# ESA Letter in Garden City, KS: No Checklist, Just the Test

> Kansas never wrote a documentation statute. In southwest Kansas the obstacle is not what the letter must say — it is getting an appointment at all.

- Source: https://supportanimal.com/blog/kansas-emotional-support-animal/garden-city/
- Publisher: Support Animal (supportanimal.com)
- Updated: 2026-09-05
- License note: informational content; not legal or medical advice.

## Key facts

- Population: 27,996
- Households renting: 39.8%
- Typical pet deposit (as a pet): Barred as accommodation
- Typical pet rent (as a pet): $25-$40/mo for pets
- Breed/weight limits common: sometimes
- Pet fees, deposits, and breed limits with a valid ESA letter: none (FHA reasonable accommodation)

## Southwest Kansas's only real rental market

Garden City has 3,956 renting households out of 9,941 occupied homes, 39.8
percent on the 2020–2024 American Community Survey five-year estimate, seven
points above the 32.8 percent Kansas figure and tenth of the state's twenty
largest cities.

Median gross rent is $1,052: only eight dollars under the $1,060 Kansas
median, which is striking for a city three hours from anywhere. Sustained
demand from the region's meatpacking employment keeps it there. The 2024
Census estimate puts the city at 27,996, fourteenth in Kansas and by far the
largest place in the state's southwest quarter.

## Kansas never wrote the checklist

Some states tell a landlord exactly what documentation to accept.

**South Dakota** does. SDCL 43-32-35 requires the documentation to confirm the disability,
confirm the relationship between the disability and the need for the accommodation, and
originate from a licensed health care provider "who does not operate in this state solely to
provide certification for service or assistance animals."

**Alabama** does, with a statutory list of licence types.

**Kansas does not.** There is no documentation statute for housing assistance animals anywhere
in the provisions retrieved for this material. No required contents, no list of who may sign,
no disqualified provider, no form.

What Kansas has is the test itself, in K.S.A. 44-1016(h)(3)(B):

> "a refusal to make reasonable accommodations in rules, policies, practices or services, when
> such accommodations **may be necessary to afford such person equal opportunity to use and
> enjoy** residential real property"

## That cuts both ways

**It removes a hurdle.** No Garden City landlord can point to a Kansas statute and say your
letter fails a statutory requirement, because there is no statutory requirement to fail. The
argument a South Dakota tenant has to have about the source of their documentation does not
arise here.

**It removes a shield.** There is equally no sentence you can point at to prove your letter
qualifies. In South Dakota you can hold up 43-32-35 and show that your clinician satisfies it.
In Kansas nobody is checking a box; they are asking whether the accommodation may be necessary.

So the whole weight falls on what the documentation actually establishes.

## What has to be established

**One: that you are a person with a disability.** K.S.A. 44-1002(j) gives three routes: an
impairment substantially limiting one or more major life activities, a record of such an
impairment, or being regarded as having one.

But K.S.A. 44-1002(k)(2) closes the third: an accommodation "need not be provided to an
individual who meets the definition of disability in K.S.A. 44-1002(j)(3)," which is the
regarded-as route. So it has to be an actual impairment or a record of one: a finding about
you, not about how someone treats you.

**Two: that this accommodation may be necessary** for equal opportunity to use and enjoy the
property.

Both are clinical questions in statutory clothing. Neither is answered by a
certificate.

## Which makes access the real problem here

This is the part a page about Kansas law usually skips, and in Garden City
it is the whole of the difficulty.

Southwest Kansas has very little behavioural health capacity. Garden City
serves an enormous catchment, several counties, many of them without a
practising mental health clinician of any kind. The nearest large clinical
bench is Wichita, roughly three hours east. New-patient waits run into
months when appointments exist at all, and services in Spanish are scarcer
still in a city where a substantial share of households speak it at home.

None of that changes the legal test. K.S.A. 44-1016(h)(3)(B) asks the same
question in Garden City that it asks in Overland Park. What it changes is
how hard the answer is to obtain, and pretending otherwise would be
dishonest about the thing that actually stops people.

## Start with whoever already sees you

If you have a treating relationship of any kind (a family practitioner, a
counsellor, a prescriber, a clinic you attend), that is the strongest and
cheapest route. They can speak to a disability-related need from history
rather than from a single appointment, and it costs nothing beyond the
visit.

The honest frictions: a family practitioner managing medication may not
consider a housing accommodation their assessment to make; some practices
decline to write housing documentation as standing policy; and a clinic
seeing you twice a year may not have the continuity to speak to what the
statute asks about.

