some connection between the tenant's disability, the requested change or accommodation, and the ability of the tenant to use and enjoy their housing. If a tenant's disability is not obvious or readily apparent, a housing provider may ask for documentation to support the request. A tenant or resident is not required to disclose their specific disability.  They need only disclose enough information to document the disability-related need for the request. So, a landlord cannot ask you for your complete medical records.  And some have done that. Reliable documentation of an individual's disability or need for accommodation or modification can include their own credible statements, statements of family members, social workers, documentation of the receipt of disability benefits. It really depends, it's a case-by-case determination. But a letter from a doctor is not always going to be required.  It's a lot more flexible than that. Next slide. 


This is an example of where there is and is not a nexus, just to make it completely obvious.  A tenant's disability is exacerbated by loud noises and the tenant requests a transfer to a quieter unit and the ability to install sound-proofing.  There's a nexus there between the disability, a request for accommodation and modification, and the use of housing. An example of no nexus is where a tenant's disability is exbaited by loud noise and the tenant requests an accessible parking space.  There doesn't appear to be a relationship between those two things; more information would be required. Next slide.  


So speaking of more information being required, it is advisable under federal law and required under state law that housing providers engage in an interactive process when it comes to accommodation and modification requests. When a housing provider refuses a request of accommodation or modification because it's not reasonable, it's on them to discuss with the requester whether there are alternatives that would effectively address the person's disability-related needs. And individuals with disabilities should be willing to engage in this process also, especially when a landlord is asking for additional information or confirmation of disability when it may not be obvious. Next slide. 


I did want to highlight a couple of cases relevant to people in California on the interactive process under the Federal Fair Housing Act. The first is Howard versus HMK Holdings.  This is a Ninth Circuit case that held there is no stand-alone liability for a failure to engage in an interactive process.  Meaning a tenant cannot sue a landlord solely for failing to engage in an interactive process. However, there is additional case law in California.  One of the cases is cited here, Rodriguez v Morgan, the other is Smith versus Paldril and the interactive process was held to be a relative factor whether a housing provider failed to reasonably accommodate a tenant's disability. So although tenants in California cannot sue solely claiming there was no interactive process, the failure of a landlord to engage in any kind of discussion over a person's disability can be a relevant factor in looking at their reasonable accommodation claim. And then I also note on this slide the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Department of Justice's joint statement on reasonable accommodations and modifications, both of which use the language, you know, "you should" engage in an interactive process. So the interactive process, from the perspective of these federal enforcement agencies, is something that is very encouraged. Next slide. 


Under California law, the regulations that were passed I think effective of 2022 make the interactive process required for folks in housing context. Housing providers must engage with the person requesting the accommodation or their representative.  And the purpose, and this is language taken from the regulation itself, is to exchange information to identify, evaluate, and to implement a reasonable accommodation or modification that allows the individual with a disability equal opportunity to use and enjoy their dwelling or housing. If a housing provider believes that a request cannot be granted, the provider must engage in the interactive process to determine if there is an alternative that is feasible.  And the citation to the regulations is on this slide. Next slide. 


All right.  So now getting onto some more common types of issues that we see come up involving disability in adverse housing actions. Next page. 


The first is hoarding behaviors.  Hoarding that violates health and safety codes is going to be considered a lease violation.  And if hoarding is at a lease violation, it does indicate that there may be a disability involved. Next slide. 


Some of the characteristics of hoarding disorder are persistent difficulty discarding or parting with possessions, regardless of their actual value due to a perceived need to save the items and a distress associated with discarding them. Another is accumulation of possessions that conjest and clutter active living areas and substantially compromises their intended use. Clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning.  And the hoarding is not attributable to another medical condition, for example, a brain injury, or better explained by symptoms of another mental disorder such as obsessive compulsive disorder. Next page. 


If you're dealing with a tenant or a client who has hoarding disorder, there are some things you can consider for accommodating those folks. Accommodations might take the form of a tenant agreeing to modify their behavior or might involve a landlord altering their policy or rules and possibly even absorbing some costs. For example, a housing provider may provide a tenant extra time to clean out their apartment in order to pass a housing or subsidy inspection.  Or may allow extra time to allow a tenant to access and utilize services to address their behavior and the underlying causes of that behavior. Or agreeing to a payment plan that permits the hoarder to catch up on unpaid rent when the hoarder used rent money for his or her hoarding activities. Next slide. 


