Montana HOA Water Conservation

Montana has no HOA-specific water-conservation statute. Neither the Montana Unit Ownership Act, for condominiums, nor any planned-community statute limits an association's authority over drought-tolerant landscaping, xeriscape, artificial turf, native plantings, rainwater harvesting, or graywater reuse; those questions are governed by recorded CC&Rs, the corporate framework of the Montana Nonprofit Corporation Act, common law, and, for owner-facing water use, local water systems.

Section 1: Overview

Montana hasn't enacted a statute limiting an HOA's authority over water-efficient landscaping. A search of the Montana Code Annotated returns no provision protecting drought-tolerant or xeriscape landscaping, native plantings, artificial turf, rainwater harvesting, or graywater reuse against association restriction.¹⁶ What governs instead is a layered set of sources: recorded covenants, conditions, and restrictions; architectural-control provisions in the declaration; the Montana Unit Ownership Act for condominiums; the Montana Nonprofit Corporation Act for corporate formalities that apply to most associations; and, for any rule an owner actually faces on outdoor water use, the local water system.¹⁷

State water-resource law is a separate body of law from HOA landscaping authority. Montana's prior-appropriation water-rights system, administered by the Department of Natural Resources and Conservation, governs who may withdraw water and in what quantity; it doesn't determine whether an HOA may forbid replacing turf with drought-tolerant plantings.¹⁸

Nationally, Montana sits with the silent, CC&R-governed states. It hasn't adopted the HOA-restriction statutes found in drought-exposed jurisdictions such as California, Arizona, Nevada, Colorado, Texas, Florida, and Utah, and it hasn't adopted the Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act.¹⁹ What follows sets out the statutory framework, what the framework requires of associations, recent legislative and judicial activity, and how Montana compares.

Section 2: Statutory and regulatory framework

2A. Statutory limits on HOA authority over water-efficient landscaping

A search of the Montana Code Annotated identifies no statute that limits an HOA's authority over water-efficient landscaping. There's no Montana provision protecting xeriscape, drought-tolerant plantings, native plants, or artificial turf from association restriction, and none requiring an association to permit water-efficient irrigation.²⁰ The Montana Legislature's own Local Government Interim Committee staff analysis concluded that the Code "has, historically, been largely silent on the governance of homeowners' associations."²¹

The chapters where such a provision would appear confirm the absence. Condominiums are governed by the Montana Unit Ownership Act, Mont. Code § 70-23-101 et seq., which addresses creation, declarations and bylaws, ownership interests, common expenses, and administrative process, and contains no landscaping or water-use provision.²² Planned-community HOAs have no general Montana statute; they operate under recorded CC&Rs and the Montana Nonprofit Corporation Act, Mont. Code § 35-2-113 et seq., which supplies corporate structure but says nothing about landscaping or water.²³ The narrow HOA-specific provisions the Legislature has enacted concern political signs, Mont. Code § 70-1-522, and a limit on imposing "more onerous" use restrictions than existed when an owner acquired the property, Mont. Code § 70-17-901; neither touches water or landscaping.²⁴

To make the absence concrete: several drought-exposed states have enacted statutes that do exactly what Montana hasn't. Colorado's Colo. Rev. Stat. § 38-33.3-106.5, as amended by SB 23-178, signed May 2023, provides that an association "may not prohibit the use of xeriscape, nonvegetative turf grass, or drought-tolerant vegetative landscapes," must allow an owner an option consisting of at least 80 percent drought-tolerant plantings, may not unreasonably require hardscape on more than 20 percent of the landscaped area, and must select at least three preplanned water-wise garden designs.²⁵ California's Cal. Civ. Code § 4735(a), amended by AB 349, approved September 4, 2015, makes a governing-document or landscaping-guideline provision "void and unenforceable" if it prohibits "the use of low water-using plants as a group or as a replacement of existing turf" or prohibits "the use of artificial turf or any other synthetic surface that resembles grass."²⁶ Utah's Utah Code § 57-8a-231 similarly restricts association bans on drought-tolerant landscaping. Montana has adopted no equivalent, and no comparable bill has become law.²⁷

2B. Related water law, drought response, rainwater and graywater

Montana's water-resource framework is administered by DNRC under a prior-appropriation system, with adjudication of claims through the Montana Water Court. This body of law governs the allocation of water among users and has no bearing on whether an HOA may regulate a member's landscaping; it's background context only.²⁸

No state drought-declaration mechanism reaches private landscaping enforcement. DNRC coordinates the Drought and Water Supply Advisory Committee, Mont. Code § 2-15-3308, and published a modernized Montana Drought Management Plan in December 2023, but that framework addresses monitoring, assessment, and response by state, tribal, and local entities, not mandates on private HOA landscaping.²⁹

