Vermont HOA Political Signs

Section 1: Overview — How political signs are regulated in Vermont HOAs

Start with what Vermont law actually protects. The Vermont Common Interest Ownership Act bars an association from prohibiting an owner from displaying, on a unit or on the limited common element that adjoins it, signs about candidates for public or association office or ballot questions — though it lets the association set reasonable rules on the time, place, size, number, and manner of those displays.¹ That protection lives in one detailed governance statute, the Vermont Common Interest Ownership Act (VCIOA), Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 27A, § 1-101 et seq., Vermont's version of the Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act.² Know its limits. The protection is narrower than a general noncommercial-sign right, and it carries a date line: it reaches communities created on or after January 1, 1999, and it does not automatically cover older communities, which answer to their recorded declarations.³ Where the statute does not reach, the recorded declaration — the CC&Rs — controls, and the federal First Amendment offers no help, because an association is a private entity enforcing a contract, not a government actor.⁴ That mix places Vermont among the protective-statute states on this question, alongside California, Nevada, Maryland, and Montana, even though its statutory language reaches less far than several of those.⁵ The sections that follow lay out the statute, the constitutional backdrop, the role of the declaration, and the operating rules that follow from them.

Section 2: The legal framework for political signs

2A. A protective statute, with limits and a date line

Vermont has put a statutory protection for candidate and ballot-question signs on the books, and that sets it apart from states where the declaration alone decides. The operative provision is VCIOA § 3-120(d). It says an association "may not prohibit display on a unit or on a limited common element adjoining a unit of the flag of this State, or signs regarding candidates for public or association office or ballot questions, but the association may adopt rules governing the time, place, size, number, and manner of those displays."¹ The same subsection tells associations to keep any rule on the United States flag consistent with federal law, and § 3-120(h) demands that every rule be reasonable.¹ Two limits do real work here. First, this is not a general noncommercial-sign right; it reaches signs about candidates and ballot questions, not every message an owner might post. Second, it protects display on a unit or on the limited common element that adjoins a unit, so displays on the general common elements stay under association control.¹

The date line matters just as much. The VCIOA governs common interest communities created on or after its effective date of January 1, 1999.³ Lawmakers added § 3-120 in 2009, and it took effect January 1, 2012.¹ Section 3-120 does not appear on the list in § 1-204 of provisions that apply retroactively to communities created before January 1, 1999, so the sign protection does not reach those older communities unless they opt into the VCIOA by amending their declaration under § 1-206.³ The Vermont Supreme Court spelled out these mechanics in Watson v. Village at Northshore I Association, Inc., 2018 VT 8, noting that provisions of § 3-120 not listed in § 1-204 do not apply to communities created before January 1, 1999.⁶

Two more statutes help orient the reader, and neither one adds a sign protection. The older Vermont Condominium Ownership Act, Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 27, § 1301 et seq., governs condominiums that chose it before the VCIOA framework applied, and it says nothing about political signs.⁷ The Vermont Nonprofit Corporation Act, Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 11B, governs the corporate structure of associations organized as nonprofits, and it too is silent on signs.⁸ The flag portions of § 3-120(d), along with the federal Freedom to Display the American Flag Act of 2005, deal with flags and belong to the Flag Display page. For contrast, California reaches further: Cal. Civ. Code § 4710 bars governing documents from prohibiting any noncommercial sign, poster, flag, or banner on a member's separate interest, and under § 4710(c) an association "may prohibit noncommercial signs and posters that are more than nine square feet in size and noncommercial flags or banners that are more than 15 square feet in size."⁵

2B. The First Amendment and the state constitution

The federal First Amendment constrains government, not private parties. It switches on only where state action exists, and a homeowners or condominium association is a private entity that a contract created. Enforcing a recorded covenant or a validly adopted rule is private contractual action, so the First Amendment does not, on its own, limit a Vermont association's sign rules. This is the error that turns up most often in lay and even law-firm coverage of the subject: owners and boards assume a constitutional free-speech right runs against the association, and it does not. In Vermont, any sign right traces to the VCIOA and the declaration, not to the federal Constitution.

Two United States Supreme Court decisions surface again and again in sign disputes — Reed v. Town of Gilbert (2015) and City of Austin v. Reagan National Advertising (2022) — and both turn on the content-neutrality of municipal sign codes. They limit how government regulates signs. They do not reach private associations, so they do not govern an association's rules.

