El Dorado Hills HOA Guide: Local Rules for Boards and Owners

El Dorado Hills has more than 104 sets of recorded CC&Rs, and the Community Services District says it enforces about two-thirds of them. That is unusual. In most of California only an association or the owners themselves enforce CC&Rs. Here, voters gave the CSD that job in 1983 (Measure B) and approved a special tax of up to $10 per parcel per year to pay for it.

Two points matter for boards. First, know which side of the line you are on. The CSD lists about 40 communities, Serrano and Blackstone among them, whose own association or architectural committee approves owner applications. If yours is one, enforcement is your board’s job under your documents and state law, and you should not expect the CSD to step in. Second, the line is not always clean. The CSD’s own list notes one association that handles common area maintenance only, and another where the CSD committee must still approve all property improvements. Read the table and your documents together, and tell owners in plain words who to call.

If your village has CC&Rs but no working association, the CSD may be the only enforcer. It works from the street and from its priority list, so some violations that bother neighbors will not get attention.

Most villages require approval before an owner changes the outside of a home or lot. Where the CSD holds that authority, its Design Review Committee (DRC) does the review. The CSD describes the DRC as the successor to the original architectural control committees. Where an association has its own committee, owners apply to the association and nothing goes to the CSD.

Neither a CSD approval nor an association approval is a county permit. The CSD says it is the owner’s job to find out whether El Dorado County also has to approve the work. If your association runs its own review, say so clearly on your website and in your welcome packet. New owners in El Dorado Hills often do not know which office to apply to.

The county’s defensible space rules are in County Code Chapter 8.09, Hazardous Vegetation and Defensible Space. The current version was adopted July 16, 2024 and took effect August 16, 2024. It applies all year to every property in the unincorporated county, and it goes further than state law in a few places. We read the county’s summary, FAQ and web page for this chapter, not the ordinance text itself.

Two points matter for boards. First, the good neighbor rule applies to improved and unimproved parcels. As we read the county’s summary, that includes association-owned open space behind a row of homes, so the association may have to clear within 100 feet of an owner’s house even though the house is not on association land. Second, if your association owns its streets, the road clearance is yours to maintain.

To find a parcel’s zone, use the State Fire Marshal’s Fire Hazard Severity Zone Viewer. We do not state a zone for any neighborhood. For sale inspections, the county lists both CAL FIRE and the El Dorado Hills Fire Department as inspecting agencies, depending on where the parcel sits. Call the Fire Department at (916) 933-6623 to learn which one covers yours. Only the seller or the seller’s agent can request the inspection.

The El Dorado Hills Fire Department runs a separate Vacant Lot Program for undeveloped parcels in El Dorado Hills and Latrobe. Its governing board has declared weeds on unimproved property a fire hazard and a public nuisance (the department’s page cites Ordinance 2024-01). Owners must bring vacant parcels up to the department’s Standard W-001 by May 1 each year. A lot that is not cleared can be abated by the Fire Department.

We could not open Standard W-001 itself, so we do not quote its heights or widths. Ask the department’s defensible space inspector at (916) 933-6623 ext. 1044 for the current standard.

The department tells lot owners to follow their HOA’s rules as well as its own. That gives a board a clear role: remind owners of unbuilt lots in March, and check that any undeveloped parcel the association owns is on your landscaper’s schedule before the deadline.

El Dorado County regulates short-term rentals in County Code Chapter 5.56, and the rules reach El Dorado Hills. The county says it is operating under the ordinance adopted November 21, 2024. The county’s pages describe the rules this way:

These rules are under review. As of August 18, 2026 the county was studying changes aimed mainly at the West Slope, including removing the buffer for hosted rentals, dropping the two-bedroom cap and raising the occupancy limit. Check the county’s Vacation Home Rentals page before you quote a number to an owner.

Nothing on the county’s pages says it checks CC&Rs before it issues a permit, so do not expect the county to enforce yours. California Civil Code section 4741 limits rental bans but says it does not stop an association from prohibiting rentals of 30 days or less.

The county’s Oak Resources Conservation Ordinance is Chapter 130.39 of the zoning code. The Board of Supervisors approved updates on July 22, 2025. It applies to private land in the unincorporated county at or below 4,000 feet in elevation.

Expect a second layer. The CSD lists tree removal among the projects its Design Review Committee reviews, and it tells owners to check their village CC&Rs for oak preservation language. An association with its own committee will have its own tree rule. Before a vendor removes or heavily prunes an oak in a common area, call the county Planning Division at (530) 621-5355 and check your own documents.

The El Dorado Irrigation District (EID) supplies water. EID has been at normal water supply conditions since its board ended a Stage 1 Water Alert on April 24, 2023, and we found no day-of-week watering schedule on its site. Its water waste rule, Administrative Regulation 1041, applies all year in any conditions. We could not open the regulation’s list of prohibited uses, so ask EID’s water efficiency office at (530) 642-4126 for it.

EID also runs a recycled water system in El Dorado Hills. It has run the system since the late 1970s and in 2004 required recycled water for new subdivisions in the service area. It now irrigates front and back yards, parks and common areas for more than 5,600 homes and almost 100 businesses. If your community is on that system, find out which of your meters are recycled and which are drinking water. It affects the next point.

The deadline to plan for is January 1, 2029. From that date state law bars the use of drinking water on nonfunctional turf in HOA common areas. Nonfunctional turf is mowed grass that is only decorative, such as strips along streets and parking lots. Grass that people use for recreation or gatherings can still be watered, and so can trees. The law requires you to stop watering that turf with drinking water. It does not require you to remove it. An association with more than 5,000 square feet of irrigated common area must also certify compliance to the state by June 30, 2031, and every three years after that until 2040.

The law is written for drinking water, and the State Water Board’s guidance does not discuss recycled water. If your common-area turf runs on EID’s recycled system, ask EID in writing how the deadline applies to you before you budget for a conversion.

On rebates, EID’s 2026 program pays up to $250 per water account for items such as smart irrigation controllers and flow monitoring devices. It does not list a turf replacement rebate. EID does offer a free site visit, called a Water Wise Business Call, to commercial customers including HOAs.

ADUs. The county’s accessory dwelling unit rules are in zoning code section 130.40.300. The county’s ADU page says units range from 220 to 1,600 square feet in some cases and offers pre-reviewed plan sets. It does not state height, setback or parking limits, and we could not open the code text, so we do not quote them. For boards, the state rule matters most. Civil Code section 4751 voids CC&R provisions that prohibit or unreasonably restrict an ADU or junior ADU on a lot zoned for single-family use. An association can still apply reasonable restrictions through architectural review.

RVs, boats and trailers. The CSD says most CC&Rs in El Dorado Hills do not allow RVs, motor homes, trailers or boats to be parked on the street or on the lot. Where the CSD enforces, it offers a Temporary Parking Notification form for loading and unloading, limited to 48 hours before or after a trip. The same form covers dumpsters and storage pods. We could not confirm the county’s own street parking limits, so we do not quote one.

Construction noise. The CSD’s FAQ says the county sets no start and end times for construction noise. It suggests asking crews to hold loud work until after 7 a.m. on weekdays and 8 a.m. on weekends, and calling the Sheriff at (530) 621-5655 if that fails. The county zoning code does have a noise chapter (Chapter 130.37) that we could not open, so confirm the current rule with the Planning Division before you put hours in a contract. Your own rules can set work hours.

Gates. County Code Enforcement lists fences and gates within easements among the violations it handles, and the zoning code has a section on gates (130.30.090) that we could not open. Before your association adds or changes an entry gate, call the Planning Division and the El Dorado Hills Fire Department about permits and emergency access.