The WNC Desk · North Carolina
What the 2026 legislature did on homelessness
Three bills, moving together in one July week: longer court-ordered treatment, a statewide camping ban, and a bar on most local parking minimums.
Session action late June–July 2026 · Prepared 2026-07-07 · Updated 2026-08-14 (HB 437 and HB 1104 corrected against the bill texts)
In one week this summer, North Carolina's legislature moved to change how the state treats people who are homeless or in mental-health crisis. Three bills moved together, and they point the same way: more court-ordered treatment, a tougher rule on sleeping outside, and a lighter hand on the zoning that keeps housing scarce. Governor Stein signed two into law on July 6 and vetoed the third on July 8. None of them arrives with much new money.
The three bills
Longer court-ordered treatment
The biggest change is signed, and starts later this year. HB 1104 doubles the longest first order a court can make for outpatient commitment, from 90 days to 180, for proceedings on or after December 1, 2026; renewal orders could already run 180 days. The law does more than that. For the same proceedings, it adds two tests for outpatient commitment. A person must have a history of declining or not following treatment prescribed by a licensed provider, together with at least one of these in the relevant past: prior violent convictions, repeated violations of a civil protective order, repeated incarcerations, or repeated involuntary psychiatric hospitalizations. And the person must be due for discharge from inpatient hospital care or for release from a county jail or state prison, though a court may, at its discretion, commit someone living outside an institution who meets every other test. It also pushes back, from December 1, 2026 to July 1, 2028, an Iryna's Law rule requiring judicial officials who set pretrial release to order a commitment exam for two groups of defendants: those charged with a violent offense who were under a commitment order in the prior three years, and those charged with any offense whom the official has reasonable grounds to believe are a danger to themselves or others. It ends an exemption from the state health-information network for records covered by the federal confidentiality rule 42 C.F.R. Part 2, once the network's authority gives written notice, and it adds an inpatient program in the state psychiatric hospitals, beside the existing community and jail programs, to restore capacity for defendants found unable to stand trial. And from December 1, 2026, when a court finds at a supplemental hearing that someone did not comply with an outpatient order, the law creates a rebuttable presumption that they are dangerous; the court can then order inpatient commitment if it also finds, by clear, cogent and convincing evidence, that the person is mentally ill. Much of the remainder is homework. It orders the state to look into whether law enforcement could be given access to BH SCAN, the statewide registry of open psychiatric beds, and it orders the sheriffs' association to propose a pilot for doing jail mental-health evaluations by telehealth. Both reports are due March 1, 2027. The order to give law enforcement that access came a day later, in the state budget. Supporters call it a way to get people into care faster. It carries no new treatment funding.
A statewide camping ban
The most contested bill passed both chambers, and Governor Stein vetoed it on July 8. The House put an override on its calendar for August 4, then adjourned on August 6 without taking the vote. The schedule lawmakers adopted sets brief sessions before the election, with veto overrides allowed at each, but leaders said they planned no votes before November 16, after the election, unless something unexpected came up. So it is still not settled. HB 437 would forbid every city and county in North Carolina from regularly allowing people to camp or sleep on public property. It does not make camping a crime, and the ban would not apply while a state of emergency declared by the governor or by a local government is in force. A person who lives or owns a business in a city or county that allowed people to camp there regularly, or the attorney general, could sue that city or county to stop it. But the request for a court order would have to come with a sworn statement that whoever sued had given written notice, waited fifteen business days, and that the local government had failed to take all reasonable steps within its powers to fix the problem. A resident or business owner who won could be awarded reasonable costs and fees. The House gave it final passage 73 to 40 on June 30; the Senate had passed it 26 to 16 the week before. Supporters say a statewide rule gives cities a clearer tool to keep public spaces clear and to move people toward services. The bill would also let a local government set aside property it owns within its boundaries as a camping area for no more than one continuous year, once the site is certified through the state Department of Labor, and a site can be certified only if, among other things, the local government shows there are not enough open shelter beds for its homeless population. State Sen. Julie Mayfield, a Buncombe Democrat, raised concerns that it would burden local governments and said it carries no money for efforts to help homeless people, and the head of an Asheville homeless shelter said it puts a strain on local governments, especially law enforcement.
