The Arizona Attorney General’s Office (AGO) obtained a consent decree with defendants Brentwood Southern, LLC d/b/a Brentwood Southern Manufactured Home Community and Kingsley Management Corporation (Defendants) to resolve a disability-based fair housing lawsuit involving a woman and her poodle.
This lawsuit was brought by the AGO’s Civil Rights Division to adjudicate an unlawful housing practice for the aggrieved party, Shelley Graves. Under the AFHA, it is unlawful to deny a person the housing of their choosing because of their disability. It is also illegal to refuse reasonable accommodations to someone with a disability if that accommodation is necessary to provide the person with an equal opportunity to enjoy the housing.
Ms. Graves had an assistance animal, a poodle named Chase. On April 29, 2019, Ms. Graves attempted to buy a mobile home and lease the underlying land in the “no pet zone” of Brentwood Southern Manufactured Home Community in Mesa, Arizona. The state alleged that the defendants denied Ms. Graves’ housing when their agent refused to rent her land because of her disability-related assistance animal.
The AGO investigated this matter, filed a lawsuit, and pursued a consent decree to ensure that people in a similar situation have an equal opportunity to use and enjoy the housing of their choice.
Under the terms of the consent decree, the defendants are required to pay monetary damages of $35,000 to Ms. Graves and, in light of the egregious conduct before and during litigation, a $20,000 civil penalty to the state.
The defendants also are required to:
- Create and maintain policies that prohibit discrimination based on disability, race, color, religion, sex, familial status, and national origin; which state all units are available for sale, lease, or rental, as applicable, on a nondiscriminatory basis.
- Create and maintain a reasonable accommodation policy that requires Defendants to (1) provide reasonable accommodations for any applicants, tenants, and residents who have a disability as defined by the AFHA; (2) provide a specific procedure through which an applicant or tenant may request a reasonable accommodation or modification orally or in writing; (3) review all reasonable accommodation requests and provide a written response to requesting individuals within fourteen days.
- Create and maintain a supplemental employment policy that requires all agents and employees who have duties with respect to the sale, leasing, or rental of housing at Brentwood Southern Manufactured Home Community to provide a complete copy of the reasonable accommodation policy to any and all applicants and residents; and provides for disciplinary action if an employee fails to give the reasonable accommodation policy to an applicant or resident or fails to notify the defendants of a request for a reasonable accommodation.
- Create policies and provide robust fair housing training to prevent this from happening again.