Kentucky HOA EV Charging

Quick-Reference EV Charging Table

For condominiums created before January 1, 2011, the Horizontal Property Law (KRS 381.805 to 381.910) governs rather than the Kentucky Condominium Act. Non-condominium homeowner associations are not condominium regimes and are governed by the recorded declaration, the Planned Community Act (KRS 381.785 to 381.801, for communities within its scope), the Kentucky Nonprofit Corporation Acts (KRS Chapter 273) if incorporated, and common-law covenant doctrine.

Section 1: Overview — How EV charging is regulated for HOAs in Kentucky

Kentucky has written no statute that specifically governs electric vehicle charging stations in common interest communities, so no state law overrides the recorded declaration on the question of whether an owner may install a charger.¹ In the absence of an EV-specific statute, an owner's ability to install charging equipment is controlled by the declaration, the CC&Rs, and, for condominiums, by the general alteration and common-element provisions of the Kentucky Condominium Act for post-2011 regimes, the Horizontal Property Law for pre-2011 regimes, and, for non-condominium homeowner associations, by the declaration together with the Planned Community Act, general corporate law, and common-law covenant doctrine.² The controlling practical question is where the proposed station would be installed and who controls that space, because a charger placed inside a unit gets treated very differently from one that requires work on a common element such as an assigned parking stall.³ This places Kentucky in the majority of states that haven't enacted EV-charging mandates for community associations, unlike states such as California and Colorado, where statutes limit an association's power to prohibit charging.⁴ The sections below work through the statutory framework, the operational limits on association authority, and recent legislative and judicial activity.

Section 2: The statutory and regulatory framework

2A. EV-charging-specific law in Kentucky

A genuine search of the Kentucky Revised Statutes, including the Kentucky Condominium Act, the Horizontal Property Law, the Planned Community Act, the Kentucky Nonprofit Corporation Acts, and Chapter 278, public utilities, locates no provision addressing electric vehicle charging stations in community associations.¹ The consequence: no statutory override of the declaration, no statutory approval timeline, no deemed-approval rule, and no statutory cap on the conditions an association may impose. Kentucky has enacted EV-related revenue and infrastructure measures, but these aren't association-access rules. House Bill 8 (2022) created an electric-vehicle-power excise tax under KRS 138.477 that began at three cents ($0.03) per kilowatt-hour effective January 1, 2024 and stood at $0.032 per kilowatt-hour in 2025; a 2024 amendment, House Bill 122, narrowed the definition of an electric-vehicle-power dealer to exclude Level 1 and Level 2 charging stations, so only stations with a charging capacity greater than 20 kilowatts must register and remit the tax, which removes most residential charging from its scope entirely.⁵ The National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure, or NEVI, program, administered by the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet, funds fast-charging stations along Alternative Fuel Corridors, and the Cabinet doesn't own or operate those stations.⁶ Neither measure grants an owner a right to charge against an association. No association-access or right-to-charge bill was introduced in the 2024, 2025, or 2026 Regular Sessions.⁷

2B. How the Kentucky Condominium Act's general provisions bear on EV charging

The Kentucky Condominium Act, KRS 381.9101 to 381.9207, is modeled on the 1980 Uniform Condominium Act, took effect January 1, 2011, and contains no EV-specific provision, but its general provisions structure the analysis for post-2011 condominiums.⁸ Under KRS 381.9145, a unit owner may make improvements or alterations within the unit that don't impair structural integrity, utility components, or mechanical systems, but the same section provides that an owner "shall not change the appearance of the common elements, or the exterior appearance of a unit or any other portion of the condominium, without the written permission of the association."² Because most parking is a common element rather than part of the unit, that written-permission requirement is usually the operative constraint. Limited common elements, such as an assigned parking stall, are allocated to units under KRS 381.9139, and that allocation may not be altered without the consent of the affected owners.³ The association holds authority over common elements and rulemaking power over their use under KRS 381.9167.⁹ Pre-2011 condominiums are governed instead by the Horizontal Property Law, KRS 381.805 to 381.910, which has a different structure.³ Non-condominium HOAs aren't governed by the Condominium Act; they operate under the declaration, the Planned Community Act, KRS Chapter 273, and common-law covenant doctrine. The Condominium Act neither compels an association to permit EV charging nor prohibits it; the declaration controls.