A case worth noting often cited is Douglas versus Kriegsfeld Corp and this is a case where a landlord tried to evict a tenant because the tenant's ability interfered to upkeep and clean her unit. The tenant sought an accommodation, specifically a stay of eviction so she could utilize social service agencies that could assist her in cleaning up her apartment, bringing it back into compliance with her lease. And the court in that case ruled that the tenant was entitled to such an accommodation, meaning the stay of eviction and kind of a second chance to comply with lease terms. Next slide. 


If you're trying to develop an accommodation plan for someone with hoarding disorder and you're working with a landlord, it's really important to develop both a short and long-term plan.  Imminent threats to health and safety must be dealt with as quickly as possible.  Any outstanding rent, damage to property, or issues like that should be addressed as quickly as possible. And then you have to have a long-term plan to make sure that the lease violations don't reoccur and that the conditions don't reoccur.  So things like ongoing therapy or ongoing support. And then it's important to note that accommodations may not be required if there's repeat violations and prior attempts to accommodate prove unsuccessful.  So if you're working with someone who has been given an accommodation plan, you know, five times over the last three years and the conditions just reoccur or they discontinue treatment prematurely, it's going to get harder and harder as you move along in arguing that an accommodation is appropriate, because, again, it has to be reasonable and necessary.  And if you've tried multiple times and failed, it's no longer going to be considered reasonable or necessary for the landlord to continue to accommodate. Next slide. 


It's also important to keep people's behaviors in perspective.  Folks are allowed to live in their homes and apartments and to fill them with their belongings.  Other people may consider some of those belongings garbage when, to them, it's a treasure, right?  One person's trash is another person's treasure. So it's important to think and to consider on a case-by-case basis are lease terms being followed?  Are city ordinances being complied with?  And are there actual risks of safety and harm rather than a landlord trying to dictate someone's housekeeping habits. Next slide. 


Minimum safety guidelines to consider:  Is there a working toilet and sink?  Are there adequate walking paths in rooms that are used on a regular basis?  Is there a safe walkway?  Or is the flooring cluttered?  Is there any infestation of insects or rodents?  Is there excessive accumulation of garbage? Are there fire hazards?  Are there things stacked on the radiators or the stoves?  Are there issues with the gas?  Are there overloadings of outlets?  Those are all things that need to be looked at on a case-by-case basis. Next slide. 


Now moving on to just general non-compliance with lease terms. Next slide. 


Sometimes disability-related behaviors may create a nuisance or make others uncomfortable.  They may even rise to the level of a lease violation.  For example, these are examples from cases that I have had:  Tenants who talk to themselves or engage in self-stimming behaviors or yell or have night terrors. Those may be a nuisance.  They may make others uncomfortable, but oftentimes they're not rising to the level of a lease violation and noticing -- you have to make sure that there isn't some kind of bias going on when people are being noticed for those types of issues or behaviors at their property. In the event there is a breach of a lease term, you want to initiate an accommodation request and begin an interactive process immediately with your client. Next slide. 


If you're requesting accommodation or a modification to cure an alleged lease violation, you want to be able to show, again, that there's a link between the non-compliance and the tenant's disability.  And that the accommodation or modification requested will allow the tenant to obtain compliance and remain compliance with the lease terms.  Meaning is it necessary. And that the accommodation or modification is reasonable. If the request is denied, it will provide an affirmative defense if there is later an eviction filed. Next slide. 


There is a direct threat exception to both federal and state law.  These laws do not protect or require accommodation of a tenant whose tenancy would constitute a direct threat or health or safety of other individuals or whose tenancy would result in substantial physical damage to the property or others.  And the citations for both of federal law and state law are contained on this slide. Next slide. 


Your assessing a direct threat is an objective, not subjective analysis, and the assessment required considers the nature of the risk, duration of the risk, the severity of risk or injury, the probability that injury will occur. A housing provider must also determine whether there is an accommodation that could eliminate or lessen the direct threat before taking adverse action. Next slide. 


And I have two examples of direct threat cases to just illustrate those points.  In Boston Housing Authority versus Bridgewater, there was an eviction of a public housing tenant who had physically assaulted another tenant.  The eviction was overturned due to the Housing Authority's failure to make an individualized assessment as to whether the danger or the threat would continue. In that particular case, there was evidence that post-incident treatment had eliminated the problematic behavior for the tenant who had mental health disabilities that had caused that behavior. Next slide. 


