Maryland authorized condo boards to install EV charging in common parking areas. New York has no equivalent.

On October 1, 2026, Maryland Chapter 753 took effect. The law prohibits any provision in a condominium or homeowners association's governing documents from unreasonably restricting a board's authority to install electric vehicle recharging equipment in common parking areas, and it applies retroactively to every governing document adopted before that date. New York's right-to-charge statute, Real Property Law § 339-LL, protects a condo unit owner's right to install a charger in their own dedicated parking space. It does not void governing document restrictions on board-driven common-area charging programs, and it does not apply to co-op shareholders at all.

What Maryland's Chapter 753 requires.

Maryland House Bill 405 passed both chambers of the Maryland General Assembly and was signed by Governor Wes Moore on May 26, 2026. The text, codified as Chapter 753, amends the Maryland Condominium Act and the Homeowners Association Act to establish that governing documents may not prohibit or unreasonably restrict a board from installing or authorizing the installation of electric vehicle recharging equipment in common-use or limited common-use parking areas.

The law applies retroactively. Its operative language covers any covenant or restriction "recorded or adopted on or before" October 1, 2026, so an association cannot rely on pre-existing governing document language to block a board-driven EV charging project. The board retains full authority to manage the project through its normal budget process: any EV recharging equipment installation must go through the same approval procedures that would apply to a common-area renovation of comparable cost or scope. No separate unit-owner vote is required beyond what the governing documents already require for improvements of that cost level, and the cost-level requirement itself cannot be weaponized to block EV charging specifically.

Chapter 753 also authorizes boards to grant renewable three-year licenses over any portion of a common element needed for the installation or for the electrical supply to it. Before approving a project, the board must consider whether sufficient parking remains available to serve the rest of the community. Sponsor testimony before the Maryland House Economic Matters Committee noted that a majority of HOA and condo governing documents in Maryland were drafted before EVs were a commercial product and that many contain restrictions on common-area improvements broad enough to block an EV charging project even when the board, the owners, and the vendor are all ready to proceed.

What New York's § 339-LL covers.

New York Real Property Law § 339-LL took effect in 2019, enacted through A.6338-A. The statute makes void and unenforceable any covenant, restriction, or condition in a condominium declaration that effectively prohibits or unreasonably restricts the installation or use of an electric vehicle charging station within an owner's unit or in a designated parking space, including a deeded space, a space in an exclusive-use common element, or a space specifically assigned to a particular owner.

The statute sets a 60-day response clock on board applications from unit owners. If a board does not deny an owner's installation request in writing within 60 days of receipt, the application is automatically approved. The board may impose reasonable conditions: use of a licensed contractor, compliance with architectural standards, a certificate of insurance naming the association as additional insured, and the owner's responsibility for installation and operating costs.

On the question of board-driven common-area charging, § 339-LL contains one sentence: an association "may install an EV charger in the common area for the use of all condominium owners." That language is permissive. It tells a board it is authorized to do this; it does not void any governing document restriction that would otherwise require a supermajority owner vote before the board can add equipment to common parking. A board in a building whose declaration requires a two-thirds vote of unit owners to install new systems in common areas cannot rely on § 339-LL to proceed without that vote. Maryland's Chapter 753 removes that procedural barrier. New York's statute does not.

The co-op shareholder's position.

New York City's owner-occupied housing stock is dominated by cooperative apartments: roughly 45 percent of owned units in the city are co-ops, where the resident owns shares in a corporation and holds a proprietary lease rather than a deed to a unit. The legal structure matters for EV charging because § 339-LL is written around property law concepts a co-op shareholder does not hold.

The statute defines the protected installation as occurring "within an owner's unit or in a designated parking space." A co-op shareholder does not own a unit or a deeded parking space. The 60-day approval clock and the voidness provision both depend on the unit-owner framework. New York has not enacted any companion statute giving co-op shareholders a comparable right to demand EV charging installation, either in an assigned space or in a common area. The board's authority in a co-op building is governed by the proprietary lease, the house rules, and the business judgment rule. No statute requires a co-op board to process an EV charging application on any timeline, and no statute voids proprietary-lease provisions that restrict such installations.

