# ESA Letter in Manhattan, KS: The Dog in the Statute

> K.S.A. 39-1108 bans an extra charge in housing — for a dog specially trained to pull a wheelchair. Kansas's most rented city, and the wrong section.

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

## Key facts

- Population: 54,700
- Households renting: 56.5%
- Typical pet deposit (as a pet): Barred as accommodation
- Typical pet rent (as a pet): $25-$50/mo for pets
- Breed/weight limits common: yes
- Pet fees, deposits, and breed limits with a valid ESA letter: none (FHA reasonable accommodation)

## The highest renter share in Kansas, by a tenth of a point

Manhattan has 12,584 renting households out of 22,266 occupied homes, **56.5
percent** on the 2020–2024 American Community Survey five-year estimate,
nearly twenty-four points above the 32.8 percent state figure.

Lawrence is 56.4 percent. One-tenth of a percentage point behind, with
23,198 renting households, nearly twice Manhattan's. So Manhattan leads on
share and Lawrence leads on number, and this page states it that way rather
than rounding either into a superlative it does not hold.

Median gross rent is $1,003, fifty-seven dollars under the $1,060 Kansas
median. The 2024 Census estimate puts the city at 54,700, ninth in Kansas,
with Kansas State University and Fort Riley next door both pulling on the
same rental stock.

## The section a Manhattan search finds

Type the obvious question into a search engine and Kansas hands you K.S.A.
39-1108, which appears to be precisely what you need:

> "Every person with a disability shall have the right to be accompanied by a **service dog,
> specially selected, trained and tested for the purpose** which shall include, but not be
> limited to, **pulling a wheelchair, opening doors and picking up objects**, in or upon any
> of the places listed in K.S.A. 39-1101 … **in the acquisition and use of rental, residential
> housing** and in the purchase and use of residential housing **without being required to pay
> an extra charge** for the service dog. Such person shall be liable for any damage done to
> the premises by such dog."

Every element you were looking for is in that sentence. Housing, expressly.
No extra charge, expressly. A person with a disability, expressly.

And it is not yours.

## Three qualifiers, and you need all three

**A dog.** The section says dog, not animal.

**Specially selected, trained and tested for the purpose.** Three separate verbs, all about
deliberate preparation by someone for a task.

**The purpose is physical work.** "Pulling a wheelchair, opening doors and picking up
objects." The phrase "but not be limited to" opens the list, but it opens a list of *that
kind of thing*, tasks a dog performs.

An emotional support animal helps by being present. That is a real thing and
it is not selection, training and testing for a task.

The two companion sections are drawn the same way. **K.S.A. 39-1102** gives the identical
housing right to a **guide dog** used by a "legally blind person." **K.S.A. 39-1107** gives it
to a **hearing assistance dog** used by a person "deaf or hard of hearing." Three sections,
three trained dogs, one article.

## Why quoting it costs you

Manhattan's rental market is dominated by operators who lease hundreds of
beds every August and have been asked about assistance animals many times.

A tenant who opens with 39-1108 gets a correct answer (the animal is not
specially trained and tested for a task), and has now spent their first
exchange being wrong about the law. The next argument, which would have
worked, arrives from a weaker position.

This is the same structural trap Montana sets with MCA 49-4-214(2), which bars "extra
compensation" for a service animal while MCA 49-4-203(2) says the term "does not include an
emotional support animal." Montana excludes the ESA by name; Kansas excludes it by
description. Both leave the tenant needing a different section.

## The different section

**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"

No animal. No dog. No training. No task. A no-pets clause is a rule; the accommodation is an
exception to it. **42 U.S.C. § 3604(f)(3)(B)** stands behind it in the same words.

## And the charges

Without 39-1108 there is no express fee bar to quote, so the charge comes off two ways.

**K.S.A. 44-1016(h)(2)** — discrimination in "the terms, conditions or privileges" of a rental
because of disability. A charge attached to an animal you are required to have is a term
applied because of the disability.

**K.S.A. 58-2550(a)** — the additional half-month pet deposit is available "if the rental
agreement permits the tenant to keep or maintain pets in the dwelling unit." An accommodation
animal is not there on the agreement's permission, so the condition is not satisfied. That is a
textual argument and no Kansas case applying it was retrieved for this page; (h)(2) is the
reliable route.

## Training, once and clearly

No training is required for a housing accommodation in Kansas. The only
Kansas provisions that demand training are 39-1102, 39-1107 and 39-1108, and
those govern a different right.

The corollary is worth saying too: training does not by itself win a
44-1016(h)(3)(B) request. The subsection asks whether the accommodation may
be necessary for equal opportunity to use and enjoy the home, and that
question is about you rather than about the animal's résumé.

## The clock on a nine-month lease

K.S.A. 44-1005(i) gives six months, counted from the act of discrimination
or from the last act of a continuing practice, before the commission that
K.S.A. 44-1003 establishes.