In City-wide Associates versus Penfield, the landlord attempted to evict a tenant whose mental disability caused her to engage in property damage.  The tenant damaged walls because she had been hearing voices. The tenant requested the landlord delay eviction to allow her time to avail herself of counseling programs and to demonstrate that interventions would minimize the risk of her engaging in further property damage. In that case, the court ruled in favor of the tenant to allow for reasonable accommodations to consider that time.  The court ruled the cost of damage and lack of evidence that property damage affected other tenants in finding that allowing her time to avail herself of counseling programs was not going to be harm to anyone. Next slide. 


Moving onto assistance animals.  I added a couple of slides on assistance animals, because in my experience, the presence of animals in housing is a frequent cause of adverse housing actions, including eviction. And it's mostly because people are unsure how to request accommodation.  Sometimes they think they don't need to or they just will sneak in animals, not understanding that they have a right to accommodations.  So they don't ask, they just sneak in their annals that they need and they hope for the best (Correction: Animals that they need and they hope for the best). Next page.  


So under both federal and state law, people with disabilities have the right to reside with service animals and emotional support animals.  And the rights in housing are broader than rights in other settings. For example, the Americans with Disabilities Act only allows people to go in places of public accommodations, like stores and restaurants with service animals.  Emotional support animals are not allowed in those settings. But in housing, yes, you can have emotional support annals.  And it doesn't have to be just dogs.  Cats count; other domestic animals count. Next slide.  


A service animal is an animal afforded an individual and equal opportunity to use and enjoy a dwelling or to participate in a housing service or program. It's an animal that has been individually trained to perform work or tasks for a person related to their disability. An emotional support animal is any dog or other common domestic animal that helps an individual with managing their psychiatric disabilities, alleviating the systems of those disabilities by providing therapeutic comfort and support. And then a pet is just a domesticated animal kept for pleasure or companionship. Next page. When you're looking at service animal issues, it's important to remember a couple of things.  The first is that there's no restrictions on who may train the animal.  Animals can be self-trained, both support -- I mean service animals may be self-trained.  Support animals, the comfort they provide is just kind of natural, so there's no training at all required for them. There's no requirement that there be any kind of special training, any kind of special certification or licensing as a support animal.  Those types of things don't exist.  I know there are a lot of companies online that say they will certify a support animal or an emotional support animal and those kind of documents don't have any legal weight. Special tags, certifications not required.  And also there's no species or size limitations.  So if a landlord comes back to you and says I would be happy to allow a service dog, but not a Pit Bull, you can't just have a blanket ban. You may be able to ban a particular animal, if that particular animal causes property damage or a threat to others.  But you would have to go through that direct threat analysis and individualized case-by-case analysis to figure out if that is the case. Next slide. 


Another issue I wanted to touch on was economic accommodations.  An economic accommodation is a change in a rule, policy, practice, or service that's necessary to overcome disability-caused economic barriers to tenancy. And Tina, can you jump ahead to slide 41?  Thank you. Some examples of economic accommodations might be waiving income requirements for move-in; allowing a co-signer on a lease; altering rent due dates to accommodate someone's receipt of public benefits; overlooking somebody's lack of a credit history; allowing somebody to pay their security deposit in installments; or allowing a tenant to break a lease early as an accommodation without any kind of financial plenty. Can you go back to slide 39? A couple of key cases on this topic:  Giebeler versus M&B Associates.  This is a case that involved a tenant with disabilities who requested a co-signer as an accommodation.  An exception to the housing provider's no co-signer policy was necessary to afford the prospective tenant equal opportunity to rent the dwelling. And in that case, because the housing provider declined such a waiver, the court found in favor of Mr. Giebeler and found that the accommodation need not stem directly from a disability, but may adjust for the practical impact of a disability. And here the practical impact of the disability was that Mr. Giebeler did not have a job that allowed him the income to be able to qualify for the housing on his own. Again, this is an oft-cited case, if you have not read it, you should read it. Next slide. 


