No blanket criminal-record denials; individual review
Boston Fair Chance Tenant Selection PolicyCity law
Covered housing providers must not impose a blanket policy denying housing to anyone with arrests or convictions and must consider applicants case by case.
Answers the question “What can they check about me?”
The source
… SELECTION POLICY Under this policy, housing providers agree to the following: Housing providers receiving Department of Neighborhood Development (DND) funding and/or land, or that have income restricted units created under the Boston Planning and Development Agency (BPDA) Inclusionary Development Policy will not impose a blanket policy that denies housing to anyone with arrests and or convictions. Housing providers will consider applicants on a case-by-case basis. 1. The Developer/Agent (Agent) agrees to not consider any of the following categories when determining housing eligibility and or considering eviction: a) Arrests that did not result in conviction. This includes dismissed charges, diversion programs, and similar non-convictions. b) Convictions that are…
- Official law
- Not in our sources. Only a secondary link: news or law-firm page
- Document
- D010, retrieved Oct 1, 2026
- Dates
- In force since Nov 6, 2020
- Status on Oct 1, 2026
- In force
What it depends on
- Covers
- Applies to housing providers receiving DND funding and/or land, or with income-restricted units created under the BPDA Inclusionary Development Policy.
- What you can do next
- Read the source we have (news or law-firm page)
Audit trail
The model reads the law; code decides who it covers. The line between them stays visible.
Extracted by the model
What the model read from the source text, checked by code (the quote must appear word for word).
- Category
- Screening
- Requirement
- Covered housing providers must not impose a blanket policy denying housing to anyone with arrests or convictions and must consider applicants case by case.
- Key value
- none
- Effect
- protection_or_duty
- Quote found in source
- yes
- Confidence
- 90%
reasoning boundary
Decided by code
Deterministic: same rules, facts and date give the same answer.
- Jurisdiction: listed only for addresses whose state or legal city is MA-BOSTON.
- Dates: in force from 2020-11-06; before that, not yet in force.
- Coverage: tested against whether the building is subsidised; a missing fact gives "unknown", never a guess.
As of Oct 1, 2026Engine run
Sources retrieved Oct 1, 2026.
Which buildings it reaches
All 110 sample addresses in Massachusetts on Oct 1, 2026.
- 26 applies
- 34 unknown
- 50 not covered
Every dot is the rule engine’s result for that address. The larger dots are the example addresses listed below. 6 addresses have no coordinates and are counted but not drawn.
Decided by code for the example addresses
On Oct 1, 2026. Rules that don’t apply are left out.
- 471 Columbia Rd, Dorchester: Applies. Boston Fair Chance Tenant Selection Policy covers this address: subsidised (use code A/125 'SUBSD HOUSING S- 8').