BOULDER — The restrictions that Boulder County is considering for medical marijuana businesses aren’t restrictive enough, several people objected at a County Planning Commission hearing on Wednesday.
Planning panel members nevertheless voted, 5-1, to recommend that the Board of County Commissioners adopt proposed Land Use Code amendments restricting where “medical marijuana centers” can locate.
Dispensaries and growing operations — as well as any other businesses selling, growing or distributing medical marijuana — could only operate inside certain business, commercial and industrial zoning districts in unincorporated Boulder County under the proposed rules.
The regulations would bar medical marijuana centers from locating within 1,000 feet of day care centers, schools or drug and alcohol rehabilitation facilities. And medical marijuana centers couldn’t be within 500 feet of one another.
Jim August of Longmont, however, recommended that Boulder County ban such businesses entirely within the unincorporated parts of the county, something it could do under a proposed law awaiting Gov. Bill Ritter’s consideration.
While the use, possession or distribution of marijuana generally remains illegal under state and federal laws, Colorado voters approved an amendment to the state constitution in 2000 to permit its use by state-registered patients with certain debilitating medical conditions.
But August told Boulder County planning commissioners that he opposes allowing any dispensaries under the regulations being proposed, because “you’re dealing with an illegal substance.”
At the very least, the owner of any property within 500 feet of a current or proposed dispensary should have the right to object to its presence and the county should then have to shut it down, August said.
Several Niwot residents complained that while the proposed regulations would prohibit medical marijuana businesses along Old Town Niwot’s Second Avenue core downtown area, the rules might allow dispensaries to open in the Cottonwood Square Shopping Center or a smaller commercial area near Niwot Elementary School at the eastern edge of that unincorporated community.
Katherine Koehler suggested medical marijuana businesses could have a negative impact on residential property values of neighboring Niwot-area homes, and Dick Piland said the community also is concerned about the traffic that would result, as well as about Niwot’s children and adolescents being exposed to marijuana and its users.
Piland and Renea Dahiya both cited a Niwot Community Association survey, which they said showed that 99 percent of those polled oppose letting medical marijuana businesses move into the community.
Land Use director Dale Case said he didn’t have an exact number of how many medical marijuana dispensaries and growing operations already exist in the unincorporated parts of the county, but that based on what his staff has heard, it’s “probably around half a dozen or so.”
Case said the county staff’s approach in drafting rules about locations for medical marijuana businesses has been “to look at how we can control it, but not ban it outright.”
Planning commissioners also heard from at least four people who argued that Boulder County should allow marijuana crops destined for medical users to be grown and stored in the county’s agriculture and forestry zoning districts — something that wouldn’t be permitted under the proposed rules.
The next stop for the proposed medical marijuana Land Use Code amendments will be the Board of County Commissioners, which has scheduled a public hearing for 9:30 a.m. June 8 in the third floor of the Boulder County Courthouse, 1325 Pearl St., Boulder.
Rules under consideration
Under the medical marijuana Land Use Code amendments recommended Wednesday by the Boulder County Planning Commission:
• Medical marijuana centers — businesses that grow, sell or distribute medical marijuana — would become a “use by right,” as long as they meet certain other land-use restrictions and conditions, in unincorporated Boulder County’s business, commercial, light industrial, general industrial and transitional zoning districts.
• Medical marijuana centers would not be allowed in any of unincorporated Boulder County’s other zoning districts, such as residential, forestry and agricultural districts.
• Medical marijuana centers would not be allowed in Old Town Niwot’s Rural Community District along Second Avenue northwest of Second Avenue.
• A property occupied by a medical marijuana center could be no closer than 1,000 feet to the nearest boundary of a property occupied by an alcohol or drug treatment facility, a licensed child care facility or an educational facility with students below a college grade level.
• A medical marijuana center’s property line could not be closer than 500 feet to another medical marijuana center’s property line.
• A medical marijuana center would have to have one parking space for every 200 square feet of the center’s floor area.
• A medical marijuana center would have to get all necessary state and local permits.
• Any medical marijuana center that has been established or is operating in unincorporated Boulder County as of Aug. 1 would have to register with the county Land Use Department.
• Any medical marijuana center established or operating after Aug. 1 would have to register with the county within 30 days of commencing operations.
• Registration information would have to include: the business’ legal name, its owner and on-site manager; contact information for the owner and manager; the date the business was established; the description of the nature and extent of the business; the identification of all structures, and the floor area of the property occupied or associated with the business.
• The new county regulations would not cover marijuana grown or used by state-registered medical-marijuana patients in their own homes, which county officials have said is a legal residential use allowed by the Colorado Constitution.
• The new county regulations also don’t deal with the home-based operations of caregivers who provide marijuana to state-registered medical marijuana patients, a practice county officials said would continue to be allowed as a “legal accessory home occupation” under the existing Land Use Code.