Where that route is closed, a licensed evaluation is the same examination
arranged deliberately. A licensed clinician works out whether a disability
is present and whether this animal is connected to it, then either writes
the determination or explains that they cannot. Both endings are real, and
the second one is what makes the first mean anything.

Kansas will not tell you which of those two documents it wants. It will ask
what the document establishes, which comes to the same thing.

## Money, and the limits around it

Charges attached to the animal come off under **K.S.A. 44-1016(h)(2)**, discrimination in "the
terms, conditions or privileges" of a rental because of disability. **K.S.A. 58-2550(a)** caps
the unfurnished deposit at one month's periodic rent, just over a thousand dollars at Garden
City's median, and authorises the additional half-month pet deposit only "if the rental agreement
permits the tenant to keep or maintain pets in the dwelling unit," which an accommodation animal
is not there under.

**K.S.A. 44-1016(h)(7)** leaves a landlord free to refuse where this tenancy would endanger other
people's health or safety, or would do substantial physical harm to their property: a judgment
about the household in front of them, not about a category of animal.

Do not open with **K.S.A. 39-1108**: its extra-charge bar belongs to a "service dog, specially
selected, trained and tested for the purpose."

## Two appointments, not one

Where the wait is the obstacle, the sequence that works is to run the
request and the appointment in parallel rather than end to end.

Make the accommodation request now, in writing, saying that documentation is
being obtained. The refusal (if it comes) is dated from that exchange, and
the six-month window under K.S.A. 44-1005(i) starts running from something
you can prove.

Then keep the appointment. A determination arriving eight weeks later can be
sent as an addition to a request already made, and in the meantime nothing
has been lost. Waiting until the letter is in hand before asking, by
contrast, spends two months of a six-month clock on silence.

## Six months, when the appointment takes three

If you have a treating relationship of any kind (a family practitioner, a
counsellor, a prescriber, a clinic you attend), that is the strongest and
cheapest route. They can speak to a disability-related need from history
rather than from a single appointment, and it costs nothing beyond the
visit.

The honest frictions: a family practitioner managing medication may not
consider a housing accommodation their assessment to make; some practices
decline to write housing documentation as standing policy; and a clinic
seeing you twice a year may not have the continuity to speak to what the
statute asks about.

Where that route is closed, a licensed evaluation is the same examination
arranged deliberately. A licensed clinician works out whether a disability
is present and whether this animal is connected to it, then either writes
the determination or explains that they cannot. Both endings are real, and
the second one is what makes the first mean anything.

Kansas will not tell you which of those two documents it wants. It will ask
what the document establishes, which comes to the same thing.

## What Garden City landlords can and cannot do

**Cannot:**
- May not refuse a reasonable accommodation in rules, policies, practices or services where it may be necessary to afford a person with a disability equal opportunity to use and enjoy residential real property: K.S.A. 44-1016(h)(3)(B).
- May not discriminate because of disability in the terms, conditions or privileges of the rental, or in the services and facilities provided with it: K.S.A. 44-1016(h)(2).
- May not take a security deposit above one month's rent for an unfurnished unit, or 1½ months' where the landlord supplies the furniture, K.S.A. 58-2550(a).

**Can:**
- May take the additional pet deposit of up to half a month's rent only where the rental agreement permits the tenant to keep pets, K.S.A. 58-2550(a). An accommodation animal is not there on permission, so the condition is not satisfied.
- Must return the balance of the deposit within fourteen days of determining charges and no more than thirty days after termination, possession and demand, or face damages of one and a half times the amount wrongfully withheld: K.S.A. 58-2550(b) and (c).
- May refuse where the tenancy would be a direct threat to the health or safety of others or would cause substantial physical damage to the property of others, K.S.A. 44-1016(h)(7). This is an assessment of the individual animal and tenancy, not of a breed.
- May still hold the tenant liable for damage: K.S.A. 39-1108 makes even a trained service dog's handler liable for damage to the premises, and nothing in the accommodation duty says otherwise.
- Is not required to permit modifications at the landlord's expense, K.S.A. 44-1016(h)(3)(A) puts reasonable modifications of existing premises at the cost of the person with the disability.
- Is exempt from the state act only within K.S.A. 44-1018(b): a four-family owner-occupied building, or an owner with an interest in no more than three single family houses renting without a broker. The federal Fair Housing Act runs its own, different exemptions.

