A Cranberry Township-based property management company agreed to settle two federal lawsuits filed over how the company handles requests for allowing support animals to live with tenants who have disabilities.

Perry Homes Inc. consented to an agreement that resolves both cases involving rental properties the company owns and manages in Cranberry, Harmony and Zelienople. Both cases were filed in U.S. District Court in Pittsburgh alleging violations of the Fair Housing Act of 1988.

In the consent order that was signed Dec. 27, Perry Homes does not admit to any violations of the law; agreed to pay $30,000 to the parties that initiated the complaints; and received approval to verify that requests for support or assistance animals come from qualified health care professionals.

The U.S. Attorney’s office and Justice Department agreed to allow the company to require health care providers recommending support animals for tenants to complete forms confirming that they are qualified to diagnose a tenant’s disabilities and need for a support animal, said attorney Richard Hunt, of Garland, Texas, who represented Perry Homes.

“The main thing is approval of the forms requiring health care providers to verify that they have the training and experience that qualifies them to diagnose a disability, and the training and experience with support animals,” Hunt said.

Health care providers also have to complete forms confirming that they do not issue letters verifying the need for support animals based on online diagnoses, and are not affiliated with internet-based companies that provide those verification letters, he said.

Hunt said there are a “flood of verification letters available on the internet” that people can receive after completing 15-minute questionnaires, he said.

The first suit was filed against Perry Homes, Robert Whittington and Allyson Whittington in July 2021. The Whittingtons own one of the rental properties, and Perry Homes is their agent for that property. Robert Whittington is a majority shareholder and owner of Perry Homes. The suit is based on a housing discrimination complaint the Southwestern Pennsylvania Legal Services, a nonprofit legal aid organization, filed with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development in August 2019.

SPLS conducted a series of discrimination tests between October 2018 and February 2019, calling Perry Homes and asking whether the company would waive its no-pet policy for emotional support animals at its properties. The company refused five requests to allow emotional support animals on its properties on five occasions during that time period, according to the suit.

The second suit was filed against Perry Homes in April 2022 based on housing discrimination that three tenants filed with HUD in 2020. A boyfriend who lived with one of the tenants was added to the complaint in 2021.

In one of those cases, a woman and her boyfriend, who moved into a Perry Homes apartment on Fieldgate Drive in Cranberry Township in 2018, submitted an email in April 2020 requesting an accommodation to the no pets policy to allow them to have an assistance dog to help her cope with stress associated with her mental health condition.

Part of an attached letter from the licensed professional counselor who was treating her read: “In order to help alleviate these difficulties and to enhance her ability to live independently and to fully use and enjoy the dwelling unit you own/and/or administer, I am advocating that she reside with an emotional support animal.”

Part of Perry Homes’ response read: “We will grant reasonable accommodation for your animal to be with you in the leasehold when you are living independently. When you are not living independently, the animal is not permitted,” according to the suit.

Her boyfriend responded, saying Perry Homes misunderstood the therapist’s reference to his girlfriend’s ability to live “independently,” and that such term meant living life with greater autonomy, not living alone.

The pair moved out in May 2020 with four months remaining on their lease because of the denial for an accommodation, according to the suit.

In October 2020, a month after moving into a Perry Homes apartment on Concord Way in Cranberry Township, a man and a woman asked for permission to keep an emotional support cat for the woman who has a mental health impairment. A nurse practitioner who was treating the woman sent a letter to Perry Homes saying the cat would help her, according to the suit. Perry Homes refused the request.

In the consent order, Perry Homes agreed not to refuse to rent, discriminate against or make reasonable accommodations to people because of their disabilities. The company also agreed to, and did, create a reasonable accommodation policy for support animals, according to the order.

Perry Homes also paid $15,000 to SPLS, $12,000 to the tenants in the first case and $3,000 to the woman in the second case. She also was allowed to have the cat she requested.