On an academic lease that arithmetic matters. A refusal in September is
still live in March. A refusal in April expires in October, when a K-State
student may be somewhere else entirely. Date the request and date the
refusal, in writing, at the time.

## Two sentences that replace the wrong citation

If 39-1108 has already been quoted, by you or at you, the recovery is short.

Say that the section covers a dog specially selected, trained and tested for
physical tasks, that it is not the provision your request rests on, and that
the request is a reasonable accommodation under K.S.A. 44-1016(h)(3)(B) and
42 U.S.C. § 3604(f)(3)(B).

Conceding a wrong citation quickly costs less than defending it. In a market
where the same operators handle hundreds of August move-ins, the tenant who
corrects themselves is treated better than the one who argues about a
section everybody in the office has already read.

**And keep the correction short.** One sentence withdrawing a wrong citation, one sentence supplying
the right one. Explaining at length why the first section looked applicable invites a discussion
about the first section, which is the discussion you are trying to leave.

## What the request has to rest on

Start with a clinician you already see. If your care runs through the
university's services and that is a genuine clinical relationship, it is the
strongest and cheapest route, though campus services run on semester
waitlists, are built for short-course counselling rather than for writing
disability determinations, and a clinician who has seen you twice may
reasonably decline to make a finding. Off campus, Riley County's private
capacity is thin and shared with Fort Riley's catchment.

With both of those shut, a licensed evaluation covers the same ground on
purpose. Someone licensed works out whether a disability exists, works out
whether this animal answers it, and then either signs the determination or
says plainly that they will not.

Kansas wrote a fee bar for a dog that opens doors. What it gave you instead
is a question about whether an accommodation may be necessary, and the only
thing that answers it is somebody who examined you.

## What Manhattan 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 Manhattan

1. **Check that you qualify**, Answer a short screening about how your condition affects daily life in Manhattan. 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 Manhattan. (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 Manhattan

- [City of Manhattan](https://www.manhattanks.gov/) (city government)
- [Riley County](https://www.rileycountyks.gov/) (county government)
- [Kansas Legal Services](https://www.kansaslegalservices.org/) (legal aid)
- [Disability Rights Center of Kansas](https://www.drckansas.org/) (disability rights org)

## Frequently asked questions

### Kansas law says an assistance dog cannot be charged extra in housing. Why does that not apply to me?

Because of the qualifiers on the animal. K.S.A. 39-1108 covers a "service dog, specially selected, trained and tested for the purpose which shall include, but not be limited to, pulling a wheelchair, opening doors and picking up objects." It must be a dog; it must be specially selected, trained and tested; and the purposes illustrated are physical tasks. An emotional support animal satisfies none of those, so the section's freedom from an extra charge does not reach it.

### Are there other Kansas sections like that?

Two, drawn just as narrowly. K.S.A. 39-1102 gives the same housing right to a guide dog used by a legally blind person, and K.S.A. 39-1107 to a hearing assistance dog used by a person who is deaf or hard of hearing. All three sit in the same article and all three are about specially trained dogs.

### So what do I cite instead in Manhattan?

K.S.A. 44-1016(h)(3)(B), which makes discrimination include "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," together with 42 U.S.C. § 3604(f)(3)(B). Neither mentions an animal or requires training.

### And how do the charges come off without 39-1108?

Through K.S.A. 44-1016(h)(2), which makes it unlawful to discriminate in the terms, conditions or privileges of a rental because of disability. Separately, the additional pet deposit K.S.A. 58-2550(a) authorises applies only "if the rental agreement permits the tenant to keep or maintain pets in the dwelling unit", and an accommodation animal is not there on permission.

### Does my animal need any training in Kansas?

Not for a housing accommodation. Training is what K.S.A. 39-1108 requires of a service dog, and that section governs a different right. K.S.A. 44-1016(h)(3)(B) asks only whether an accommodation in rules, policies, practices or services may be necessary to give you equal opportunity to use and enjoy the property. An untrained animal can satisfy that, and a trained one does not automatically satisfy it either.

### Does Manhattan really have the highest renter share in Kansas?

Yes, by a tenth of a point. Manhattan is 56.5 percent and Lawrence is 56.4 percent on the 2020-2024 estimates. Lawrence has 23,198 renting households to Manhattan's 12,584, so Lawrence is the larger market by far, and the correct way to state it is that Manhattan leads on share while Lawrence leads on number.

### How long do I have on a nine-month lease?

Six months, counted under K.S.A. 44-1005(i) from the act of discrimination or from the last act of a continuing practice, before the commission K.S.A. 44-1003 establishes. On an academic lease that arithmetic decides things: a refusal in September is still live in March, while one in April has run by October, so date the request and the refusal in writing when they happen.

---

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%2Fmanhattan