{**184 AD3d at 62}As noted by its title, Social Services Law § 143-c was enacted to prevent abuses of cash security deposits by both landlords, who previously retained cash deposits by making false claims for damages, and tenants, who converted cash deposits—paid from public assistance funds—to their own use after landlords returned them. By 1972, when the statute was enacted, the Department of Social Services calculated that it had little chance of recovering $25 to $30 million dollars in cash security deposits, due to such abuses. Thus, it was enacted to protect the City, not tenants.
Plaintiff's argument that the HRA security voucher is not an "appropriate agreement" with a landlord pursuant to Social Services Law § 143-c (1) (a), as a landlord is forced to accept the terms or be the subject of a complaint under the HRL is without merit.[FN3]
An enforceable agreement consists of an offer, acceptance of the offer, consideration, mutual assent, and an intent to be bound (Kolchins v Evolution Mkts., Inc., 128 AD3d 47, 59 [1st Dept 2015], affd 31 NY3d 100 [2018]). To the extent that a landlord signs the security voucher, the landlord has accepted the offer and agrees to be bound by the terms and conditions of the voucher.
While, as plaintiff argues, the landlord is essentially compelled to "agree" to accept the security voucher, the fact that anti-discrimination laws require a landlord to agree to accept the voucher, even if under protest, does not, standing alone, render it an inappropriate agreement, or a contract of adhesion.