Whittier, CA Public Conduct: Public Alcohol Use (2026)

Section 9.12.010 sits in Chapter 9.12, Intoxicated Persons, within Title 9's Public Peace, Morals and Welfare provisions, and traces to Prior Code Section 4260. Subsection A prohibits drinking any intoxicating liquor upon a public street, alley, sidewalk, park or other public place in the city, and specifically states the rule applies whether or not the drinker is in or on an automobile, motorcycle, vehicle or other conveyance, closing off the argument that being inside a car takes a drinker outside the public-place ban. Subsection B defines intoxicating liquor broadly to include beer, wine, whiskey and gin, or any other beverage exceeding one-half of one percent alcohol by volume, a threshold low enough to sweep in most beer and wine along with hard liquor. The chapter's placement alongside Whittier's other intoxicated-persons provisions signals that the city treats public drinking as part of its broader public-order enforcement rather than as a narrow open-container traffic rule.