Texas City, TX Homelessness & Encampment Rules: Encampment Sanitation (2026)

Section 92.07 of the Texas City Code of Ordinances is the City of Texas City's own camping rule for its parks and recreation areas. It makes it unlawful for any person to camp within the confines of any public park, public recreation area or city facility located in the city, without express permission by the Recreation and Tourism Director. The permission is not open-ended: it has to be in conjunction with approved events. A person with no event approval has no path to lawful camping on that land.

The definition is what gives the rule reach. Section 92.07(B) says camping includes sleeping or living overnight in a temporary, portable or mobile shelter or vehicle, including tent, but not excluding sleeping in the open air without a shelter. That wording covers a tent or a vehicle used as a shelter, and it also covers a person who sleeps outdoors with no shelter at all. The words overnight and living matter as well, since the definition turns on sleeping or living at the location overnight rather than on being present during the day.

The rule applies on three kinds of City land: a public park, a public recreation area and a city facility. It does not, by its own terms, reach private property or land outside those categories, and this section does not set out a cleanup, storage or property-removal procedure for belongings left behind. Those matters are not addressed in Chapter 92, so this page is limited to what the section states.

Express permission comes from the Recreation and Tourism Director, the same official who sets park hours under § 92.02 and prescribes park rules under § 92.03. A visitor camping at the Texas City Dike also has to follow the Dike's own rules and regulations including hours, fees and use. Because parks are also closed from 10:00 p.m. to 7:00 a.m. where no hours are posted, staying overnight in a park raises a hours problem in addition to a camping problem.