Cent. Hous. Assocs., LP v. Olson, A17-1286

• Decision Date: 09 April 2018
• Docket Number: A17-1286
• Citation: 910 N.W.2d 485
• Parties: CENTRAL HOUSING ASSOCIATES, LP, Appellant, v. Aaron OLSON, Respondent.
• Court: Minnesota Court of Appeals

910 N.W.2d 485

CENTRAL HOUSING ASSOCIATES, LP, Appellant,

v.Aaron OLSON, Respondent.

A17-1286

Court of Appeals of Minnesota.

Filed April 9, 2018

Christopher T. Kalla, Douglass E. Turner, Hanbery & Turner, P.A., Minneapolis, Minnesota (for appellant)

Samuel Spaid, Paul Birnberg, HOME Line, Minneapolis, Minnesota (for respondent)

Considered and decided by Peterson, Presiding Judge; Worke, Judge; and Ross, Judge.

OPINION

ROSS, Judge

Landlord Central Housing Associates LP notified tenant Aaron Olson that it was terminating his apartment lease on multiple grounds, including unpaid rent, unpaid utilities, and providing false information in his lease application. Olson refused to vacate and instead filed a report with the Minnesota Department of Human Rights alleging that Central Housing had discriminated against him on account of his disability, his daughter’s ethnicity, and his daughter’s religion. Central Housing filed an eviction complaint with the district court after Olson held over after the lease period ended. A jury found that Olson materially breached the lease but also that Central Housing retaliated against him for attempting to secure or enforce his rights. The district court reasoned that Olson was entitled to maintain possession based on a retaliatory-eviction defense available under Minnesota Statutes, section 504B.285, subdivision 2 (2016), and section 504B.441 (2016). Because that defense in section 504B.285 does not apply in an eviction action based on breach of lease, and the defense in section 504B.441 does not apply unless the tenant has filed a tenant-remedies action in the district court, we reverse and remand.

FACTS

Aaron Olson entered a one-year apartment lease with Central Housing Associates LP beginning May 1, 2016. On January 20, 2017, Central Housing gave Olson written notice that it was terminating his lease on February 28. The termination notice cited breaches of multiple lease terms, asserting that Olson had submitted false information in his lease application, repeatedly failed to timely meet his payment obligations under the lease, shared the unit with a personal-care attendant whose criminal record disqualifies her from residing there, and tolerated disruptive behavior. A month after receiving the notice, but before the termination date, Olson filed a report with the Minnesota Department of Human Rights, alleging that Central Housing discriminated against him. His allegations emphasized that he has a disability and that his daughter is a Muslim who wears a hijab. He alleged that Central Housing began occasionally notifying him about lease infractions only after he wrote Central Housing an email complaining that a maintenance worker verbally harassed his daughter.

Olson refused to vacate the property, and, after the lease period ended, Central Housing filed a holdover eviction action in district court. A jury trial followed.

The district court’s draft jury instructions and special-verdict form invited a finding regarding landlord discrimination and landlord retaliation as a defense to eviction. The district court omitted the discrimination-defense references after Central Housing argued that the defense cannot apply here, but Central Housing did not object to the retaliation-defense references. The jury found that Central Housing proved that "Olson materially violated the terms of the lease." But it also found that Central Housing "retaliated against [Olson] in whole or in part as a penalty for his good faith attempt to secure or enforce rights under the lease or the laws of the State of Minnesota or the United States."

After trial, Central Housing argued that the jury’s retaliation finding is legally irrelevant because the retaliation defense does not prevent an eviction premised on breach-of-lease allegations. The district court rejected the argument as a matter of procedure, concluding that Central Housing had waived it by failing to raise it sooner, and as a matter of law, concluding that the defense applies to an eviction action even when it is premised on breach-of-lease allegations.

Central Housing appeals.

ISSUE

Did the district court properly apply the jury’s retaliation finding to grant possession to the tenant rather than the landlord in this breach-of-lease eviction action?

ANALYSIS

Central Housing argues that the district court misapplied the law when it relied on the jury’s retaliation finding to deny Central Housing possession after its eviction action. We review a district court’s application of the law de novo. Harlow v. State, Dep’t of Human Servs. , 883 N.W.2d 561, 568 (Minn. 2016). Central Housing also argues that the district court improperly instructed the jury on the retaliatory-eviction defense. If Central Housing is correct that the district court cannot, as a matter of law, rely on retaliation to prevent landlord repossession in an eviction action premised on a breach of lease, we need not reach Central Housing’s jury-instruction argument. We therefore first answer whether the retaliatory-eviction defense applies here.