2C. The role of CC&Rs, architectural review, and corporate law

The declaration is the operative rulebook for EV charging in Kentucky absent a statute, and architectural or design-review provisions are the mechanism most associations use to evaluate a charging-station request. For condominiums, the order of precedence runs from the non-variable provisions of the Kentucky Condominium Act, to the Act's default rules as modified by the declaration, to the declaration, then the bylaws, then the rules.⁸ For associations incorporated as nonprofits, the Kentucky Nonprofit Corporation Acts, KRS Chapter 273, supply corporate-formality scaffolding — board-action, meeting, and notice requirements — but no EV-specific authority.¹⁰ Kentucky's Planned Community Act, KRS 381.785 to 381.801, enacted as Senate Bill 120 and effective June 29, 2023, added a governance framework for planned communities covering budgets, records, meetings, assessments, and liens, but it doesn't address EV charging.¹¹ Where the declaration stays silent, common-law contract and property doctrine governs, and Kentucky courts enforce restrictive covenants that are reasonable and construe them according to their plain language.¹²

Section 3: What HOAs can and cannot do regarding EV charging

A. Installation rights and prohibitions

Whether an association may prohibit installation outright turns on the declaration, because no Kentucky statute limits such a prohibition, true across every framework.¹ For a condominium, the Act's requirement of written association permission for any change to the appearance of common elements gives the association substantial leverage where the charger would touch a common element — true for post-2011 condominiums, and for pre-2011 condominiums under the Horizontal Property Law.² The line that matters is between prohibiting installation and conditioning it: an association may often decline a proposal that requires common-element alteration while still being expected to follow its own documented review procedures.

B. Conditions an association may impose

An association may condition approval on architectural review of the method, equipment, and routing; on professional or licensed installation and code compliance; on insurance, indemnification, and allocation of liability to the owner; and on aesthetic and location standards, in each case as authorized by the declaration, true across every framework.² In a no-statute state, the ceiling on those conditions is whatever the declaration permits, subject to general reasonableness principles, not a statutory cap.¹²

C. Cost, metering, and maintenance allocation

Who bears installation cost, electricity cost, metering, and maintenance, repair, and damage responsibility is set by the declaration, because no Kentucky statute allocates these for EV charging, true across every framework.¹ As a practical matter, associations typically place these costs on the requesting owner. On the utility question, the Kentucky Public Service Commission determined in Case No. 2018-00372, order of June 14, 2019, that an entity owning or operating an EV charging station isn't a public utility, reasoning that "the defining characteristic of a public utility is service to, or readiness to serve, an indefinite public, which has a legal right to demand the utility's service," and that charging-station service is limited to a specific, defined class of EV owners; an owner charging on a private meter is therefore generally not reselling utility service.¹³

D. Where the station may be installed

The analysis depends on whether the station sits within a separate interest — the unit, including an attached garage defined as part of the unit — a limited common element, such as assigned parking, or a general common element — true for post-2011 condominiums, for pre-2011 condominiums under the Horizontal Property Law, and for non-condominium HOAs per the declaration.³ The association generally controls alterations to common elements, including assigned ones, absent declaration language to the contrary, because the Act ties any change to common-element appearance to written association permission and ties limited-common-element allocation to owner consent.²

Section 4: Recent legislative and judicial activity

A. Recent bills

No bill creating or amending EV-charging rules for community associations was introduced in the Kentucky General Assembly's 2024, 2025, or 2026 Regular Sessions.⁷ The EV-related measures enacted in recent sessions are revenue and infrastructure laws: the EV-power excise tax, House Bill 8, 2022, later narrowed by House Bill 122, 2024, and the annual EV ownership fees, House Bill 360, 2023, which set an annual fee of $120 for electric vehicles that rose to $126 for EVs and plug-in hybrids in 2025 under the National Highway Construction Cost Index adjustment, with $63 for electric motorcycles. Neither addresses association access.⁵