The next case is McGary versus City of Portland, also a Ninth Circuit case.  In this case, the tenant requested additional time to clean up his yard in order to discharge a nuisance citation.  The city rejected the request, saying that the tenant could just pay the city to do the cleanup. And then the city went ahead and did the cleanup and billed the tenant.  And the tenant sued, alleging discrimination. And in that case, the District Court held that the city's imposition of a financial burden did not deny the tenant use of his home or prohibit him from living there. And the tenant appealed and the Ninth Circuit reversed that District Court's decision, recognizing that exceptions to neutral policies may be mandated where a tenant's disability related need for a policy modification is essentially financial in nature. So there is some basis for financial accommodations in some instances. Okay.  Jump ahead to the hypotheticals.  One more.  Thanks. Okay.  So, let me just get through the hypotheticals, and it looks like we will have plenty of time for a couple of questions. The first hypothetical:  And I would ask that -- there are -- there is a question after I read the hypothetical and if you want to just jot down your thoughts in the chat, that would be appreciated. First hypothetical is for Taylor.  Taylor has mental health disabilities.  Six months after moving into a no-pet apartment complex, Taylor's treating psychologist recommended that she get an emotional support dog. Taylor contacts the management company and asks if it's possible for her to have an emotional support dog.  Management tells Taylor that her lease is for a no-pet rental.  So although they could not approve her for her request to have a dog, they will allow her to break her lease without penalty as a reasonable accommodation. Has the management company violated the law? Next slide. 


Here are your choices:  No, they have not violated the law, because Taylor is in the middle of her lease and the building is a no-pets building. B, no, because they offer Taylor her ability to break her lease as a reasonable accommodation. C, yes, management should have allowed Taylor to have an emotional support dog as an accommodation. Or D, A and B. Well, everybody is just getting this one right.  The answer is C.  The request to modify a no-pets rule is a reasonable accommodation.  It's a very common accommodation that's granted; it's in the run of cases, as they would say. This request is reasonable, necessary, and has a nexus.  Taylor has mental health disabilities.  Her landlord or her treating psychologist recommended she get the emotional support dog.  The emotional support dog is going to help her be able to use and enjoy her housing. Another point brought out in this hypothetical is accommodations can be requested at any time.  It doesn't matter that she was already in the middle of her lease. And although allowing somebody to break a lease early is also a type of accommodation that may be right in some circumstances, for example someone gets into a car accident and becomes newly disabled and uses a compare but they're on a second floor apartment, it may be an accommodation in that circumstance to allow the person to break their existing lease to move to another apartment complex where they're on the ground floor.  That would be perfectly reasonable. But here this is not what Taylor requested and what she requested is reasonable, and so the landlord cannot dictate a different accommodation without showing what she is requesting can't be done. Next slide. 


Trevor.  Trevor is a veteran with post-traumatic stress disorder who experiences night terrors.  Trevor recently moved into a federally subsidized apartment for veterans where walls are very thin.  Trevor's bedroom wall is shared with a neighboring unit.  Trevor's neighbor has complained that Trevor's night terrors, which occur multiple times a week.  The on-site manager warned Trevor that he will lose his housing if he does not get his night terrors under control. Trevor contacts you for help.  What can you help him with? Next page.  


The transfer to a different unit or building.  Reconfiguration of Trevor's unit.  Soundproofing the walls.  All of the above.  Or only A or B because Trevor can probably not afford to soundproof the walls.  Okay.  It seems like the vast majority of people said D.  So let's turn to the next slide. 


The answer is D, all of the above. This is a situation where a reasonable accommodation or a reasonable modification may work in resolving the issue, or even both. The transfer to another unit would be an accommodation that might be granted.  Sound-proofing is a reasonable modification that might be granted. Reconfiguring the unit is, I would think, more of an accommodation, unless there needed to be some actual, physical changes to the unit. So all of those things are things that could be done. E, nobody said E was the answer, but E is not the answer because as this is, you know, public housing, federally subsidized housing, the cost of any physical modifications can be shifted to the housing provider. And then another note here, although individuals with disabilities are generally acknowledged to know what accommodation will work best for them, the decision of what accommodation to pursue in this particular case probably would be best determined through an interactive process. Just because it is a subsidized housing complex and there's various ways that the issue could be resolved, and you want to have people coming together to determine what the best solution is. Next page. 


Trina. Trina is a wheelchair user and has a hoarding disorder.  Trina lives in a one-bedroom apartment in a building owned by Agnes.  Agnes stopped by Trina's unit and noticed that Trina has high stacks of magazines and newspaperses lined up along the walls of her hallway. Agnes serves Trina with a three day notice requiring her to clean up her apartment or face eviction.  Trina asks Agnes for additional time to clean her apartment.  She refuses and telling Trina to get it done because of health reasons.  Has Trina violated any housing law? Next page.  