News Hawk: Warbux 420 MAGAZINE
Source: TimesCall.com
Author: John Fryar
Contact: The Longmont Times-Call
Copyright: 2010 Longmont Times-Call
Website: The Longmont Times-Call
Planning panel members nevertheless voted, 5-1, to recommend that the Board of County Commissioners adopt proposed Land Use Code amendments restricting where “medical marijuana centers” can locate.
Dispensaries and growing operations — as well as any other businesses selling, growing or distributing medical marijuana — could only operate inside certain business, commercial and industrial zoning districts in unincorporated Boulder County under the proposed rules.
The regulations would bar medical marijuana centers from locating within 1,000 feet of day care centers, schools or drug and alcohol rehabilitation facilities. And medical marijuana centers couldn’t be within 500 feet of one another.
Jim August of Longmont, however, recommended that Boulder County ban such businesses entirely within the unincorporated parts of the county, something it could do under a proposed law awaiting Gov. Bill Ritter’s consideration.
While the use, possession or distribution of marijuana generally remains illegal under state and federal laws, Colorado voters approved an amendment to the state constitution in 2000 to permit its use by state-registered patients with certain debilitating medical conditions.
But August told Boulder County planning commissioners that he opposes allowing any dispensaries under the regulations being proposed, because “you’re dealing with an illegal substance.”
At the very least, the owner of any property within 500 feet of a current or proposed dispensary should have the right to object to its presence and the county should then have to shut it down, August said.
Several Niwot residents complained that while the proposed regulations would prohibit medical marijuana businesses along Old Town Niwot’s Second Avenue core downtown area, the rules might allow dispensaries to open in the Cottonwood Square Shopping Center or a smaller commercial area near Niwot Elementary School at the eastern edge of that unincorporated community.
Katherine Koehler suggested medical marijuana businesses could have a negative impact on residential property values of neighboring Niwot-area homes, and Dick Piland said the community also is concerned about the traffic that would result, as well as about Niwot’s children and adolescents being exposed to marijuana and its users.
Piland and Renea Dahiya both cited a Niwot Community Association survey, which they said showed that 99 percent of those polled oppose letting medical marijuana businesses move into the community.
Land Use director Dale Case said he didn’t have an exact number of how many medical marijuana dispensaries and growing operations already exist in the unincorporated parts of the county, but that based on what his staff has heard, it’s “probably around half a dozen or so.”
Case said the county staff’s approach in drafting rules about locations for medical marijuana businesses has been “to look at how we can control it, but not ban it outright.”
Planning commissioners also heard from at least four people who argued that Boulder County should allow marijuana crops destined for medical users to be grown and stored in the county’s agriculture and forestry zoning districts — something that wouldn’t be permitted under the proposed rules.
The next stop for the proposed medical marijuana Land Use Code amendments will be the Board of County Commissioners, which has scheduled a public hearing for 9:30 a.m. June 8 in the third floor of the Boulder County Courthouse, 1325 Pearl St., Boulder.
Rules under consideration
Under the medical marijuana Land Use Code amendments recommended Wednesday by the Boulder County Planning Commission:
• Medical marijuana centers — businesses that grow, sell or distribute medical marijuana — would become a “use by right,” as long as they meet certain other land-use restrictions and conditions, in unincorporated Boulder County’s business, commercial, light industrial, general industrial and transitional zoning districts.
• Medical marijuana centers would not be allowed in any of unincorporated Boulder County’s other zoning districts, such as residential, forestry and agricultural districts.
• Medical marijuana centers would not be allowed in Old Town Niwot’s Rural Community District along Second Avenue northwest of Second Avenue.
• A property occupied by a medical marijuana center could be no closer than 1,000 feet to the nearest boundary of a property occupied by an alcohol or drug treatment facility, a licensed child care facility or an educational facility with students below a college grade level.
• A medical marijuana center’s property line could not be closer than 500 feet to another medical marijuana center’s property line.
• A medical marijuana center would have to have one parking space for every 200 square feet of the center’s floor area.
• A medical marijuana center would have to get all necessary state and local permits.
• Any medical marijuana center that has been established or is operating in unincorporated Boulder County as of Aug. 1 would have to register with the county Land Use Department.
• Any medical marijuana center established or operating after Aug. 1 would have to register with the county within 30 days of commencing operations.
• Registration information would have to include: the business’ legal name, its owner and on-site manager; contact information for the owner and manager; the date the business was established; the description of the nature and extent of the business; the identification of all structures, and the floor area of the property occupied or associated with the business.
• The new county regulations would not cover marijuana grown or used by state-registered medical-marijuana patients in their own homes, which county officials have said is a legal residential use allowed by the Colorado Constitution.
• The new county regulations also don’t deal with the home-based operations of caregivers who provide marijuana to state-registered medical marijuana patients, a practice county officials said would continue to be allowed as a “legal accessory home occupation” under the existing Land Use Code.
News Hawk: Warbux 420 MAGAZINE
Source: TimesCall.com
Author: John Fryar
Contact: The Longmont Times-Call
Copyright: 2010 Longmont Times-Call
Website: The Longmont Times-Call
