Fifteen guides to what the law actually says, and what happens when someone ignores it. Refused at a door, challenged over a breed, threatened with eviction, told your dog in training has no rights at all — every page here quotes the statute it relies on so you can read it yourself, and says plainly where federal law stops and your state’s begins. Twelve years of handling, and nothing sold to you at the end of it.
There is no official color code, and no federal law names a vest color. Two states once named one, orange, and both have since repealed it. Where each belief came from, including the organization behind “purple means PTSD”.
North Carolina is two different states depending on which half of its law you are standing in. If somebody hurts your service dog it is the strongest state covered here, with a felony tier that counts harm requiring retraining or retirement of the dog. If somebody turns you away it is the weakest, with no damages available at all. And in the middle sits a free state registration tag, and one sentence about showing it that causes more confusion in North Carolina than anything else.
Texas writes post-traumatic stress disorder into its statutes twice, by name, in two different codes: once in the definition of who counts as disabled, and again in the list of tasks a service dog may perform. No other state covered here does both. Texas also has the widest criminal statute in this series for anyone who hurts your dog, forbids any city from writing a breed ban, and names the service dog in its housing law. Here is what it adds, and the one sentence in the middle of it that does not match the rest.
Almost every page with this title is written backwards, as a list of what each state demands of you. A state cannot demand anything, because state law only survives alongside the ADA where it gives greater or equal protection. So here are the six questions that actually vary, with six states read statute by statute and set side by side: money, crime, identification, dogs in training, emotional support animal letters, and housing.
New York gives a dog that is still in training the same public access rights as a finished one, which no federal law does anywhere. It also wrote the use of an animal in housing into its own statute, in words that do not require any training at all, which is why what HUD did in May 2026 did not reach it. Here is what New York adds, quoted from the statutes and linked so you can read them yourself.
Michigan will send you a service dog identification card and a patch, free, from the state government. They also prove nothing, and no business in Michigan is allowed to ask you for them. Both halves are real law and both took effect on the same day. Here is what the card actually costs you, which is not money, and the three places Michigan protects a handler more strictly than federal law does.
Florida issues no service dog registration, no tag and no card, and every site selling you one is selling a private product the state does not recognize. What Florida does have is a felony for deliberately hurting a working dog, mandatory restitution that covers your lost wages for the whole time you are without it, and a statewide ban on local breed and weight rules that took effect on 1 October 2023.
California really does issue a service dog ID tag, from a real county office, under a real statute. It is voluntary for a working team and required for a dog in training, and almost every page online gets one of those two halves wrong. Here is what the tag does, what it cannot do, and the four thousand dollars California owes you that federal law does not.
The two questions every handler memorizes do not apply at work. Employment runs under a different part of the ADA, your employer can ask for documentation, and here is how to make the request so it gets a yes.
Mostly no — but May 2026 changed what HUD will enforce, and a lot of pages haven’t caught up. What still stands, what doesn’t, and what to do when a landlord says no anyway.
Staff may ask two questions, and there are only two lawful reasons to refuse you. Neither is breed, paperwork, a no-pets policy or another customer’s allergy. What to say in the next sixty seconds, a script from a real refusal, when a business genuinely can ask you to leave, and what to do afterwards.
Federally, no — the ADA gives dogs in training nothing at all. Forty-nine states grant something anyway, but read who the statute actually names: most protect professional trainers, and only a couple name the disabled person training their own dog.
Usually, but it is not the actual requirement. The regulation asks for control; a leash is just the normal way of achieving it. Two written exceptions, eight situations where they apply, and the one place they stop applying entirely.
Inside a restaurant your emotional support animal has exactly the standing of a pet. The reason is a food safety regulation nobody writing about ESAs mentions, and it explains why the manager saying no is the one taking the legal risk.
Registration papers, certificates and ID cards are all worthless, because no registry exists under the ADA. What the real tells are, who profits from the fakes, and why they make life harder for genuine teams.
What the regulation actually says, quoted directly: the leash rule and the two exceptions almost nobody mentions, the only two grounds for removal, and how your state’s law stacks on top of the federal floor.
