Oakwood latest city to put freeze on recreation marijuana business permits
The number of area cities placing a freeze on business permits for selling recreational marijuana is expanding.
Oakwood Vice Mayor Steve Byington said a one-year ban on issuing and processing such permits, after Ohio voters approved state Issue 2 in November, is a particularly prudent move for the city of about 9,200.
The legalization of recreational marijuana is “a major change in the law, particularly when it comes to the potential impact of marijuana business operations on a small residential community,” Byington said.
Moratoriums also have passed in Beavercreek, Carlisle, Centerville, Fairfield, Franklin, Hamilton, Kettering, Miamisburg, Monroe, Springboro, Vandalia, Waynesville, Xenia, and several other cities throughout Ohio.
Oakwood — like other cities — needs to “consider appropriate regulations for the orderly implementation of the law,” Byington said.
“It will preserve the public health, safety and welfare, as well as the community character we value in Oakwood,” he added.
The measure approved 5-0 by Oakwood City Council on Tuesday night places a 12-month moratorium on “retail dispensaries, cultivators or processors of adult use marijuana,” but has no impact on legalized possession and use, Byington said.
Oakwood requires four votes for ordinances to take immediate effect, Mayor Bill Duncan said.
The new state law allows adults 21 and older to legally possess up to 2.5 ounces of marijuana, as well as using it and growing up to six plants per person and 12 per household. It also imposes a 10% sales tax.
But until rules and regulations are put in place — and licenses are issued — locals can’t buy recreational marijuana.
Last month the Department of Commerce named Jim Canepa to head the Division of Cannabis Control, the new department created to oversee the regulation of Ohio’s recreational marijuana industry.
The division has several months to develop those regulations. Meanwhile, because the law was approved as a voter-initiated statute rather than a constitutional amendment, it could be altered by the state legislature “and a number of changes are currently debated,” Byington said.