B. Recent Kentucky appellate rulings

No published opinion of the Kentucky Court of Appeals or the Supreme Court of Kentucky from the past 36 months addresses EV charging or condominium common-element alterations by unit owners.⁷ For context, HOA civil disputes are filed in Kentucky Circuit Courts, appealed to the 14-judge Kentucky Court of Appeals, which sits in three-judge panels, and reach the Supreme Court of Kentucky only by discretionary review.¹⁴

C. Active legislative debates

No active proposal that would create EV-charging rights or restrictions for Kentucky community associations is pending; legislative attention on EVs in Kentucky has centered on road-fund revenue and highway-corridor infrastructure rather than owner access within associations.⁷

Section 5: National positioning and related coverage

Kentucky sits at the permissive end of the national EV-charging landscape. A minority of states have enacted EV-charging-station mandates that void or limit association prohibitions, notably California, Civil Code § 4745, and Colorado, C.R.S. § 38-33.3-106.8, and a few states address charging more narrowly within a condominium or HOA act.⁴ Kentucky is among the majority of states with no EV-charging-specific statute, where the declaration controls. For a multi-state operator entering Kentucky from a mandate state, the owner-protective rules they're accustomed to, such as deemed approval, statutory insurance ceilings, and limits on outright bans, don't apply, and the declaration governs. This is a fast-moving area, and Kentucky's status is worth rechecking every quarter.

HOA Weekly's Kentucky EV Charging coverage updates quarterly as the General Assembly and the Kentucky appellate courts act, and we re-verify the threshold question — whether a statute exists — each cycle. Federal incentives such as the Section 30C credit may affect installation economics, but no federal law mandates HOA EV charging access.¹⁵

Footnotes

1. Kentucky Revised Statutes, Chapter 381 (section list showing the Kentucky Condominium Act, Horizontal Property Law, and Planned Community Act, none of which contains an EV-charging provision) ↩
2. KRS 381.9145, Alteration of units ↩
3. Kentucky Revised Statutes, Chapter 381 (KRS 381.9139, Limited common elements; KRS 381.805 to 381.910, Horizontal Property Law) ↩
4. California Civil Code § 4745 (and Colorado Revised Statutes § 38-33.3-106.8) (out-of-state comparison) ↩
5. U.S. Department of Energy, Alternative Fuels Data Center, Kentucky Laws and Incentives (EV power excise tax, KRS 138.477; annual EV ownership fees, House Bill 360 (2023)) ↩
6. Kentucky Transportation Cabinet, EV Charging Program (NEVI Alternative Fuel Corridors) ↩
7. Kentucky General Assembly, 2025 Regular Session bill title index (no EV-charging association-access bill) ↩
8. KRS 381.9103, Application and construction of KRS 381.9101 to 381.9207 (effective January 1, 2011) ↩
9. KRS 381.9167, Powers of unit owners' association ↩
10. Kentucky Revised Statutes, Chapter 273, Nonprofit Corporations ↩
11. KRS 381.786, Planned communities subject to KRS 381.785 to 381.801 (effective June 29, 2023; Senate Bill 120) ↩
12. Hensley v. Gadd, 560 S.W.3d 516 (Ky. 2018); Ceresia v. Mitchell, 242 S.W.2d 359 (Ky. 1951) (reasonableness and plain-language construction of restrictive covenants) ↩
13. Kentucky Public Service Commission, Case No. 2018-00372, order of June 14, 2019 (EV charging stations are not utilities) ↩
14. Kentucky Court of Justice, About the Courts (Circuit Court, Court of Appeals, Supreme Court discretionary review) ↩
15. Internal Revenue Service, Instructions for Form 8911, Alternative Fuel Vehicle Refueling Property Credit (Section 30C; terminates for property placed in service after June 30, 2026) ↩