Kokomo, IN Public Conduct: Public Alcohol Use (2026)

Subsection (E) of § 96.19, Kokomo's park Disorderly Conduct section, bans drinking, selling, possessing, gifting, or offering for sale any alcoholic liquor or controlled substance within the confines of a city park. It goes further than a simple open-container rule: anyone already under the influence of alcohol or a controlled substance is barred from entering or remaining in a park at all, and the section separately forbids using, administering, receiving, offering for sale, possessing, or making available any alcoholic liquor or controlled substance to oneself or another person while inside.

An editor's note under § 96.10 explains that the term 'controlled substances,' defined by reference to IC 35-48-1, replaced the older term 'dangerous drugs' throughout the chapter after a statutory reference was repealed. The rule covers every park in the system, defined in § 96.10 as all land, water, and facilities owned, leased, controlled, or used by the Parks and Recreation Department, and it is enforced by rangers appointed under the Board of Park Commissioners. The provision sits directly beside § 96.19(F), which separately bars carrying concealed weapons in a park, and § 96.19(G), which bars gambling, showing Kokomo grouped alcohol, weapons, and gambling together as core park order-and-safety rules. Because the section carries no exceptions or permit process of its own, the ban applies uniformly to every visitor regardless of age.