Spalding County, GA Public Conduct: Public Alcohol Use (2026)

Sec. 11-1004, added to the offenses chapter by Ord. No. 2012-05 on April 16, 2012, closes a specific gap in Spalding County's alcohol licensing scheme rather than imposing a general ban on drinking in public. Once a location's license for on-premises alcohol consumption has been revoked or suspended, the ordinance makes it unlawful for anyone to consume or possess alcoholic beverages at that establishment for the following twelve months, unless the establishment has since obtained a new consumption license. The rule follows Sec. 11-1003's disorderly conduct offenses in the same chapter and functions as an enforcement backstop for the county's alcoholic beverage licensing article in Part VI, which otherwise governs retail package sales, on-premises consumption permits, and hours of sale for licensed establishments.

Because the offense sits in Part XI, Chapter 1, Offenses Against Public Order and Safety, rather than in the licensing article, it is enforced the same way as the chapter's other public-order offenses: through Sec. 11-1002's general violation and enforcement clause, which ties the punishment to the code's Sec. 1-1007 general penalty and to the maximum fine and jail term Georgia law allows for county ordinance violations. The provision does not reach drinking on a public street, sidewalk, or park; it is limited by its own terms to consumption or possession at an establishment whose license has recently been pulled.