Emotional Support Animals Explained
Emotional support animals (ESAs) are a classification of animals that have been found to assist individuals who may be suffering from debilitating mental or emotional conditions. Such animals are sometimes referred to as "comfort animals" or "therapy animals." Unlike service animals who are trained to specifically perform work or tasks for those with disabilities, ESAs play a different role entirely.
ESAs provide therapeutic and medicinal support with the idea of improving an individual’s well-being. Aside from the presence of the animal, a therapist or other mental health professional must deem the animal necessary for the individual’s mental health, as documented in writing. Because they are not considered service animals, ESAs are not legally permitted to accompany their owners to public places where service animals are allowed to go . However, under the Fair Housing Act and the Fair Housing Amendments Act, ESAs can be required as a reasonable accommodation in the housing context for individuals who have a disability under the definition above and a disability-related need for the accommodation. Whether the specific need for the ESA is a mental health issue or a physical issue does not matter. The request for reasonable accommodation is usually just a matter of proving the presence of a disability and an associated need for the animal. In this way, the law is similar to the Americans with Disabilities Act and service animals; individual circumstances or what condition may be wrong generally are not probed deeper.
Protections Afforded to ESAs by Federal Law
The FHA is a federal law designed to prevent discrimination in housing based on disability and is intended to ensure equal opportunity for individuals with disabilities when it comes to living in a rental apartment, condominium, or other similar residence. Under the FHA, landlords must make reasonable accommodations for tenants with emotional support animals and must permit ESAs to accompany tenants with a disability.
The FHA also includes rules for landlords to follow when it comes to emotional support animal rental laws. These rules outline the following:
Emotional Support Animal and Restrictions
While the FHA does contain protections for people with disabilities to have service animals in their rental units, there are some restrictions that landlords can enforce.
The worst thing you can do with an ESA rental situation, is to violate the protections and restrictions of the FHA. There are no federal restrictions when it comes to the size, breed, or weight of an ESA. Landlords cannot prevent an ESA from living in the unit based on these things alone.
In addition, the FHA also prohibits landlords from forcing their tenants with a disability to pay additional fees and/or other charges to have their emotional support dog or emotional support cat in the home. Emotional support animal rental laws apply to both rental units that are owned by a private individual as well as apartment complexes that are rented through an apartment management company.
Utah’s Rental Laws that Affect ESAs
The rental property laws in Utah do not allow _______ to deny reasonable accommodation of emotional support animals as defined by state law. The Fair Housing Act, ADA, and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act all cover emotional support and service animals within Utah. This means that an ESA in Utah must work, provide assistance, perform tasks, or services for persons with disabilities. Under these Utah Fair Housing laws, an ESA or emotional support bird cannot be charged any fees or pet deposits. Throughout Utah, reasonable accommodations must be met for an ESA even if you have specific rules about additional pets like dogs, cats, reptile, birds, or others. The law goes on to say that under Utah state housing law, any housing provider has a duty to provide a reasonable accommodation when required. This means allowing service and emotional support animals. As stated by the Utah Division of Human Rights, "Utah Law requires that housing accommodations be granted assistants of persons with disabilities. The law defines ‘assistant’ to include but is not limited to a seeing-eye or hearing dog, service dog, guide dog, emotional support animal, seizure alert animal, and other like assistance animal provided the accommodation is necessary to compensate for an individual’s disability."
Text for Landlords Regarding ESAs
Utah law prohibits discrimination in housing on the basis of disability. This includes not only physical disabilities but also mental or emotional disabilities. For this reason, landlords in Utah cannot treat a tenant who has an ESA any differently than they would treat a tenant who is disabled but does not have an animal.
This also falls under the federal Fair Housing Act, which also prohibits discrimination in rental housing on the basis of disability. Per the Eight Circuit Court of Appeals in 2013, "under federal law, an emotional assistance animal qualifies as a service animal, regardless of whether it is specifically trained to perform a task for an individual with a disability." It is also quoted that when it comes to housing, "the FHAA (Fair Housing Amendments Act) eliminates "no pet" rules and other blanket restrictions for a person with disabilities who has docile service animals that meet those needs."
That said, if a landlord has a no pets policy and prohibits ESAs, the landlord must accept an ESA if it can be reasonably accommodated under the reasonable accommodation requirements in federal and state law. Reasonable accommodations require an interactive process between the landlord and the tenant to determine if ESAs can be accommodated. In addition, landlords may deny a request for reasonable accommodation based on the following criteria:
- Failure to pay rent and utilities
- Mistreatment of property
- Communication issues
- Health issues of roommates
- Threats of harm to the physical health of others
- Threats of substantial damages to property that is not otherwise part of the lease
- Landlord/pet waiver requests being declined
One of the best ways to determine if an ESA can be reasonably accommodated in Utah is to have the tenant fill out an Emotional Support Animal Request for Reasonable Accommodation form. This will help determine their need for the ESA and if their ESA can potentially cause problems for the community.
