Ridgefield became the latest local city to take a hard stance on marijuana this week, voting to ban recreational pot businesses and collective gardens for medical marijuana.
The council approved two ordinances Thursday night, staking unanimous opposition to collective gardens and narrowly outlawing the recreational side with a 4-3 vote. The laws will go into effect in about a month, just before the city’s moratoriums expire, City Manager Steve Stuart said.
Initially, the Ridgefield Planning Commission recommended permitting collective gardens on a limited basis. Each garden would have up to 45 plants and 10 members, and they would have to abide by siting restrictions and odor controls, said Elizabeth Decker, a planning consultant working with the city.
The council also considered allowing some aspects of the recreational side. But after months of discussion and studying the market, Councilor John Main suggested banning all three prongs of recreational marijuana operations: growth, processing and retail.
“We’re positioning Ridgefield as a destination community,” said Main, who’s been one of the council’s most vocal opponents to the idea of pot shops in Ridgefield. “If we really want to be a destination community, we can say ‘no.’ ”
Councilor Don Stose found himself on the opposite side of the debate, saying he hoped that opening the door for pot shops would help deal a lethal blow to the black market for recreational marijuana.
Nonetheless, the councilors easily agreed that paving the way for collective gardens wouldn’t stop the black market.
“You may have one out of 10 medical marijuana patients that receive medical marijuana for medical purposes,” Stose said. The others tend to use their green cards just to get high, he said.
While some cities plan to maintain temporary bans until the Legislature fleshes out the regulations for recreational and medical marijuana, officials in Ridgefield simply grew tired of waiting, Main said. But the issues could come up again if state lawmakers do take action.
Sen. Ann Rivers, R-La Center, attended the Thursday night meeting to let the councilors know her game plan for marijuana regulations in the next legislative session. Last session, Rivers proposed a bill that would have created a registry for medical marijuana patients and providers, phased out collective gardens and established limits on possession.
Much to the disappointment of local officials, the bill passed the Senate but never made it the House floor. Rivers told the councilors she plans to resurrect the bill this winter.
The councilors are hopeful it’ll move through both the Senate and the House this time.
But Main isn’t counting on it, as he expects most of the focus at the Legislature to fall on meeting the State Supreme Court’s school funding mandate for education in the 2012 McCleary decision.
“I’ve just got a feeling the McCleary issue’s just going to suck the oxygen out of the room, and they’re going to be dealing with that a lot more,” Main said.
Justin Runquist: 360-735-4547; twitter.com/col_smallcities; justin.runquist@columbian.com
