Chandler, AZ Homelessness & Encampment Rules: Encampment Sanitation (2026)

2 defines "camp" as using public property for living accommodation purposes, including sleeping in a tent, vehicle, trailer or other structure, laying out bedding, storing personal belongings, cooking or lighting a fire outside a city-provided fire pit or barbecue pit, or digging and otherwise modifying landscaping. "Public property" is defined expansively to include parks, playgrounds, splash pads, restrooms, streets, sidewalks, rights-of-way, alleys, bike paths, transit stops, preserves, washes, plazas, monuments and parking lots. 3 bars camping on any public property unless expressly designated a permitted camp site, bars camping in any city-owned building, facility, parking lot or structure, and bars camping within 500 feet of a school, childcare facility, shelter or city park boundary.

The chapter exempts City-approved special-event or permitted activities, physical emergencies or medical assistance, and temporary disaster-relief camps set up by government agencies. Adopted by Ordinance No. 5122 on April 10, 2025, the enforcement scheme requires an officer to have already given the person a warning within the prior 12 months, or the site to be conspicuously posted, before a citation can issue, and lets an officer instead take a consenting individual to a facility for mental-health, housing or substance-abuse services in lieu of a criminal citation.