Most parking minimums barred from 2027
The quietest bill may do the most for housing. Starting January 1, 2027, HB 162 bars cities and counties from requiring a minimum number of off-street parking spaces for any development or structure; local governments in the coastal area are exempt, except on historic-district, historic-landmark and Study List properties. Those rules raise the cost of building and can kill small, affordable projects outright. Removing them will not build a single home by itself. But it clears one obstacle that has stood in the way for years, and it was the state's main housing move of the session, a rule change rather than new money, as the new state budget shows. The same bill has a second half that has nothing to do with parking. State law already barred stormwater rules from making owners add new controls for existing development, or for redevelopment that keeps the controls it has, and already counted only new surface on a redeveloped site, even where old surface was torn down; HB 162 rewrites that part of the law to say that buildings and pavement already on a site are credited square foot for square foot when it is developed or redeveloped, even if they are torn down and replaced, and it lets local governments offer voluntary incentives for extra controls. In a region rebuilding from a flood, that is worth watching, and it is a separate story.
What it means here
Put the three together and Western North Carolina feels all of them. Buncombe County counted 824 people homeless on a single night in February 2026, and 334 of them had no shelter at all; the state as a whole counted 15,512 in its 2025 tally.† The camping ban would reach the people among those 334 who sleep outside on public property; it does not cover sleeping in a motor vehicle that is registered, insured and in a place where it may lawfully be used, or camping for recreation on property set aside for it. A statewide rule against sleeping outside does not add a shelter bed in Asheville. It leaves a city two ways to comply: clear the camps it now tolerates, or open a certified site of its own. The bill puts the duty on the city or county, not on an officer: it may not allow regular camping on public property unless it opens a state-certified site, and a site can be certified only if there are not enough open shelter beds.
The commitment law runs into the same wall from the other side. From December 1, 2026, a Buncombe court can make an outpatient commitment order of up to 180 days, but the staff to carry that order out are in short supply. The state psychiatric hospitals are short of both, and Marvin Swartz, a Duke psychiatrist who has studied outpatient commitment, said the state health department does not have enough people to run the kind of system lawmakers have in mind. A longer order does not create a clinician. A court may order outpatient commitment only after making findings on whether treatment is available from a provider that has agreed to take the person, so where clinicians are scarce, the shortage, not the length of the order, sets how far the law reaches. The parking repeal points the other way, easing over time the housing shortage that sits under both. But that relief is measured in years. The commitment law is already counting. The ban would not be: even if the veto is overridden, its camping section does not take effect until June 30, 2027.
The thread through all three is money
The commitment law adds no funding, though the state put more than $800 million into mental health in an earlier cycle.§ The camping ban sends nothing to the cities and counties that would have to carry it out. Only the parking repeal costs the state nothing, because it works by removing a rule rather than spending a dollar. Where the state's dollars did go this year, on housing, Helene, and a Medicaid food-and-housing pilot, is its own story. A state can order treatment and ban a tent. Neither one builds a bed.
The bottom line
North Carolina's 2026 session moved decisively on homelessness, in the same direction as Washington: treatment first, enforcement first, and only a modest nod to the housing supply underneath it all. Two of the three bills are law. The hardest question, where the beds and the money come from, the session mostly left for later.
How to read this honestly
This is a roundup, not a verdict on any one bill. Two of the three are signed, and the third, the camping ban, was vetoed on July 8; an override attempt is still possible, so check the bill's status before treating the ban as settled either way. Reasonable people read these differently: supporters see faster paths into treatment and cleaner public spaces, and Step Up AVL's own explainers, linked below, argue the fuller case on the commitment law and the camping ban. What is not in dispute is the pattern, three bills leaning the same way in a single week.