No, because she hasn't violated fair housing law because having clutter in your hallway is a safety issue and lease violation and must be addressed immediately. B, there's no violation because Trina never asked to engage in an interactive process and never asked for a reasonable accommodation. C, yes, because Trina asked for more time to clean her unit. And D is A and B. And E -- [chuckles] -- I don't know why there's an E there, I'm working with someone else's hypotoday. So let's see what folks thoughts are. V?  There's no V, Hunter!  [Laughs]. Yes, the answer is C.  Turn the page. Okay.  So a couple of things to note here. Having clutter block your hallway may be a lease violation here. Minimum safety guidelines require safe and clear walkways and walking paths within rooms.  But here the hypodoesn't say.  It says there's high stacks of magazines and newspaperses in the hallway, with he don't know how wide the hallway is in her home. If you were an advocate working with her, you would want to get more information on what exactly the problem is.  And oftentimes you won't get that unless you go to the person's unit yourself. Another note:  Additional time is, you know, well within the scope of accommodations that are available to people with hoarding behaviors.  And it may -- it may be here that the additional time is an accommodation for Trina's physical disability.  The hypo noted she was someone who also uses a wheelchair and that's a disability, which is obvious. So the fact that her disability is obvious and she requested additional time should be enough to trigger an interactive process from Agnes, the housing provider, because a tenant does not have to use special words or phrases to ask for an accommodation or to initiate an interactive process.  As a wheelchair user, Trina's disability should be evident. And this is true whether or not Agnes also understood that she had a hoarding disorder. All right.  Um... I thought I had -- next slide. Tina, next slide. 


Oh, this last page here or second to the last page, I think, has some resources that are really helpful when you're representing clients with disabilities who may have accommodation or modification needs. The first is HUD and DOJ's joint statement on reasonable accommodations. The second is the joint statement on reasonable modifications. Both of those publications are extremely helpful.  They are very easy to understand.  They're citable in briefs. I will put -- yes, we can put those links in the chat. They are in question/answer format.  So really easy to understand for people with, you know, people who are in the community, people who are advocates, attorneys, it doesn't matter; they're pretty easy to understand. The third resource is the notice on service animals and assistance animals for people with disabilities in housing and HUD-funded programs.  This is a relativity new publication, but goes into a lot of detail about how requests for assistance animals should be processed, including quite a bit on the kind of documentation that a provider can ask for to support a request for assistance animals. Because that is something that comes up a lot where landlords just want way too much information that they're not entitled to. And then there's also a fact sheet on HUD's assistance animal notice, and that's there as well.  That's the end of the presentation. Can you go to the next page, Tina? 


This is my contact information if you need it. I'm going to answer the questions that have been posted in the Q&A.  Tina, while I do that, is there a way you could take the links from the resources page and drop them in the chat? Again, though, everybody, I'll send the materials around so you'll have those links as well when you get that later this afternoon. 


>> TINA PINEDO:  Yes, I'm going to stop sharing the slides and do that in the chat while you read the Q&A.