The Vermont Constitution carries its own free-speech and free-press guarantee at Chapter I, Article 13, which provides that "the people have a right to freedom of speech, and of writing and publishing their sentiments, concerning the transactions of government, and therefore the freedom of the press ought not to be restrained."⁹ Like the First Amendment, that provision binds government actors. A minority of states read their state constitution's free-speech clause to reach private community associations, and New Jersey leads that group in Mazdabrook Commons Homeowners' Ass'n v. Khan, 210 N.J. 482 (2012), where the New Jersey Supreme Court held that "the sign policy in question violates the free speech clause of the State Constitution."¹⁰ No Vermont decision has applied Chapter I, Article 13 to a private association's sign restrictions.¹¹ Without such authority, the state-action principle controls, Vermont covenants are enforced as private contracts, and the VCIOA — not the constitution — supplies whatever statutory sign rights exist.

2C. The role of CC&Rs and permissible restrictions

For the communities the VCIOA sign provision does not reach, and for the signs it does not cover, the recorded declaration is the rulebook. Precedence runs in order: any applicable statute first, then the recorded declaration, then the bylaws, then the board's rules. Where § 3-120(d) applies, it overrides a conflicting declaration or rule, because owners cannot waive or vary rights the VCIOA confers except as the act itself allows.² Where it does not apply, the declaration decides whether an owner may post a sign at all, and the VCIOA still governs how the association adopts and enforces its rules.¹²

Vermont courts read restrictive covenants by their terms, enforce clear ones as written, and construe any ambiguity against the drafter and in light of the surrounding circumstances.¹³ The VCIOA lays a good-faith obligation over the performance and enforcement of covenants and rules.² Within those limits, an association may generally regulate where signs go — on a lot or unit versus the common elements — and, under § 3-120(d), the time, place, size, number, and manner of protected displays, so long as each rule stays reasonable.¹ Content neutrality and consistent enforcement mark the practical risk: even a valid rule invites a challenge when the association applies it selectively or aims it at a viewpoint. The operational takeaway is straightforward. In Vermont, whether an owner may post a candidate or ballot-question sign turns first on the community's creation date and the VCIOA, and then on the recorded declaration.

Section 3: Operational rules for Vermont associations

Because Vermont protects signs by statute in newer communities but leaves older ones to their declarations, the rules below draw on both the VCIOA and the recorded declaration. Each rule notes which one governs.

A. What an association may not do

An association under the VCIOA may not stop an owner from displaying, on the owner's unit or on the limited common element that adjoins it, signs about candidates for public or association office or ballot questions; a flat ban fails for any community created on or after January 1, 1999 (VCIOA § 3-120(d)).¹ It also may not enforce a sign rule selectively, arbitrarily, or capriciously — a limit that flows from the VCIOA's enforcement-discretion and good-faith provisions and from general covenant law.¹² For a community created before January 1, 1999 that has not opted into the VCIOA, no statute forbids a sign restriction, so the floor is the declaration plus general law, not a sign statute (older condominiums fall under Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 27, § 1301 et seq.).⁷

B. What an association may regulate

Even where § 3-120(d) applies, an association may adopt rules on the time, place, size, number, and manner of protected displays, and every such rule must be reasonable (VCIOA § 3-120(d), (h)).¹ Displays on the general common elements — as opposed to a unit or its adjoining limited common element — stay under association control (VCIOA § 3-120(d)).¹ For the communities the statute does not reach, the declaration may regulate placement, size, number, and duration, and it may impose broader restrictions, including outright bans, where it so provides (recorded declaration).⁷

C. Enforcement and fining constraints

Before it imposes a fine for a sign-rule violation, an association must give notice and an opportunity to be heard; the VCIOA authorizes reasonable fines only "after notice and a hearing" (VCIOA § 3-102(a)(11)).¹² A duty not to act arbitrarily or capriciously constrains the board's decision whether to pursue enforcement, and that duty frames the selective-enforcement risk (VCIOA § 3-102).¹² Self-help removal of an owner's sign carries real legal risk; the safer path runs through the notice-and-hearing process the statute and declaration lay out (VCIOA § 3-102; recorded declaration).¹²

D. Rule adoption and disclosure

To hold up, a sign rule has to clear the VCIOA's rulemaking process: the board gives owners notice of a proposed rule and its text, sets a date on which it will act, then notifies owners and hands over a copy of any rule it adopts (VCIOA § 3-120(a), (b)).¹ Associations must keep records and make them available to owners to inspect and copy (VCIOA § 3-118).¹⁴ For pre-1999 condominiums, the older Condominium Ownership Act governs adoption and recordkeeping (Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 27, § 1301 et seq.).⁷

Section 4: Recent legislative and judicial activity

A. Recent bills

No bill in the Vermont General Assembly's 2023-2024 or 2025-2026 bienniums has amended VCIOA § 3-120 or otherwise changed political-sign rules for Vermont associations. Section 3-120 has stood unchanged since 2009 (effective January 1, 2012).¹ The topic still answers to the VCIOA and, for the communities the statute does not reach, to recorded declarations.

B. Recent rulings

No Vermont Supreme Court decision in the past 36 months has taken up political or campaign signs in community associations or the enforcement of a sign covenant. The only Vermont Supreme Court decision to cite VCIOA § 3-120 at all is Watson v. Village at Northshore I Association, Inc., 2018 VT 8, which addressed other subsections and confirmed that provisions of § 3-120 not listed in § 1-204 do not apply to communities created before January 1, 1999.⁶ Because Vermont has no intermediate appellate court, any appellate ruling on the question would come from the Vermont Supreme Court, on appeal from the Superior Court.¹⁵

C. Active legislative debates

No active proposal to broaden or narrow the VCIOA sign provision turned up in the current session.

Section 5: National positioning and related coverage

Vermont sits among the protective-statute states on political signs, but its statute reaches less far than several of its peers. That group bars associations from prohibiting political or noncommercial signs while letting them set reasonable time, place, and manner rules. California (Civ. Code § 4710) protects any noncommercial sign, subject to a nine-square-foot cap.⁵ Nevada (NRS 116.325) bars boards and governing documents from prohibiting political signs an owner displays in areas used exclusively, and it caps each sign at 24 by 36 inches and one per candidate, party, or ballot question.¹⁶ Maryland (Md. Code, Real Property §§ 11-111.2 and 11B-111.2) provides that a covenant, declaration, or HOA rule "may not restrict or prohibit the display of" a candidate sign or a ballot-question sign, subject to common-area and time limits.¹⁷ Montana (Mont. Code Ann. § 70-1-522) declares any covenant restricting political speech "contrary to the public policy of this state" and unenforceable.¹⁸ A separate, minority route reaches associations through the state constitution, as New Jersey did in Mazdabrook Commons v. Khan. Vermont, though a UCIOA state, protects one defined category — signs about candidates for public or association office and ballot questions — and only for communities created on or after January 1, 1999, so for older communities and for other messages the recorded declaration controls. Owners and boards reach for the First Amendment, but an association is not a state actor, and the federal free-speech clause gives them no basis to challenge its sign rules.

HOA Weekly's Vermont political-signs coverage updates quarterly as the General Assembly and the Vermont Supreme Court act. Several federal frameworks — the FHA, ADA, FDCPA, SCRA, and OTARD — apply to Vermont associations regardless of the state framework, while the federal First Amendment supplies no basis to challenge an association's sign rules.

1. Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 27A, § 3-120 (Rules), Vermont Statutes Online ↩ ↩ ↩ ↩ ↩ ↩ ↩ ↩ ↩ ↩ ↩
2. Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 27A, ch. 1 (General Provisions, incl. §§ 1-101, 1-104, 1-113), Vermont Statutes Online ↩ ↩ ↩
3. Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 27A, §§ 1-201, 1-204, 1-206, Vermont Statutes Online ↩ ↩ ↩
4. Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 27A, § 3-120, Vermont Statutes Online (association rules are private contractual action) ↩
5. Cal. Civ. Code § 4710 (Display of Noncommercial Signs), California Legislative Information ↩ ↩ ↩
6. Watson v. Village at Northshore I Ass'n, Inc., 2018 VT 8, Vermont Judiciary ↩ ↩ ↩
7. Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 27, ch. 15 (Condominium Ownership Act), Vermont Statutes Online ↩ ↩ ↩ ↩
8. Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 11B (Nonprofit Corporation Act), Vermont Statutes Online ↩
9. Vermont Constitution, Chapter I, Article 13, Vermont General Assembly ↩
10. Mazdabrook Commons Homeowners' Ass'n v. Khan, 210 N.J. 482 (2012), New Jersey Supreme Court ↩
11. Vermont Judiciary, Opinions, Decisions and Order Library (no decision applying Ch. I, Art. 13 to a private association) ↩
12. Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 27A, § 3-102 (Powers of unit owners' association), Vermont Statutes Online ↩ ↩ ↩ ↩ ↩
13. Gardner v. Jefferys, 2005 VT 56 (construction of restrictive covenants), Vermont Supreme Court ↩
14. Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 27A, § 3-118 (Association records), Vermont Statutes Online ↩
15. Vermont Judiciary, Supreme Court (no intermediate appellate court; appeals from Superior Court) ↩
16. Nev. Rev. Stat. § 116.325 (Political signs), Nevada Legislature ↩
17. Md. Code, Real Property § 11B-111.2 (Candidate or proposition sign), Maryland General Assembly ↩
18. Mont. Code Ann. § 70-1-522 (Restrictions on political free speech contrary to public policy), Montana Legislature ↩

Last verified: July 17, 2026.