Montana has no statute addressing rainwater harvesting or graywater reuse as against HOAs. Rooftop rainwater collection for non-potable use is generally permissible under state water policy, subject to other users' water rights, but no statute overrides a contrary covenant.³⁰ Graywater reuse is regulated as an environmental and water-quality matter under Mont. Code § 75-5-325 and § 75-5-326. Section 75-5-326, enacted by Ch. 312, Laws of 2007, provides in full: "(1) Gray water may not be used to irrigate plants to be consumed by humans. (2) Gray water reuse systems may not be located within a flood plain, as defined in 76-5-103." Those sections sit in Title 75, Environmental Protection, and say nothing about homeowners' associations.³¹

2C. Where water-conservation rules actually live in Montana

For any Montana association, the operative rulebook on landscaping is the recorded declaration. CC&Rs and their architectural-control provisions determine whether an owner may remove turf, install artificial turf, or plant a xeriscape, because no statute displaces the declaration on these points.³² For condominiums, the Unit Ownership Act supplies the surrounding framework of declaration and bylaws; for planned communities there's no general statute, so authority rests on the CC&Rs plus the corporate formalities of the Nonprofit Corporation Act.³³

The rules an owner actually faces on outdoor water use come from the local water system, which operates independently of the HOA framework. During dry summers the City of Billings has imposed Stage 1 restrictions that, per Billings Public Works, prohibit "lawn watering on Mondays from midnight to 11:59 p.m." for all residential, business, and government properties using the city's treated water, with properties served by a well or irrigation ditch exempt; Public Works states these measures "are allowed by the Billings Municipal Code and the City's Rules and Regulations for Water and Sewer Service."³⁴ Missoula Water publishes conservation guidance and off-peak watering recommendations, and the City of Great Falls provides irrigation and overwatering guidance for its Missouri River supply.³⁵ The operational takeaway is that the controlling water-conservation rules for a Montana community sit in the declaration and in the local water system, not in an HOA-specific water statute.³⁶

Section 3: What the framework requires of HOAs

A. Landscaping approval and architectural review

Architectural review of landscaping changes derives from the recorded declaration and bylaws, not statute, and Montana courts construe restrictive covenants strictly, enforcing them as written where the language is clear.³⁷ For condominiums, the Unit Ownership Act frames the declaration-and-bylaws structure through which such review operates; the Act doesn't itself mandate or prohibit any landscaping standard, so the substantive rule is set by the declaration and may be varied by it.³⁸

B. Drought response and watering restrictions

Mandatory watering restrictions come from the local water system, not the association. Billings' Stage 1 measures illustrate a municipally imposed limit binding on owners regardless of HOA rules.³⁹ No state statute suspends HOA enforcement against dormant or brown lawns during drought; any relief depends on the declaration's terms or the association's discretion.⁴⁰

C. Rule adoption and disclosure

Most Montana associations are nonprofit corporations and must observe corporate formalities for records, meetings, and member access.⁴¹ An association may not enforce a covenant that imposes "more onerous" use restrictions than existed when the member acquired the property, absent the member's written consent, under Mont. Code § 70-17-901. This limits retroactive tightening of use covenants, including some landscaping-related use rules.⁴²

D. Enforcement limits and conflicts

Covenant enforcement actions may be brought by the parties, benefited or burdened owners, or the association under Mont. Code § 70-17-210, as revised in 2025.⁴³ Where a CC&R requires a green lawn while a local water system restricts watering, the tension is a contract-versus-local-rule conflict resolved under general law and the declaration's terms, not under any water-conservation statute.⁴⁴

Section 4: Recent legislative and judicial activity

A. Recent bills (past 24 months)

No bill enacted or introduced in the past 24 months addresses HOA authority over water-efficient landscaping, drought enforcement, rainwater, or graywater. The nearest enacted HOA measure was a general covenant-enforcement revision.

House Bill 761, 2025, which would have amended Mont. Code § 70-17-901 on residential covenants to bar imposing more onerous restrictions than existed when an owner acquired the property, died in process on May 20, 2025, and didn't become law.⁴⁶

B. Recent Montana Supreme Court rulings (past 36 months)

No qualifying Montana Supreme Court ruling addressing HOA authority over water-efficient landscaping, drought, or water-related use restrictions turned up. The nearest recent decision concerned architectural/covenant enforcement generally.

