Lakewood, CA Curfew Laws: Park Curfew (2026)

Section 4254, added by Ordinance 80-15 as part of the code's loitering and trespassing chapter, sets Lakewood's park curfew at 11:00 p.m. to sunrise the next day for any park, recreation facility, land, building or improvement owned or operated by the City. The only exception written into the section is for a person required by their employment to be on the property during those hours, such as maintenance or security staff.

The same section separately reaches park and recreation land inside Lakewood's city limits that is owned or maintained by Los Angeles County rather than the city, an overlap that matters because Lakewood is the original contract city: it relies on the County for police, fire and other services, and some recreational parcels within its borders are County-operated. For those County facilities, the curfew is not the fixed 11 p.m.-to-sunrise window; instead, it is unlawful to be present whenever the County has posted the facility as closed or otherwise directed the public to stay out during closed hours.

Section 4254 is expressly inapplicable whenever a facility, city or county, is opened to the public by written order of the city or county for a particular use, such as a permitted nighttime event. Separate park nuisance and conduct rules recorded elsewhere in the code, including a distinct ejection-and-hearing process for people barred for misconduct, sit alongside this curfew but govern different situations. A curfew violation is prosecuted like any other Municipal Code violation, as a misdemeanor under Section 1200 unless a citing officer designates it an infraction.