Vanderburgh County, IN Property Maintenance: Snow & Sidewalk Clearing (2026)

04's "Streets and Sidewalks Generally" rules, places the snow and ice removal duty on the "occupant of a premises," defined as the occupant of the building's first floor regardless of whether the occupancy is residential or business. If the first floor sits unoccupied, the duty shifts to the property owner instead. The obligation is to remove the snow and ice that collects on the abutting sidewalk. The code does not set a fixed number of hours or days to comply; instead it builds in a practical standard for conditions that make removal impossible: when snow or ice is frozen too hard to remove by normal means, when removal would damage the sidewalk, or when weather conditions make removal impracticable, the responsible person must instead sprinkle the walk with sand, salt, sawdust, or similar material to make it safe to walk on, and must finish the actual cleanup as soon as the weather permits.

080, and is enforced the same way, under a single penalty section covering the whole chapter. Because county road jurisdiction reaches the unincorporated area and county-maintained roads, this duty applies to sidewalks along those routes rather than sidewalks inside Evansville, which enforces its own snow-clearing rule.