>> MICHELLE UZETA:  Okay.  We have a couple of questions, both on service animals.  The first is:  I had a landlord say my service animal needed to be evaluated before they allowed it on the property.  Is that something I have to agree to? My answer would be no.  There's no need for that.  I don't know... I don't know if you want to say more about why they thought that was an appropriate question? Landlords can't ask people to have their service animals demonstrate the tasks that they perform.  They have no right to evaluate the dog.  That suggests to me that they want to see what the breed and size of it is before they will agree to it, and that's something that they can't consider. Um... There's also a question about could Taylor get the dog and then ask for reasonable accommodation?  Yes, yes.  And people do this often.  It's not advisable that you just go out and get your service animal and then move it in and then ask for the accommodation, because it just ends up causing drama between you and your landlord. And if you want to maintain a good relationship, you probably don't want to do that. I would say if I was advising somebody who was in the middle of a lease and acquired the need for an assistance animal, I would tell them to contact the landlord to let them know, hey, my doctor, my medical professional, whoever, prescribed a service animal for me due to my disability and I'm just letting you know that this is an accommodation I need. And then if the landlord says no, seek out some guidance or provide to them information about your rights and advocate for yourself. Because it just -- it does cause bad feelings if you just move in an animal and don't tell your landlord; they're going to accuse you of breaching your leave.  They may initiate you de-proceedings and you may have to come up from a space of defending yourself rather than asserting your rights, where if you were just open from the beginning. And somebody said they asked this question last session in a mixed building where tenants are both HUD tax credit units and market rates, do the same laws apply? It depends.  I mean, receipt of tax credit itself doesn't make housing public housing, at least as far as I know, last I researched. But if it's HUD housing, like a subsidized building that's operated by a housing authority or by HUD, that would be -- that would fall under kind of a public housing analysis. If there also happened to be market-rate units in that building that are rented, you know, to people individually, not subsidized housing, then I would assume you would do the analysis for private housing, meaning if you have an accommodation or a modification request, rather, that the obligation to pay is going to fall on the tenant. But that's an interesting -- I don't -- I have to say honestly, I don't receive a lot of calls regarding people who are in housing that has such a mix, so I'm just telling you what my gut reaction would be; that definitely should not be perceived [chuckles] as solid legal advice, because I haven't looked into that. But that would be my initial take, without looking into it further. Are there any other questions? Oh, I see there's questions in the chat, so I'm going to look at those real quick. Do you have resources for our members that want to obtain low cost/no cost emotional support service animals?  Um... yeah, that's a tough one. I know that in different counties there are different resources for those types of things.  I don't have a resource list myself. Again, emotional support animals shouldn't require anything more than just going to your local shelter and picking up an animal.  'Cause the support that they provide is something that is inherent for animals to provide, which is, you know, nuzelling and licking and spending time with you, that type of thing, to alleviate feelings that are alleviated. For a service animal, that's a little tougher, because, right, to qualify as a service animal, the dog has to be individually -- the dog or -- it's usually a dog -- has to be individually trained to do work or tasks that are related to your disability. So things like pulling your wheelchair, opening doors, you know, barking to let somebody know that a doorbell has been rang or reminding you that medications are needed, picking up items. Those types of things do require training.  Not professional training, but it does require training.  So if you have the ability to train your own animal, then you should be able to do that. But, you know, that's about that. So, I know people, especially -- I work with a lot of veterans who have disabilities.  There's a lot of resources out there for veterans to get dogs trained.  There's people that will train the dogs to do the tasks that are commonly needed by veterans related to, like, post-traumatic stress disorder and physical disabilities related to combat service. I'm not sure about resources for other folks.  But any kind of dog trainer that can train the dog to pick up items, if that's your need, that should be pretty easy to do.  For other types of dogs, maybe not so much. I know some people have dogs who can help them identify when their sugar is too high and things like that.  That is something that requires more intense training and, I'm sorry, I just don't have the resources for that. Jillian Foster, so the law that you're talking about, that actually is not accurate, that does not apply in California, if I'm -- if we're thinking of the same rules. There was a law passed recently, and it was -- I went over it in my last training, but I don't remember the name of the bill off the top of my head, but it does have these requirements for what somebody who is selling emotional support animals or, you know, you have to have some kind of relationship, you have to have some kind of documentation, you have to give some particular types of notice.  Yes, that does not apply in the housing context, AB-468, so, yes, don't even worry about that , that does not apply, that does not apply to the housing context. And if you go on the Civil Rights Department website formerly known as CDH, you can look at that and that bill just does apply to housing at all. And this will be the last question, because we're right up on time:  Can you shift the financial cost of around $400 for a non-permanent modification in private housing to a very large apartment -- I mean... okay.  So private housing, the cost of a reasonable modification falls on the tenant, right.  That said, I have had people engage in an interactive process with their housing provider. And with success.  To say listen, I'm low income, I can't afford this accommodation that I need or this modification that I need, can you please help me pay for it? And sometimes the housing apartment complex has said sure, we'll go ahead and pay for that or they say how about splitting the cost? I had one housing provider help link their tenant up with a local resource to help pay for a ramp that they needed outside. So, even though the cost falls on tenants in private housing, that doesn't preclude you from going to the landlord and say hey, let's share the cost of this, it's only fair. Especially if it's things in the common area that might increase access for other tenants or for future tenants.  A landlord might have motivation to go ahead and help you get that done. All right.  So, we're right up at 1:00 o'clock.  I will send the materials back out again.  I will also send the link to that Civil Rights Department fact sheet on that bill that was asked about, because -- I know where it is, it will be easy for me to pull up. And, again, I encourage people to reach out to me if you have any other questions.


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