My super smart attorney has summarized this for me several times: "Most lay people confuse civil liability with criminal liability.

Also, is it important to check criminal history? 

There is just so much money to be made in the business that it is BOUND to attract the criminals and the thieves.

The housing authority does background checks, criminal checks, & credit checks.

They've decriminalized most felonies, so that it "appears" the crime rates have dropped, when in fact, they just stopped prosecuting violent criminals and other crimes.

From what I can gather, landlords will not be able to decline applicants based on most criminal records, past evictions, and others as long as it was longer than 12 months ago.

I'm not social justice warrior-ing here at all, just curious because I did the same thing.

I am still a little worried about all of the crap people can and will take you to court on.HUD says “A housing provider must… be able to prove through reliable evidence that it’s policy or practice of making housing decisions based on criminal history actually assists in protecting resident safety and/or property.”I mean - Sure you can prove it in ways as offenders have a higher chance of offending again.

Ex Post Facto has been held to apply to criminal laws only, not civil.

And IMO there should be standards that will help landlords understand who is a good applicant and who is not (beyond no criminal history) there is a time coming soon where declining folks based on time served in prison, arrests etc will no longer be allowed.