## How to get an ESA letter in Garden City

1. **Check that you qualify**, Answer a short screening about how your condition affects daily life in Garden City. No diagnosis paperwork needed up front. (About 5 minutes: free)
2. **Connect with a licensed professional**, You are matched with a provider licensed for Kansas clients who reviews your situation in a telehealth evaluation. (Telehealth evaluation)
3. **Complete your evaluation**, The professional evaluates whether an emotional support animal alleviates symptoms of a condition recognized in the DSM-5. Honest evaluations, not everyone qualifies. (Most of Our Applicants Qualify)
4. **Receive your signed letter**, Your letter arrives on the professional's letterhead with their license number: the documentation Kansas landlords may lawfully request. (Typically within days of approval)
5. **Send it to your landlord**, Submit the letter with a short reasonable-accommodation request. Pet fees, pet deposits, and breed limits no longer apply to your animal in Garden City. (Protection under FHA + state law)

## Conditions that can qualify for an ESA

No fixed government list exists. A licensed professional evaluates whether an animal alleviates symptoms of a DSM-5-recognized condition, commonly:

- Generalized anxiety disorder
- Major depressive disorder
- Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
- Panic disorder
- Social anxiety disorder
- Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)
- Bipolar disorder
- Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)
- Phobias with housing impact
- Chronic stress affecting daily function

## Housing help in Garden City

- [City of Garden City](https://www.garden-city.org/) (city government)
- [Kansas Legal Services](https://www.kansaslegalservices.org/) (legal aid)
- [Kansas Housing Resources Corporation](https://kshousingcorp.org/) (state housing authority)
- [Disability Rights Center of Kansas](https://www.drckansas.org/) (disability rights org)

## Frequently asked questions

### Does Kansas say what my ESA letter has to contain?

No. Kansas has no documentation statute for housing assistance animals. Nothing equivalent to South Dakota's SDCL 43-32-35, which sets what the letter must confirm and which providers are disqualified, or Alabama's list of licence types. What Kansas has is the substantive test in K.S.A. 44-1016(h)(3)(B): whether an accommodation may be necessary to afford equal opportunity to use and enjoy the property.

### Is that better or worse for me?

It removes a hurdle and removes a shield. There is no statutory checklist a Garden City landlord can insist you fail, and equally no sentence you can point at to prove your letter qualifies. The question is what the documentation actually establishes rather than which boxes it ticks.

### Can a landlord ask for documentation at all?

Kansas has no provision expressly authorising the request, as South Dakota's SDCL 43-32-34 does, and none expressly prohibiting it. In practice a landlord considering whether an accommodation may be necessary will ask for something, and the federal Fair Housing Act framework that runs alongside K.S.A. 44-1016 contemplates reliable information where a disability or the need is not obvious.

### What has to be established?

Two things. That you are a person with a disability under K.S.A. 44-1002(j) (an impairment substantially limiting a major life activity, or a record of one), and that the accommodation may be necessary for equal opportunity to use and enjoy the property. Note that K.S.A. 44-1002(k)(2) excludes the third route, being regarded as having an impairment, from generating an accommodation duty.

### Getting an appointment here is hard. Does that change the standard?

No, and pretending otherwise would not help. Southwest Kansas has very little behavioural health capacity and Garden City serves an enormous catchment; the nearest large clinical bench is Wichita, roughly three hours east. That is a genuine access problem and it is why this route fails for people who would otherwise use it, but the legal test is the same as in Overland Park.

### Can a Garden City landlord charge a pet deposit for my animal?

Not for a required accommodation. K.S.A. 44-1016(h)(2) reaches the charge as discrimination in the terms, conditions or privileges of a rental, and K.S.A. 58-2550(a)'s additional half-month pet deposit is conditioned on a rental agreement that permits pets, which an accommodation animal is not there under. The unfurnished cap is one month's rent, just over a thousand dollars at the city's $1,052 median.

### How long do I have to complain?

K.S.A. 44-1005(i) allows six months, run from the act complained of or from the last act of a continuing practice, before the commission K.S.A. 44-1003 creates. Six months is workable against a three-month wait for an appointment, but only if you count from the refusal rather than from the day the documentation finally arrives.

---

Get evaluated by a licensed provider: https://my.supportanimal.com/qualify?sa_source=blog&sa_medium=blog&sa_campaign=esa-guides&sa_content=markdown&ref=blog&sa_term=kansas-emotional-support-animal%2Fgarden-city