Articles — legislation

In 2018, Kentucky joined a growing list of states that have passed laws addressing fraudulent conduct by tenants and others attempting to get an Assistance Animal. KRS 383.085 makes it a criminal offense for any person to knowingly provide false information or documents in an attempt to get an Assistance Animal in housing. Check out this post to find out the details on Kentucky's version of the law.

On October 13, 2017, the Lexington Herald-Leader ran a front-page article that was nothing more than a hit piece against Lexington's private rental industry. The article's purpose, other than perpetuating a false narrative against landlords, was to promote a report released by the Lexington Fair Housing Council titled Locked Out: Foreclosure, Eviction and Housing Instability in Lexington, 2005-2016. You can read the report in its entirety here. You'll likely be appalled at the report's tone that landlords are the problem and at its suggestion that landlords profit from evictions and exploit the eviction process for personal gain. In short, the...

In my very first post on this site, found here, I wrote about Kentucky’s then-current law on liability for landlords for dog-bites on their rental property. The law at that time centered around a 2012 case, Benningfield v. Zinsmeister, in which the Kentucky Supreme Court interpreted the state’s dog-bite statutes in such a way as to hold landlords liable for injuries caused by certain dogs on their rental property if the dog causes damage on the property or within immediate physical reach of the property. I’m glad to finally get to provide an update on that law: it’s changed. Landlords are...

On March 30, 2017, the Kentucky General Assembly passed House Bill 309, a bill creating new rights, obligations, and protections for landlords and tenants affected by incidents of domestic violence. Similar bills had been filed in previous years, but had never been brought to a vote. This year, the bill passed both houses of the legislature easily and, on April 11, 2017, was signed into law by Governor Bevin. The new law, which will be found in KRS Chapter 383, will take effect this week on June 29, 2017. It will drastically change the way many landlords do business, so...

Dog Bite and DV Bill Update, Part II from Stephen Marshall on Vimeo.