Orange County, CA Sidewalk & Pedestrian Rules: Obstruction Rules (2026)

Orange County Codified Ordinances section 3-4-14 makes it a misdemeanor for any person to willfully and maliciously obstruct the free movement of another person on a street, sidewalk, or other public place, or in any place open to the public. The two-part mental state matters: the obstruction must be both willful, meaning deliberate, and malicious, so accidental congestion, an unintentionally parked delivery cart, or a momentary crowd does not violate the section on its own. What the statute reaches is broad, covering not only paved sidewalks but any public place and any place open to the public, from a county parking lot to a lobby, wherever someone deliberately keeps another person from moving freely.

022 and was carried forward, unchanged in substance, when the Board of Supervisors renumbered and reorganized the Code by Ordinance No. 98-15, section 26, adopted December 8, 1998. It now sits in Division 4, Disorderly Conduct, Places and Publications, Article 2, of Title 3, the county's public morals, safety and welfare title, applicable in the unincorporated area of the county; the 34 incorporated cities, including Anaheim and Santa Ana, enforce their own municipal codes for sidewalk obstruction. Because section 3-4-14 does not set its own punishment beyond labeling the act a misdemeanor, the general penalty at section 1-1-34 applies: conviction carries a fine of up to one thousand dollars, up to six months in County Jail, or both.

Section 1-1-35 further provides that a continuing obstruction is a separate offense for each day, or portion of a day, that it is committed, continued or permitted.