Dispensaries can be any distance apart, but cannot be within 300 feet of schools.
MINNEAPOLIS – The Minneapolis City Council has new rules for cannabis businesses, affecting where dispensaries can be located from each other and from places like schools.
In Minnesota’s growing cannabis industry, retailers like Sweet Leaves are on high alert for such announcements.
“Our top tip helps keep up with the ever-changing laws,” said Adam Hoffman, one of four friends who decided to bring a “premiere cannabis dispensary” to Minneapolis’ North Loop.
Open since May, Sweet Leaves is one of the Social Equity applicants waiting to find out if it has secured a lottery spot, Hoffman says, which would allow them to offer weed in flower form in addition to organic, vegan THC and gluten free. and the CBD foods and drinks they sell now.
That announcement by the State Office of Cannabis Management could come by the end of this year.
Meanwhile, Minneapolis is setting city rules, approving cannabis business zoning regulations on Thursday by a 12-1 vote. The passage included setting against a measure that would require a certain spatial distance between each dispensary.
“Just removing the subdivision requirements is blunt, without intent, it’s a very blatant use of our zoning policy,” Ward 13 Council Member Linea Palmisano said during a discussion before the vote. “We have a huge responsibility here to go into this carefully, because we’re never going to be able to go back.”
“We can always go back and revise this ordinance,” said Ward 6 Councilman Jamal Osman, who co-authored the ordinance with Ward 12 Councilman Aurin Chowdhury.
The authors explained that the lack of a buffer is to encourage healthy competition and prevent existing overseas cannabis corporations from taking over an area where startups like Sweet Leaves might also want to sell.
“Minneapolis is a dense place,” Hoffman said. “More people, more businesses, it’s better for everybody. I also think competition is healthy … Putting small businesses first is exactly what the city should be doing.”
Although a buffer between dispensaries is not required, distance between hospitals and schools will be required. The council considered making it 500 feet, but approved lowering it to 300 feet, which is the same distance that liquor stores must be located from schools.
“Especially thinking about the legacy of the criminalization of cannabis and how legalization is part of correcting that legacy of harm especially to people who are incarcerated for low-level drug crimes and how cannabis has been perceived in our country, having a greater limitation in space. from schools to liquor stores, liquor stores, I felt a way to say one is more moral than the other,” Chowdhury said.
Barring a few recreational dispensaries located on Indian reservations, most of the state won’t see one open until the summer of 2025.
Minneapolis is expected to enact more rules before then, such as whether to allow smoking in outdoor patio spaces.
“I don’t think the cannabis business should hinder, you know, the city and pedestrians in any way,” Hoffman said.
According to a city press release, other highlights include:
- Allowing cannabis retailers in most commercial and production areas.
- A three-hectare area of adjacent commercial or manufacturing areas is required to locate a cannabis retailer.
- Seeking commercial cultivation of cannabis in Production and Processing zoning areas, similar to existing urban agriculture uses
- Allowing limited production of cannabis products in most commercial districts
Minnesota state law requires the city to grant a minimum of 34 dispensary licenses, based on the demand of one cannabis retailer for every 12,500 people.