Terrance Mitchell spent three years rebuilding his life after a drug conviction that, in an earlier era, would have followed him indefinitely. He found work, rebuilt relationships with his family, and stayed out of the legal system. But when he applied for an apartment in North Philadelphia last spring, the background check flagged his record and the landlord turned him away. He never got an explanation. He never got a second chance — at housing, at least — until he learned about a new city ordinance designed to prevent exactly that.

Mitchell's experience captures the gap that clean slate advocates have spent years trying to close: even as automatic expungement laws have accelerated across the country, people with criminal records still face housing discrimination that can undo every other measure of rehabilitation. Two developments in Pennsylvania — one at the state level, one in Philadelphia — are now taking direct aim at that gap.

Pennsylvania's Expanded Clean Slate Legislation

Pennsylvania's Clean Slate Act, originally passed in 2018 and expanded several times since, has been one of the more active state-level experiments in automatic record clearing. In 2026, the legislature advanced a package of amendments that would expand the list of eligible offenses for automatic sealing, shorten the waiting periods for certain felony convictions to become eligible, and — critically — add housing-specific nondiscrimination provisions that prohibit landlords from using criminal records as a blanket screening tool.

The legislation, which passed the state Senate in May and was awaiting a House vote as of early June, would require Pennsylvania landlords to consider the nature and age of a conviction before denying housing. Under current law, landlords in Pennsylvania may deny housing based on any criminal record, regardless of how old the conviction is or how unrelated it is to tenancy. The proposed change would bring housing screening closer to the employment context, where Pennsylvania law already restricts how far back employers can consider criminal records.

Advocates called the housing provisions the missing piece of the clean slate framework. "You can clear someone's record automatically, but if a landlord can still pull up the arrest or conviction in a background check and use it against them, the expungement doesn't mean much in practice," said a representative from the Pennsylvania Innocence Project, which has backed the legislation.

The bill also proposes to expand the categories of offenses eligible for automatic sealing to include certain second-degree misdemeanors that previously required a petition to expunge. Under current Pennsylvania law, people with older, lower-level convictions often must navigate a complex court petition process with no guarantee of success. The 2026 amendments would make many of those records automatically sealable without any action by the record holder.

Philadelphia's Ordinance Expansion

Meanwhile, Philadelphia City Council advanced amendments to the city's Fair Criminal Records Screening Standards ordinance in March, significantly expanding the categories of housing providers subject to the city's "ban the box" and record inquiry restrictions. The amendments extend the ordinance's coverage to small landlords with three or fewer units — a significant expansion, since many of the city's rental units are owned by individual landlords who were previously exempt.

The city also added a provision requiring landlords to notify applicants in writing if a criminal record is the basis for a denial, and to give applicants 10 business days to respond or provide context before a final decision is made. This "response window" provision is modeled on similar requirements in a handful of other cities and is designed to prevent reflexive denials based on automated background check results.

Philadelphia's ordinance already prohibited most employers from asking about criminal records on initial job applications. The 2026 housing amendments extend those same principles to the rental housing context — prohibiting landlords from advertising unit availability in ways that discourage people with records from applying, and from using criminal background as an automatic disqualifier.

"Philadelphia is showing other cities what comprehensive record equity policy looks like in practice," said a policy analyst with the Center for American Progress, which has tracked local record-screening reforms across the country. "The combination of automatic sealing at the state level and specific housing nondiscrimination protections at the city level is the model other jurisdictions are trying to replicate."

How They Work Together

The Pennsylvania state legislation and the Philadelphia ordinance address different layers of the same problem. The state law governs what appears on a record and when it can be accessed; the city ordinance governs what landlords can do with that information once they have it. Together, they represent an attempt to close the gap between record clearing and real-world access to housing.

For tenants like Mitchell, the practical effect of both laws — if the state bill passes — would be significant. Records that once appeared on background checks would be automatically sealed and hidden from most standard tenant screenings. For those records that remain accessible, landlords would be required to evaluate them individually rather than rejecting applicants outright. And small landlords who previously operated outside any oversight would face the same standards as large property management companies.

Implementation challenges remain. State agencies tasked with processing automatic sealings already face backlogs; adding new categories of eligible offenses could stretch those resources further. And enforcement of the city's housing ordinance depends on complaints — which many tenants do not know how or when to file.

Clean slate advocates say the combination of automatic clearing and housing nondiscrimination rules is exactly what is needed, but that both require sustained funding and political attention to work as intended. "The law on the books is the starting point," one advocate noted. "The point is what happens in the landlord's office and the courthouse."

What to Watch

The Pennsylvania bill is the item most closely watched by clean slate advocates nationally. If it passes with the housing nondiscrimination provisions intact, it would be among the most comprehensive state-level record reform packages in the country. A final vote is expected before the legislative session ends in late June.

For people in Pennsylvania or Philadelphia who want to understand where they stand, clean slate eligibility tools are available through legal aid organizations and the state's courts website. Those who have already had records sealed and are still encountering housing discrimination can file complaints with the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission or the Philadelphia Commission on Human Relations.

As automatic expungement continues to expand across the country, the intersection of record clearing and housing access is emerging as the next major frontier — and Pennsylvania's experiment will be closely watched by advocates and policymakers in other states looking for a template.