The City of Dallas is hauling several landlords and an affordable-housing nonprofit into court, accusing them of discriminatory practices and long-running maintenance failures that tenants say left their apartments unsafe. The lawsuit’s name Zahir Properties, which operates Courthouse Apartments, Mid-America Apartments’ MAA Meridian, KPM Property Management and the Texas Workforce Housing Foundation. City attorneys say the complaints describe denied reasonable-accommodation requests and repeated failures to correct hazardous defects.
According to WFAA, one tenant, Ja’shaelyn Carmichael, received a nonrenewal notice in April 2022 and later had part of her security deposit withheld. The filings also allege that Mid-America denied a reasonable-accommodation request for an emotional-support animal and instead required a $500 pet deposit plus $20 a month in pet rent. City lawyers say they are seeking civil remedies that could reach up to $200,000 in each case, based on the documents.
Nonprofit ties and past scrutiny
The Texas Workforce Housing Foundation bills itself on its website as an affordable-housing nonprofit and highlights its work creating workforce units in North Texas. TWHF’s involvement in local properties has drawn municipal attention before. Reporting shows the foundation was named in a 2024 Mesquite lawsuit over dangerous conditions at Tradewind Apartments, and both The Dallas Morning News and a local Hoodline item previously detailed that litigation and the complex’s code-violation history.
Tenants’ accounts in the filings
In one case highlighted by WFAA, tenant Jacobe Newton says he endured a broken refrigerator, an unsecured front door and a ceiling defect that allowed water to leak into his apartment. Newton’s May 2023 request to move to a first-floor unit as an accommodation was allegedly denied.
The complaint also states that MAA Meridian required tenant Taylor Monroe to pay a $500 pet deposit and $20 in monthly pet rent before approving an emotional-support animal. Property managers then allegedly rejected Monroe’s accommodation request because the therapist who completed the paperwork was affiliated with U.S. Services Animals…