08/21/2026
There are new federal policies on Emotional Support Animals. Here are sections from the federal memorandum. If you want the whole thing with footnotes, message us and I will be glad to provide a copy.
New Enforcement Standard and Prioritization
"In a recent Fair Housing Act case, a federal court rejected a person’s reasonable accommodation claim regarding her emotional support animal.
When the plaintiff invoked FHEO’s January 28, 2020, guidance in support for her position, the Court found simply: “HUD’s Notice is unpersuasive.”
"In the absence of HUD regulations defining animal-related reasonable
accommodations, the regulations for service animals under Titles II and III of the ADA are instructive. Under the ADA, a service animal “is individually trained to do work or perform tasks for the benefit of an individual with a disability, including a physical, sensory, psychiatric, intellectual, or other mental disability.”
"To be a service animal, the tasks performed by the animal “must be directly related” to the disability. Common examples of disability-related tasks include “assisting individuals who are blind or have low vision with navigation,” “alerting individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing to the presence of people or sounds,” “assisting an individual during a seizure,” “retrieving items,” “providing physical support and assistance with balance and stability,” and “helping persons with psychiatric and neurological disabilities. But “the provision of emotional support, well-being, comfort, or companionship do not constitute work or tasks for the purposes of this definition.”
"Going forward, FHEO will use the training component of the ADA’s definition for service animals to assess animal-related reasonable accommodation complaints under the Fair Housing Act.30 30 Unlike Titles II and III of the ADA, an animal-related reasonable accommodation under the Fair
Housing Act could involve a species other than a dog, provided the animal is trained to perform a disability-related service.
Applying similar reasonable accommodation standards
between the Fair Housing Act and Titles II and III of the ADA will provide improved clarity and predictability for tenants and housing providers alike. As a corollary, defining an assistance animal as an animal trained to assist with a disability is the best guarantee of evenhanded enforcement of the Fair Housing Act.
In light of these standards, FHEO will find reasonable cause for failure to provide a reasonable accommodation involving the waiver of a pet policy only where the animal has been individually trained to perform work or perform tasks directly related to the complainant’s disability.
While requests to waive pet policies for animals trained to perform specific disability related services are presumptively reasonable, requests to waive pet policies for untrained ESAs are not. FHEO no longer expects housing providers to categorically extend accommodations for trained assistance animals to untrained ESAs. By prioritizing the most meritorious cases involving trained assistance animals, FHEO can responsibly utilize its enforcement discretion consistent with the best reading of the law."
