Andover Housing Authority v. Shkolnik, 443 Mass. 300 (2005)

We make a final observation. The “interactive process” can only work effectively when a housing authority is made aware of a tenant’s physical or mental disability at the earliest opportunity. A housing authority cannot accommodate a disability that it does not know exists. This is especially true where the nature of the disability is not readily apparent on observation. Cf. Petsch-Schmid v. Boston Edison Co., 914 F. Supp. 697, 704 (D. Mass. 1996), aff'd, 108 F.3d 328 (1st Cir. 1997) (“there is no requirement that an employer know the precise nature of an individual’s impairment to be found to have discriminated against her”). A tenant’s request for a reasonable accommodation should inform the landlord that the tenant is a qualified handicapped person, and that the tenant is currently being denied an equal opportunity to use and enjoy a dwelling. Cf. Ocean Spray Cranberries, Inc. v. Massachusetts Comm’n Against Discrimination, 441 Mass. 632, 649 n.21 (2004). Placing the burden on a tenant to acknowledge a disability and the role it may play in a purported lease violation would relieve a housing authority, which may be unable to access adequate information, of that difficult task. The purpose of the administrative process is to enable a public housing authority to resolve lease violations without resorting to summary process. This purpose is frustrated if a tenant is allowed to put forth changing defenses at various *314levels of eviction proceedings (informal settlement conference, grievance hearing, trial, and appellate review). During the administrative process here, the tenants simply denied that there was an ongoing and excessive noise problem. By taking this position, the tenants impeded the authority’s efforts to engage in a full interactive dialogue to ascertain and ultimately accommodate Barskaya’s medical conditions. Having done so, the tenants then attacked the authority at trial for failing to do more. Cf. Portela-Gonzalez v. Secretary of the Navy, 109 F.3d 74, 78 (1st Cir. 1997) (“a party cannot take one position in an underlying administrative proceeding and then disclaim it in a subsequent suit arising out of the agency proceedings”). Tenants’ shifting arguments can be a continual challenge for public housing authorities facing reasonable accommodation requests. The role of a public housing authority is to provide housing for as many qualified tenants as possible. Eviction of those who threaten the well-being of the community is a necessary component of that function. The decision to evict an allegedly handicapped tenant from public housing should be based on consistent and complete information gathered through the interactive process.