Establishes it shall be unlawful for a person to have his or her application to rent or lease a residence to be denied due to prior housing court proceedings

Summary of specific provisions

Section one of the bill states the underlying legislative findings: that some landlords discriminate against some prospective tenants based on prior landlord-tenant litigation or based on tenant screening reports that are used to blacklist some tenants.

Section 2 of the bill adds a new section 235-h to the Real Property Law ("RPL"). New RPL section 235-h(1) defines the following terms: housing accommodation, tenant screening report, person, and consumer reporting agency. New RPL section 235-h(2) makes it an unlawful practice to refuse to rent residential units based on information obtained from tenant screening reports or based on prior landlord-tenant litigation, or facts derived from such litigation, unless the tenant had a warrant of eviction issued against him or her and did not voluntarily enter into an agreement that would allow the warrant of eviction to be issued. New RPL section 235-h(3) allows aggrieved tenants to sue for injunctive relief, damages, costs and fees.

Section 3 establishes that this act shall take effect immediately.

The changes made in the A-print do not change the overall purpose of the bill. They were suggested by tenant advocates familiar with housing court practice and procedure so that the bill will more effectively accomplish its purpose of protecting tenants from discrimination.

Justification

Landlords typically review prospective tenants' background in order to evaluate their desirability as tenants. In addition to credit history and income, landlords also examine court history. In fact, an entire industry, comprised of so-called tenant screening bureaus or tenant screening companies, has been created in order to provide landlords with information on tenants, and these companies often provide a tenant's court history. Unfortunately, these companies are not necessarily thorough, and they do not always include the outcome of a tenant's court case. Tenants who have appeared in court cases relating to landlord-tenant disputes, and who might have won their cases or settled out of court, still find their applications for new housing rejected, simply based on their prior appearances in court.

This bill would make it unlawful for landlords to consider a tenant's history in court cases that arise from landlord-tenant disputes, unless that tenant was evicted against his or her will. This would ensure that appearance in court in and of itself would not prevent a tenant from obtaining new housing. Lawyers involved in housing court cases report that there are 375,000 housing court cases a year in New York State, and only 25,000 result in warrants of eviction. That means that there are potentially 350,000 residents of New York State who are suffering because the law does not prevent landlords from discriminating against them. The bill would continue to permit the use of prior litigation history that resulted in a contested (i.e., non-consented to) eviction, following a court ruling in favor of a petitioner-landlord, thus allowing legitimate use of a relatively small number of cases, while preventing discrimination based on cases that did not have such a result.

Additionally, this bill would eliminate a threat that landlords can use against their tenants. Currently, tenants who may wish to sue their landlord - over a failure to deliver services, harassment, or any other number of reasons - may be unwise to do so, simply because their involvement in housing court can be used adversely against them in the future. Similarly, landlords who wish to exercise control over their tenants can threaten to sue to evict them, knowing full well that even if they lose the case, they have caused irreparable harm to the tenants' ability to find new housing. Tenants should not feel that they are unable to exercise their rights by appearing in court, and landlords should not be able to manipulate the judicial system to intimidate their tenants. This bill would prevent both of these phenomena, and would also allow tenants who have appeared in court, but have not been evicted against their will, from suffering unreasonable hardship.

Fiscal implications

None.

Legislative history

2009/2010: S.3856B/A.3243A

Effective date

This act shall take effect immediately.