The result is a three-tier picture. Maryland condo boards, after October 1, can authorize common-area EV charging without governing-document interference. New York condo unit owners can install in their own dedicated spaces with a 60-day clock. New York co-op shareholders have no statutory floor at all.

Why the gap matters now.

Local Law 97 fines covered NYC buildings $268 per metric ton of carbon over their 2025 cap and tightens again in 2030. The compliance pathway building engineers and NYCEEC advisors most commonly recommend involves replacing gas-fired central heating with electric heat pumps. When a building installs heat pumps, the electrical panel upgrade and new service capacity it requires can also support Level 2 EV charging equipment in common parking at far lower incremental cost than a standalone EV charging project. A board that has already run new electrical service for an LL97 compliance project has the infrastructure to add managed common parking EV charging without a second set of ConEd interconnection fees and permit costs.

The board-driven, common-area approach also qualifies for incentive programs that individual owner installations do not reach at the same scale. NYSERDA's Charge NY initiative provides rebates for Level 2 charging equipment in multi-unit residential buildings when the project is board-driven and the chargers serve multiple residents. ConEd's EV Make-Ready program covers part of the infrastructure cost for qualifying common-area installations in buildings that apply through the utility. Individual owner installations in a dedicated parking space under § 339-LL do not qualify for the same ConEd program structure.

For a New York condo board pursuing an LL97 compliance project that includes common-area EV charging, the governing document risk is real. A declaration drafted in 1975 might require a 60 percent owner vote before the board can add any new systems to a common parking deck. Nothing in § 339-LL overrides that requirement for an EV charging project. The board can call an owner meeting, run the vote, and likely pass it, but the procedural obligation exists. In Maryland after October 1, it does not.

The managing agent in the middle.

Whether a New York condo board navigates its governing documents successfully or gets blocked by a supermajority requirement, the person executing the decision on the ground is typically the managing agent: evaluating bids from charging equipment vendors, coordinating with the electrician and DOB for the permit, contracting with a third-party operator if the building uses a networked charging program, and managing the ongoing relationship with ConEd. In New York, that person holds no state license, faces no minimum education requirement, and is not subject to professional discipline if a charging project goes badly or is never completed.

Senate Bill S.71, which would have required managing agents of NYC co-ops and condos to register with the Secretary of State and obtain certification from an approved organization, did not receive a committee hearing in ten consecutive sessions. The bill's longtime sponsor, Senator Brian Kavanagh, announced he would not seek re-election; the 2027 session has no identified sponsor. The specific competency gap the managing agent licensure debate was designed to close, the absence of any minimum standard for the person coordinating capital expenditures in your building, is the same gap that applies to EV charging project management in New York.

Bottom line.

Maryland's Chapter 753 addresses a concrete problem: governing documents drafted before EVs existed can block boards from moving forward even when owners, boards, and vendors are aligned. New York's § 339-LL gave individual condo unit owners a meaningful right in 2019. It did not give boards the parallel protection Maryland now provides, and it left co-op shareholders outside the statute entirely. As LL97 pushes NYC buildings toward electrification and EV adoption makes common-area charging a capital planning question rather than a future option, the gap between what a Maryland board can decide and what a New York board must negotiate with its governing documents is not a timing gap. It is a policy choice, the same one New York has made on managing-agent licensure, reserve studies, and resale disclosure: boards receive the authority to act, and owners receive no statutory floor on what the board must provide.

Primary sources: Maryland Chapter 753 (HB 405) — Maryland EV charging authority for boards · MD HB 405 legislative history — LegiScan bill record · NY RPL § 339-LL — NY right-to-charge statute · NY A.6338-A (2019) — enacting legislation for § 339-LL

Companion resources: LL97 first-year compliance and the 2030 cliff · LL97 C-PACE financing gap for co-ops · Managing agent licensure and the 2027 session · Florida HB 913 and the NY policy gap · All regulatory gaps · How we source claims