Tenant Rights and Responsibilities
Emotion Support Animals have certain rights under Utah law. These rights are in addition to the federally protected rights of Americans with disabilities. Utah Fair Housing law provides protections to people with emotional support animals, just as it provides protections to those with physical disabilities. As such, tenants cannot be discriminated against based on their disabilities, and required to pay additional deposit fees for their emotional support pets. In addition, Utah requires all animals to be licensed , and emotional support animals are subject to the same limitations in the pet policy as other animals such as cats and dogs. Utah Statute 18-16-304(1) establishes that a person with an emotional support animal that has been prescribed by a doctor must be permitted in any dwelling including common areas of the property. A request for reasonable accommodation must be made in writing to the housing provider who may request verification from a health care provider. The housing provider may also limit the size of the emotional support animal based on safety, hazards, noise and other requirements just like they would require of a tenant with an animal under the normal pet policy. Just as with the animal health certificate that is required for all animals under Utah Code 18-1-6(3), an emotional support animal must also have a current health certificate issued by a veterinarian.
Possible Issues and How to Resolve Conflicts
One of the most common conflicts between landlords and tenants regarding ESAs arise over the validity of the doctor’s note. The tenants claim they or their doctor have an "emotional support animal letter." The landlord responds by refusing to accept that letter due to some type of shortcoming. These disputes can be harmful to both the landlord and tenant. It is recommended that a thorough discussion and review of the situation be presented to the tenant prior to the granting or denial of the request for an ESA. The tenant may have important information that could help you further evaluate the request.
Another common dispute between landlords and tenants involves property damage caused by the ESA. There are many scenarios where an owner can allege that their property is being further degraded by the presence of the ESA. If the tenant is responsible for damage, it is important to know that you cannot charge the tenant for wear and tear. The reasonable normal use of the property should not be assessed.
The most common conflict between landlords and tenants occurs after a tenant has been given a space but the ESA is more of a nuisance than of a benefit to other tenants. Tenants allowing their ESA to bark all night, breaking items in units, and refusing to cooperate with management will be a consistent source of conflict. State law in all jurisdictions do allow for service animals to be excluded in certain circumstances. Your house rules should prohibit unnecessary disruption of neighbors. It is important to have documentation of most complaints against tenants. This will build a strong case for removal of the tenant or even denial of their application at lease renewal. The documentation a landlord should keep on the ESA would be 1) a written request for reasonable accommodation, 2) medical documentation, 3) Landlord/Manager notes of ESA behavior issues, 4) notes on discussions with the tenant, 5) copies of email with the tenant, etc.
Becoming ESA Certified in Utah
Getting an emotional support dog in Utah requires a prescription from a certified mental healthcare professional. Utah law does not specify residency requirements for individuals to qualify for an ESA—a doctor across the border in Idaho, for example, can issue you an ESA letter so long as he or she is a licensed mental healthcare provider in Utah.
Many other states have passed more specific ESA laws that go beyond the federal definition of ESAs. They also frequently have residency requirements, stipulating that only licensed mental healthcare providers in that state can write ESA prescriptions. In Utah, however, the law does not prevent an out-of-state mental healthcare provider from writing an ESA prescription.
Regardless of whether your prescriber is from Utah or a bordering state, it’s important to evaluate them in order to ensure they meet the minimum requirements. In addition to being licensed mental healthcare professionals, healthcare providers writing ESA letters must have a documented history of treating or observing you and your disability. This means that a healthcare provider who meets only one of these criteria is unlikely to be able to issue a valid ESA letter:
Don’t be fooled by unregulated sources of ESA letters, such as online services. Federal law prohibits landlords from discriminating against tenants with disabilities and restricts them from asking for extra documentation. In practice, though, too many landlords continue to require ESA letters as part of the process for renting to disabled individuals. In order to qualify for these letters, some online services offer hand-written ESA letters that do not satisfy the above requirements. These so-called ESA letters do not hold up in court and are therefore not used by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) or other government agencies.
Although your healthcare provider is a vital component of your journey to obtaining an emotional support animal, there are other important steps that you must take to qualify for an ESA. First, you will want to present with detailed documentation of your disability. This documentation could take the form of an email, letter, or file from a previous healthcare provider, or it could be a formal diagnosis. Your provider will then need to determine whether an ESA would work as an appropriate accommodation to help you manage your disability or illness. If so, you will receive a letter detailing your need for an ESA.
Once you have obtained your ESA letter, you should follow up with your landlord’s human resources department or property management office in order to receive further instructions on how to complete the approval process. Many landlords will ask for supplemental documentation that isn’t covered under federal law, and while you don’t have to comply with all of their requests, it’s often recommended that you substitute relevant ESA letter clauses in place of this additional documentation in order to avoid denying your ESA request.
Recent ESA Law Developments
We mentioned in the overview, some recent changes and updates to the ESA RV law. Another big shift in the last 5 years is the introduction of the Utah Antidiscrimination and Labor Commission. This organization only recently obtained authority to investigate claims and enforce the Fair Housing Act on a local level. A version of the law was already passed at the Federal level, but for many years the commission lacked the ability to investigate such claims or enforce penalties against landlords that violate ESA laws . Utah tenants can now reach out to the Utah Antidiscrimination and Labor Commission (UALD) and will have a local representative to investigate their claims. If the claim is viable, the UALD could even assist in obtaining a temporary restraining order to allow the Utah tenant and their ESA to remain in their rental for the foreseeable future based on the outcome of an investigation. For this reason, you can expect to see more landlords facing local penalties for not complying with emotional support animal laws in Utah, following the trends in places like California and New York.