Albemarle County, VA Public Conduct: Public Urination (2026)

Sec. 10-124 was added to the County Code by Ord. 10-10(1) on November 3, 2010, and it stands on its own in Chapter 10, Offenses-Miscellaneous, rather than being folded into the older disorderly conduct or public intoxication sections that surround it. Subsection A prohibits urinating or defecating within public view upon any street, highway, sidewalk, ground, public place, or place where others are present, and it carves out a single exception for a bathroom, restroom, or other facility designed for that purpose. The prohibition turns on public view, so the offense reaches conduct on private land as well as county streets and parks if it can be seen by others who are present.

The Albemarle County Police Department, not the Sheriff's Office, enforces this section as part of its general offenses jurisdiction; Animal Protection officers within the police department have no role here. 2-1200. The section sits alongside related public-order provisions in the same chapter, including the profane swearing and public intoxication ban at Sec. 10-106 and the open-container ban at Sec. 10-104, and officers commonly cite more than one of these sections together when responding to the same incident. There is no separate civil fine track for this offense: it is charged criminally and prosecuted in Albemarle County General District Court.