A Connecticut city convened its condo associations to ask what services it should be paying for
A Connecticut city convened its condo associations to ask what services it should be paying for
2026-09-09 · Connecticut · Compliance
Bristol's mayor convened a citywide conference of condominium associations at city hall to ask what the city could do about a squeeze its condo owners are feeling from two directions at once. The meeting followed a 6% property tax increase arriving alongside inflation-driven association fee rises. Bristol has roughly 2,200 condominiums in about two dozen complexes.1
It is a rare example of a Connecticut municipality treating community associations as a constituency rather than as private arrangements it has no view about.
The grievance, stated plainly
Mayor Ellen Zoppo-Sassu framed the problem as a double increase: “Here's a population that's seen escalating costs in addition to escalating taxes … their homeowners fees are rising as well. Two sets of increasing costs.”1
And the equity question underneath it: “Some of the condos are now approaching above what a single-family house is paying, but with fewer services. So I'm willing to have the conversation.”1
A resident who had first proposed a discount to a previous administration — a retired municipal tax assessor — put the owners' side: “We knew what we were buying. But there are a lot of services we don't get, and with taxes getting so high and fees getting so expensive, it's taking quite a toll on condos.”1
The two options on the table
Absorb a service the associations currently buy privately. The most plausible candidate is municipal bulky-waste pickup. South Windsor, Rocky Hill and Newington already provide town-paid bulky-waste collection for condominiums; East Hartford, Norwalk and West Hartford limit it to complexes below a size threshold.1
Use the 2024 state law. Public Act 24-151, § 71 permits a municipality to adopt a property tax exemption of between 5% and 35% for owner-occupied primary residences of not more than two units — expressly including condominiums and common interest community units.2
Why the “double taxation” argument is not quite what it sounds
The grievance is real but the label misleads, and boards making the argument to a municipality do better without it.
Condominium owners are not taxed twice. They pay municipal property tax on their units, like every other owner, and separately pay common charges for services their association provides — private road maintenance, plowing, trash, lighting, grounds.
The argument that lands is narrower and stronger: for certain services the municipality provides to other residents out of general revenue, association residents pay twice for one delivery. Bulky-waste collection is the cleanest example, which is why it is the one on Bristol's table.
The counter-argument a municipality will make is that private roads are not built to municipal standards and that plowing or maintaining them creates liability and cost the town never accepted. That is why the practical conversations concentrate on services that do not require entering private roads.
What the 2024 exemption actually is
Two features determine whether it helps a given association.
It is local option, not statewide entitlement. Each municipality decides whether to adopt it and at what rate within the 5% to 35% band. Neighbouring towns can and will differ.
It is owner-occupancy based. The exemption applies to owner-occupied primary residences of not more than two units. In a community with substantial investor or rental ownership, a meaningful share of units will not qualify — which changes both the fiscal cost to the town and the politics inside the association.
A board pressing for adoption should be able to tell its municipality how many of its units are owner-occupied primary residences. Most Connecticut boards do not know.
The other municipal decisions running the same way
Bristol is the visible example; the traffic is generally in the other direction.
Fairfield changed its annual fire safety inspection fee for apartments and multi-family homes in January 2026 from $100 flat per building to $40 per unit, raising revenue from $5,700 in 2025 to more than $19,000 year-to-date. Asked whether the cost gets passed through, the fire marshal said: “That's certainly a possibility, and it is up to the owner. I would imagine more of the condo associations are increasing their condominium fees to include this per unit.”3
That is the mechanism in miniature. A municipal fee decision converts directly into a common charge increase, and the association absorbs the political cost of a rise it did not choose.
What this is worth to a board
The Bristol meeting produced no decision, and no follow-up has been reported on what the city concluded. But the approach is replicable and costs an association nothing to attempt.
Ask for the service, not the discount, first. A municipality absorbing bulky-waste pickup is a smaller fiscal commitment than a 5% to 35% assessment exemption, and it has precedent in at least six Connecticut towns.
Go collectively. Bristol's associations were convened as a group. A single association asking is a constituent complaint; two dozen is a constituency.
Bring the arithmetic. What the association spends annually on the specific service, divided by unit, against what the town spends per household elsewhere. The equity argument is only persuasive with numbers attached.
The wider context
Roughly 15.5% of Connecticut households paid association fees as of 2024, at a median of $351 a month — the fourth-highest median in the United States. A study published in March 2026 found 35% of association members in Fairfield County paying at least $500 a month.4
Those figures are why a municipal conversation about services is worth having, and why more Connecticut towns will be having it.
What to watch next
Whether Bristol adopts anything is the immediate question, and it has not been reported since the April meeting. The more consequential one is whether other Connecticut municipalities adopt the § 71 exemption — a local-option tax break tends to spread by comparison once neighbouring towns take it up.
Related Connecticut HOA Topics
- Condo owners face hikes in taxes and private fees. A CT city is looking for ways to help., Hartford Courant (April 1, 2026) ↩
- Recently Approved Property Tax Measures in Connecticut, Pullman & Comley (June 21, 2024) — on Public Act 24-151, § 71 ↩
- Fairfield's fire safety inspection fee changed. Now it's generating thousands more dollars, Connecticut Public (June 23, 2026) ↩
- Connecticut condo prices rise as HOA fees stay high, CT Insider (August 15, 2026) ↩
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