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A state lawmaker is asking Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita to look for ways to halt a South Bend mobile home park owner’s ban on window air conditioning units for all its tenants.
Sen. David Niezgodski, D-South Bend, said tenants at Countryside Village, a mobile home park owned by YES Communities, received notification from the park to remove their window air conditioning units by July 1, leaving residents without A/C just two weeks into summer.
Now he is asking Rokita to review the situation and determine whether any “emergency action or legal guidance might be warranted to protect health in the interim.”
Niezgodski acknowledges that although this matter doesn’t present “a clear violation of existing health or housing codes, it does raise serious questions about habitability, the obligations of landlords under IC 32-31-8-5, and the protections afforded to tenants under state law.”
Countryside Village did not respond to a request for comment, but its community guidelines say window A/C units are prohibited, along with other exterior equipment like fences, CB and TV antennas and ham radios. According to the online document, the community guidelines are “intended to maintain the appearance standards of the Community.”
Niezgodski said the property owner’s justification for the ban may come from legislation approved over a gubernatorial veto in 2020 that preempts local governments from enacting additional tenant protections.
Niezgodski emphasized in his letter to Rokita that although the window A/C prohibition may be permitted under the terms of a lease, he is concerned that “the timing and nature of this policy may amount to an effort to displace lower-income residents and phase out older trailers.”
If this is the case, Niezgodski said, it could potentially rise to the level of an unfair or deceptive business practice given the lack of viable cooling alternatives.
Judith Fox, clinical professor emerita of law at Notre Dame, told The Lawyer that if the leases do prohibit window A/C units, then she does not think legislators have any legal recourse.
“I don’t know that there’s going to be any legal way to force them to do otherwise,” Fox said. “I think it’s going to be more of an extremely bad PR, but they’re such a huge company that I don’t know if that’s even going to affect them.”
This is not the first time YES Communities has cracked down on its window A/C unit policy.
In July 2023, residents at Five Seasons Manufactured Home Community in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, received notices to remove their window A/C units. Then in 2024, Springfield Meadows, a YES Communities property in Kirby, Texas, also made headlines for the same enforcement.
“They’re basically gentrifying their parks,” Fox said “But they’re also pricing out the people that have lived there for decades and people coming in.”
According to YES Communities’ website, new homes at Countryside Village South Bend can be purchased for $52,499 to $115,699, and homes can be rented for $1,269 to $1,429 per month.
Niezgodski is encouraging state and local officials to delay or reverse the A/C ban and to provide relief to those affected.
“I hope that (Rokita) will find that he’s got the leeway that’s provided with this legislation, at the very least, that he can put a stay on this, he can put a hold on this,” Niezgodski told The Lawyer.
That would give state lawmakers time to address such situations in next year’s legislative session, he added.
Rokita’s office said it was aware of the issue and Niezgodski’s letter.
A spokesperson said in an email that the attorney general’s office “takes homeowner and landlord tenant related issues in South Bend area very seriously. If consumers believe they have been negatively impacted, they are encouraged to file a complaint at indianaconsumer.com outlining the facts and circumstances surrounding their situation.”
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