| Entities | |
| Topics and Issues |
The Uniform Law Commission formed a study committee in 2021, the Tenant Information in Rental Decisions Committee. “This committee will study the need for and feasibility of a uniform or model law addressing landlords’ use of tenant screening reports in rental decisions. These reports may give landlords outdated, inaccurate, or incomplete information about a prospective tenant’s involvement in prior litigation. In particular, the committee will focus on identifying how widespread any problems may be and whether an act should be directed primarily at commercial providers of screening reports.”
Roster
- Committee Roster (Oct. 14, 2021)
Committee Documents
- Memo (May 14, 2021)
- Issues memo (May 29, 2021)
- Meeting agenda (June 30, 2021)
- Meeting agenda (Oct. 14, 2021)
- Housing Case Record Sealing and Expungement by Esme Carmello, committee reporter (Oct. 14, 2021)
- Record Sealing Slides (Oct. 14, 2021)
- Agenda (Feb. 17, 2022)
- Memo (Feb. 17, 2022)
- Memo (June 7, 2022)
- Agenda (Jan. 9, 2023)
- Memo (Jan. 5, 2023)
- CDIA letter to the ULC Scope and Program Committee (Jan. 31, 2023)
Other Resources
- Esme Caramello & Nora Mahlberg, The Misuse of MassCourts as a Free Tenant Screening Device, 59 Bos. B.J. 15 (2015).
- Esme Caramello & Nora Mahlberg, Combating Tenant Blacklisting Based on Housing Court Records, 2017 Clearinghouse REV. 1 (2017).
- Report to the ABA House of Delegates from the Standing Committee on Legal Aid and Indigent Defense, the Commission on Domestic and Sexual Violence, the Commission on Homelessness and Poverty, the Section on Civil Rights and Social Justice.
Authorities raised by committee members and observers
- A Nevada law on sealing. Ch. 121 (2021) (A.B. 141 (2021)) by Assemblyman Watts. Under NRS Sec. 40.2545, “[i]f a court grants an action for summary eviction pursuant to NRS 40.253 during the COVID-19 emergency, the court shall automatically seal the eviction case court file.”
- Evicted for Life from the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute (MLRI). Hepburn, Peter, Renee Louis, and Matthew Desmond, Racial and Gender Disparities among Evicted Americans, Sociological Science 7: 649-662, 2020.
- Opening the Door: Tenant Screening and Selection from the Housing Justice Center which examined “the methods and systems used by landlords to screen and select tenants.”
- In January 2023, CDIA sent a letter to the ULC’s Committee on Scope and Program urging it to not appoint a drafting committee for tenant information for rental decisions.
ULC Resources:
- New Project Criteria, the criteria and procedures in proposing or considering uniform and model acts for the ULC and its committees.
- ULC Uniform Personal Data Protection Act, adopted 2020.
- ULC Criminal Records Accuracy Act, adopted 2018.
- ULC Tenant Information in Rental Decisions Committee, began work in 2021.
- ULC Redaction of Personal Information from Public Records Committee, began work in 2022.
- ULC criteria for model laws.
- The role of a ULC study committee.
- Robert A. Stein, To Form a More Perfect Union: A History of the Uniform Law Commission, 2013 by Matthew Bender/LexisNexis.
CDIA Resources: