Why the question was open in the first place

Most Virginia associations are two things at once. They are common interest communities under Title 55.1 — governed by a recorded declaration that runs with the land and binds every successive owner — and they are Virginia nonstock corporations under Title 13.1, governed by articles of incorporation and bylaws that a board or a membership can amend on the corporate statute's terms.

Those two instrument sets are drafted decades apart, often by different lawyers, and they drift. A declaration recorded in 1988 might make assessment liability automatic and non-waivable; bylaws amended in 2015 might create a membership-suspension mechanism that appears to switch it off. Before this amendment, an owner resisting an assessment could point at the corporate document and argue the corporate statute governed the corporate relationship. The argument was not frivolous, and it was expensive to answer.

The two categories the subsection actually covers

The new subsection is narrow on its face, and the narrowness matters. It addresses conflicts about:

• member liability for dues, assessments, and fees; and
• membership itself — including resignation from it and suspension of it.

It does not, by its terms, resolve every declaration-versus-bylaws conflict. Quorum mechanics, notice periods, director qualifications, architectural procedure and voting method are not named. Subsection D is broader — the chapter cannot “affect the validity of or supersede” a declaration provision — but it is a construction rule rather than a conflict-resolution rule, and it is directed at the corporate statute rather than at the association's own bylaws.

What sits alongside it in the same enactment

The subsection did not arrive alone. Chapters 393 and 394 also add a new Article 7.2 on derivative proceedings, opening § 13.1-852.3 (effective the same day), and a judicial director-removal provision permitting a circuit court to remove a director who “engaged in fraudulent conduct with respect to the corporation or its members, grossly abused the position of director, or intentionally inflicted harm on the corporation.”² An association reading the new subsection C as a win for boards has only read part of the chapter.

The conditions that change the answer

Three things determine whether this reaches a given Virginia community.

The association must be incorporated under Title 13.1. Section 13.1-814.1(A) defines a “community association” as a corporation incorporated under that chapter or under former Chapter 2 of the title. An unincorporated association is outside the section entirely.

There must be an actual conflict. Where the declaration is silent and the bylaws supply the rule, there is nothing to resolve and the bylaws continue to operate.

The declaration must itself be valid. A priority rule ranks two documents; it does not cure a defect in the senior one. Virginia's Court of Appeals held in February 2026 that a declaration granting assessment power without imposing a corresponding maintenance duty does not create a valid property owners' association at all — and a declaration that fails that test gains nothing from outranking the bylaws.

What to watch next

The effective date is January 1, 2027, so associations with a conflict on the books have a full budget cycle in which to reconcile the documents rather than litigate the priority. The section's own history line now reads “1986, c. 532; 2026, cc. 393, 394” — forty years between amendments, which is a fair measure of how rarely this corner of the Code moves.