The district court did not fully explain why it concluded that the retaliation defense was available to defeat Central Housing’s eviction action. The district court’s order quotes Minnesota Statutes, sections 504B.285 and 504B.441, notes the policies underlying the defenses, and concludes, "It is reasonable for the Legislature to have enacted a statutory scheme that provides a safe harbor mechanism for tenants." Before we analyze de novo each statute to address whether it allows a retaliation defense to prevent an eviction in this case, we emphasize that eviction actions are intended to be summary proceedings to efficiently adjudicate only a single issue—the present right to evict and to recover possession of real property. Minn. Stat. § 504B.001, subd. 4 (2016). "Defendants may, however, raise defenses and counterclaims that fit within the limited scope of an eviction proceeding." Deutsche Bank Nat. Tr. Co. v. Hanson , 841 N.W.2d 161, 164 (Minn. App. 2014). The legislature has provided statutory defenses for specific circumstances, and these include the defense at issue here—the retaliation defense.

Retaliation Defense under Section 504B.285, Subdivision 2

Central Housing contends that the retaliatory-eviction defense was not available to Olson under section 504B.285 because the eviction action was premised on breach of the lease. We essentially answered this argument in Cloverdale Foods of Minn. v. Pioneer Snacks , 580 N.W.2d 46 (Minn. App. 1998), interpreting nearly identical language in an earlier version of the statute. Compare Minn. Stat. § 566.03 (1996), with Minn. Stat. § 504B.285 (2016). The question before us in Cloverdale was whether the retaliatory-eviction defense under Minnesota Statutes section 566.03, subdivision 2, "only applies when a tenancy is terminated by a notice to quit" or if it also could be asserted when a tenancy was "terminated based on a breach of the lease." Cloverdale , 580 N.W.2d at 51. We reasoned that subdivision 1 of the statute "expressly distinguishes between a tenancy that is terminated based on a breach of the lease and a tenancy that is terminated by a notice to quit." Id. We observed that the retaliatory-eviction defense, by its express terms, applies "to an action for recovery of premises following the alleged termination of a tenancy by notice to quit." Id. (quoting Minn. Stat. § 566.03, subd. 2 ). And we concluded that, because the landlord brought the eviction action under the breach-of-lease provision rather than the notice-to-quit provision, "the retaliatory eviction defense does not apply." Id.

Despite slight differences in the statutory language, the same reasoning applies here. The retaliation-defense provision of section 504B.285 states, "It is a defense to an action for recovery of premises following the alleged termination of a tenancy by notice to quit for the defendant to prove" that the landlord’s termination effort arose from specified, improper retaliatory motives. Minn. Stat. § 504B.285, subd. 2. Central Housing brought its holdover eviction action under section 504B.285, subdivision 1(a)(2), which provides, "The person entitled to the premises may recover possession by eviction when ... any person holds over real property after termination of the time for which it is ... leased to that person ..., contrary to the conditions or covenants of the lease...." It did not bring the eviction action under a different holdover provision— section 504B.285, subdivision 1(a)(3) —which addresses the right to remove a "tenant at will" who is holding over after the landlord issued a "notice to quit" the tenancy. See Minn. Stat. § 504B.285, subd. 1(a)(3). Nor could this be construed as an action to remove a tenant at will as the record does not suggest that Olson is such a tenant. Because the retaliatory-eviction defense applies only to a "termination of a tenancy [at will] by notice to quit," the defense does not apply to this action.

Olson argues that the term "notice to quit" includes a "notice to terminate." The argument disregards the practical and legal differences between removing a person who has occupancy rights under an ongoing tenancy at will and a person who has held over after his lease period has expired or who is being removed for otherwise breaching the terms of the lease. The answer we gave in Cloverdale defeats Olson’s contention.

We add that reading the retaliation provision in subdivision 2 to apply to evictions based on termination for a breach of lease would disregard a common maxim in statutory construction. Whenever possible, we will not interpret a statute in a manner that fails "to give effect to all of its provisions" so as to render any "word, phrase, or sentence ... superfluous, void, or insignificant." See Am. Family Ins. Grp. v. Schroedl , 616 N.W.2d 273, 277 (Minn. 2000) (quotation omitted). Construing the retaliation provision in subdivision 2 to apply to evictions based on breach of...