Sources: WCTI ABC 12, "Gov. Stein signs laws on gang violence, involuntary commitment, housing rules and state HR" (2026-07-06); NC Governor's Office signing release; UNC School of Government legislative summaries. What HB 1104 does is read from the enrolled session law (NCGA, H1104 / S.L. 2026-38, "Improve IVC Process and Enhance Public Safety"): the outpatient-commitment extension at sec. 11, amending G.S. 122C-271(a)(1), (b)(1) and (b)(2) and 122C-274(f), effective December 1, 2026 per sec. 11(k); the two new outpatient-commitment criteria at sec. 11(b), new G.S. 122C-263(d)(1)e. and f., under the same effective date; the finding a court must make before any outpatient order, that a provider has agreed to accept the person, at G.S. 122C-271(a)(3) and (b)(4); the jail telehealth PROPOSAL for a pilot at sec. 2, due March 1, 2027; and the BH SCAN STUDY at sec. 6.5, reporting by the same date. The act carries no appropriation. Law-enforcement access to BH SCAN is directed not by HB 1104 but by the budget act signed the next day (S.L. 2026-41). Earlier versions of this brief credited the access and the telehealth routing to HB 1104, following contemporaneous coverage (CBS17 and NC Health News, 2026-06-30) published before either act was signed. HB 437 vote counts from Port City Daily (2026-06-30), NC Newsline (2026-07-01), and WFAE (2026-07-01); ‡HB 437 passed both chambers and was vetoed by Governor Stein on July 8, 2026, with Republican leaders pledging an override (NCGA bill page H437; NC Newsline, 2026-07-08; WLOS, 2026-07-09). The override was placed on the House calendar for August 4, 2026 and no override vote is recorded after it; the bill carries no session-law number (NCGA bill history, H437, read 2026-08-09). What HB 437 does, how it is enforced, the one-year cap and Department of Labor certification on a designated site, and the June 30, 2027 effective date are all read from the ratified bill text (NCGA, H437 v6 ratified, sec. 2, new G.S. 160D-917; sec. 2(c) for the effective date). The bill's criminal provisions are in sec. 1 and concern drug offenses in a drug-free homeless service zone, not camping. HB 162 is read from its ratified text (NCGA, H162 v4), whose title runs "to restrict local governments from regulating certain aspects of off-street parking spaces and to modify the authority of certain local governments to require stormwater control for redeveloped property": the parking preemption is new G.S. 160D-702(c)(2a), which exempts local governments in the coastal area as defined by G.S. 113A-103, except for historic-district, historic-landmark and Study List properties, and takes effect January 1, 2027 (sec. 1(b)); the stormwater provisions rewrite G.S. 143-214.7(b3), add the voluntary-incentive subsection (b8), and are effective on enactment, with conflicting local ordinances void after twelve months (sec. 2(b), 2(c)). The legislature adjourned on August 6, 2026 without taking the vote. Its adjournment resolution (Res. 2026-6, SJR 1091) brings it back on August 31, September 28, October 26, November 16 and November 30, 2026, with veto overrides a permitted matter at each, and adjourns it sine die on December 18, 2026; leaders said their next voting session would begin November 16, after the election (WUNC, republished by Blue Ridge Public Radio, 2026-08-07). Sen. Julie Mayfield's concerns are from NC Health News (2026-06-26) and Asheville Watchdog (2026-06-25); the shelter director is Micheal Woods of Western Carolina Rescue Ministries (WLOS, 2026-07-09). The staffing and bed shortages at the state psychiatric hospitals, and Marvin Swartz's comment, are from NC Health News (2026-06-30). †Statewide 2025 point-in-time count (15,512) from NC Health News (2026-06-26); Buncombe 2026 single-night count (824) from Step Up AVL's figure ledger. §Prior-cycle mental-health investment (>$800M) per NC Health News. Independent summary; not affiliated with the State of North Carolina.