Craven County, NC Public Conduct: Outdoor Smoking Restrictions (2026)

Section 28-1 of the Craven County Code regulates conduct in every 'public recreation area,' defined as any public park, recreation center, playground, ball field, tennis court or other recreation facility the county owns or controls, plus their parking lots. ' That single sentence bans smoking on ball fields, tennis courts, playgrounds, trails, picnic shelters and every other part of a county park except the paved parking areas. The rule applies countywide to every recreation facility Craven operates, not just New Bern-area parks, and it stands alongside the chapter's other conduct rules on alcohol, fireworks and disorderly behavior.

Subsection (19) folds smoking violations into the chapter's general enforcement clause: any violation of Chapter 28 'shall constitute trespass' in addition to any other penalty. Recreation and Parks Department staff and any law enforcement officer, per subsection (18), may eject from the area anyone who breaks the smoking rule, and a person who refuses to leave can be charged criminally for trespass. Because Chapter 28 sets no separate fine, a smoking citation also falls under the Code's general penalty section, Sec. 1-11, which imposes a $500 civil penalty per violation and lets the county recover it as a civil debt if unpaid within ten days of notice, with each additional day of noncompliance running as a new violation.

The rule is limited to property the county owns or controls; New Bern, Havelock and Craven's other incorporated towns run separate park systems with their own rules, and there is no separate outdoor-smoking ban for county sidewalks, streets or private business patios outside the recreation-area definition.