C. Active legislative debates

No active debate specific to HOA water-conservation authority turned up; interim committee attention has centered on general HOA governance rather than landscaping or water use.⁴⁸

Section 5: National positioning and related coverage

On a water-conservation-specific axis, states fall into three groups. First, states with statutes limiting HOA authority over water-efficient landscaping, concentrated in drought-exposed jurisdictions such as California, Arizona, Nevada, Colorado, Texas, Florida, and Utah. Second, states with partial or emerging provisions, where protections are narrower or newly introduced. Third, silent, CC&R-governed states, which include most Rocky Mountain and northern-tier states and Montana, where no statute limits association control over landscaping and the declaration governs.⁴⁹ The practical implication for a multi-state operator is direct: a firm accustomed to Colorado's or Utah's xeriscape-protection rules shouldn't assume any equivalent applies in Montana, where an association may enforce a turf covenant unless its own declaration provides otherwise. Montana shows no legislative momentum toward such a statute; recent HOA bills concern enforcement mechanics and covenant duration, not water-efficient landscaping.⁵⁰

HOA Weekly's Montana water-conservation coverage updates quarterly as the Legislature and the Montana Supreme Court act. For Montana communities, the practically controlling water rules are the recorded declaration and the local water system. Federal frameworks apply to Montana associations regardless of state law — the Fair Housing Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act among them.

Footnotes

1. Mont. Code Ann. Title 70, ch. 23 (Unit Ownership Act), parts index ↩
2. Montana Legislature, HOA Governance in Montana (Local Government Interim Committee, 2024) ↩
3. Montana Legislature, HOA Governance in Montana (2024) ↩
4. Montana Legislature, HOA Governance in Montana (2024) ↩
5. Montana DNRC, Water Resources ↩
6. Mont. Code Ann. § 75-5-326 (gray water reuse — restrictions) ↩
7. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-17-901 ↩
8. Montana Legislature, HOA Governance in Montana (2024) ↩
9. Mont. Code Ann. Title 70, ch. 23, parts index ↩
10. Mont. Code Ann. Title 70, ch. 23, parts index ↩
11. Montana Drought and Water Supply Advisory Committee (Mont. Code Ann. § 2-15-3308) ↩
12. City of Billings Public Works, Water Regulations & Reporting ↩
13. Montana DNRC, Water Resources (prior appropriation; Montana Water Court) ↩
14. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-17-210 (amended 2025) ↩
15. Montana Code Annotated 2025 ↩
16. Mont. Code Ann. Title 70, ch. 23, parts index ↩
17. Montana Legislature, HOA Governance in Montana (2024) ↩
18. Montana DNRC, Water Resources ↩
19. Montana Legislature, HOA Governance in Montana (2024) ↩
20. Mont. Code Ann. Title 70, ch. 23, parts index ↩
21. Montana Legislature, HOA Governance in Montana (2024) ↩
22. Mont. Code Ann. Title 70, ch. 23 (Unit Ownership Act) ↩
23. Mont. Code Ann. Title 35, ch. 2 (Nonprofit Corporation Act) ↩
24. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-17-901 ↩
25. Colo. Rev. Stat. § 38-33.3-106.5, as amended by SB 23-178 (comparison, not Montana law) ↩
26. Cal. Civ. Code § 4735 (AB 349, 2015) (comparison, not Montana law) ↩
27. Survey of state HOA landscaping-protection statutes (comparison) ↩
28. Montana DNRC, Water Resources (prior appropriation) ↩
29. Montana Drought Management Plan (DNRC, December 2023) ↩
30. Montana DNRC, Water Resources ↩
31. Mont. Code Ann. § 75-5-325 & § 75-5-326 (gray water) ↩
32. Montana Legislature, HOA Governance in Montana (2024) ↩
33. Mont. Code Ann. Title 70, ch. 23; Title 35, ch. 2 ↩
34. City of Billings Public Works Stage 1 water restrictions (utility rule under Billings Municipal Code) ↩
35. Missoula Water, Conservation (utility rule) ↩
36. City of Billings Public Works, Water Regulations (utility rule) ↩
37. Windemere Homeowners Ass'n v. McCue, 1999 MT 292 (strict construction of covenants) ↩
38. Mont. Code Ann. Title 70, ch. 23 (Unit Ownership Act) ↩
39. City of Billings Public Works Stage 1 water restrictions (utility rule) ↩
40. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-17-901 ↩
41. Mont. Code Ann. Title 35, ch. 2 (Nonprofit Corporation Act) ↩
42. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-17-901 ↩
43. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-17-210 (covenant enforcement and abandonment) ↩
44. City of Billings Public Works, Water Regulations (utility rule) ↩
45. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-17-210, as amended (HB 325, 2025; Ch. 258 and Ch. 423, L. 2025) ↩
46. Montana Legislature Bill Explorer, HB 761 (2025), died in process 05/20/2025 ↩
47. Clover Meadows Homeowners Ass'n v. Spear (Mont. 2024) (memorandum opinion, noncitable) ↩
48. Montana Legislature, HOA Governance in Montana (2024) ↩
49. Survey of state HOA landscaping-protection statutes (comparison) ↩
50. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-17-210 (amended 2025) ↩