Our Police and Housing & Homeless Services departments are working together on a balanced approach to connect people experiencing homelessness secure housing while enforcing city laws to maintain quality of life and community safety.
At Tuesday’s City Council meeting, Police shared early results of proactive enforcement efforts since the City Council updated a city law in March 2025 to prohibit camping in vehicles in public spaces such as parks, beaches and city-owned property and parking lots. Under this ordinance:
- The city continues its approach of first offering shelter and services prior to citing a person.
- If services are refused, the city’s officers then can issue warnings.
- If the unlawful behavior continues, citations are an available tool for officers to use.
Before enforcement began, our Homeless Outreach Team – consisting of six officers and one Sergeant working daily in the community – contacted individuals living in vehicles to inform them of the new laws and try to bridge them to available resources.
Since then, Homeless Outreach Team officers, rangers and community service officers have carried out late night and early morning enforcement citywide to address oversized vehicles, unlawful camping and other parking related violations.
Here are the results since June 2025:
- 32 warnings
- 40 citations
- 13 vehicles towed
Police also shared an update on parking enforcement efforts related to oversized vehicle parking (like RVs) and illegal parking violations. Parking enforcement is a team effort in Carlsbad, with police officers, community service officers and our Senior Volunteer Patrol all playing a role. Since January 2025, more than 7,000 citations and warnings were issued, focusing on oversized vehicles and other violations that affect safety, accessibility and quality of life.
In December, staff will provide an annual progress report on overall efforts to reduce homelessness and its effects on the community, including a new grant funded-outreach program in the Village, Barrio and beach areas to connect people living in vehicles to housing and services.
You can call the non-emergency Police line at 442-339-2197 to report time-sensitive violations or concerns, such as overnight parking. Fore recurring parking violations that do not require immediate attention, you can also report concerns three ways:
