Cobb County, GA Public Conduct: Outdoor Smoking Restrictions (2026)

Section 90-63(b) of the Cobb County Code, part of Chapter 90's park rules, prohibits smoking or vaping "within the boundaries of any park, sports complex, recreation area or facility owned, leased, or operated by Cobb County, including any open area within such park, sports complex, recreation area or facility." The ban reaches parking lots, trails, ball fields, and picnic pavilions exactly as it reaches restrooms and clubhouses, since the ordinance text specifically extends to "any open area." The only exception is a designated smoking area, and the code gives sole discretion over whether to create one to the Cobb Parks Director, not to individual park visitors or facility operators. The provision was added by amendment on February 11, 2020 and last amended September 27, 2022, in the same section that now also carries the county's e-bike trail-class rules.

Because § 90-63 sits in Article III, Division 1 of Chapter 90 ("Park Rules, Generally"), a violation is punished under § 90-51, which routes penalties to the county's general penalty ordinance, § 1-10. That section makes violating a county ordinance a misdemeanor, with a fine, imprisonment, and/or probation "not to exceed the maximum punishment as set out by Georgia law under O.C.G.A. § 15-10-60," and it separately lets the county seek an injunction against a continuing violation. Cobb Department of Public Safety officers and parks staff can also eject a smoker from the park immediately under § 90-54, which authorizes "any authorized park employee or any law enforcement officer" to remove anyone violating "any provision of this article."

The park ban is separate from Cobb's indoor no-smoking policy for government buildings (§ 94-2), which permits smoking only in specially ventilated, floor-to-ceiling-walled offices designated by a department head, tied to the state's public-buildings smoking law, O.C.G.A. § 16-12-2. Section 90-63(b) applies only to parks the county itself runs, in unincorporated Cobb; Marietta, Smyrna, Kennesaw, Acworth, Powder Springs, and Austell each maintain their own separate park systems under their own municipal codes, so smoking rules at a park inside any of those cities come from that city's ordinances instead.