Arguably one of the most overdue topics facing the city of Santa Monica is finally set for discussion in Tuesday’s Council meeting, that being the policy currently surrounding the legal availability of cannabis.
While the sale of medical marijuana has been legal in California since 1996, the very first dispensary has only just opened in Santa Monica. The City allowed applications for permits to sell marijuana in a period running from December 2017 to February 2018 and 21 requests were received. From there, two were chosen, one for CPC Compassion, Inc. and the other for Harvest of Santa Monica.
The former is the outlet that’s just opened at 925 Wilshire Blvd and operates under the name of the store, the Local Cannabis Company. The latter was meant to be located at 1416 Wilshire Blvd, but that has yet to appear. Moreover, it took an additional 18 months after the permit was granted for the outlet to actually open.
Santa Monica's medical marijuana dispensary zoning ordinance, set in October 2017, dictated that only two licenses should be granted and the policy be reviewed in February 2020. However, at that point it was voted to be extended to January 2023 and in May 2022, Council requested that the City Manager schedule a study session regarding whether to allow for the sale of non-medicinal (referred to as "adult-use") cannabis in the City of Santa Monica. Subsequently, in the November 2022 election, voters approved Measure HMP, which enables the City to levy a business tax on every licensed cannabis business.
In the meeting that’s scheduled to start at 5:30 p.m. City staff will recommend that, upon viewing the presentation on key policy considerations, the Council discuss options for allowing adult-use cannabis sales and associated regulatory restrictions as may be appropriate. In addition, staff will also recommend that Council provide direction on whether to bring back changes to the Municipal Code to allow for adult-use cannabis retail businesses and non-retail cannabis business types within the City.
The study session seeks Council direction on the following key policy topics:
- Should consumer access to legal adult-use cannabis in Santa Monica be permitted, or should the City maintain the restriction of medicinal-only cannabis.
- What types of cannabis uses should be allowed.
- Should the City set a limit to the number of retailers and other uses.
- Should only the two medicinal cannabis retailers be allowed to expand into the adult-use market, or should the City allow new cannabis retailers.
- Where in the City should cannabis uses be allowed to operate.
- Which land uses, if any, should be recognized as sensitive uses requiring a distance buffer from cannabis uses above and beyond state requirements.
Staff will also present the 2023 Annual Water Shortage Assessment Report and a proposed adoption of resolution. Based on the findings from the annual assessment, staff will recommend continuing to require a 20 percent reduction in water use per the City’s 2020 Water Shortage Contingency Plan, which was adopted by City Council in June 2021. (The City has remained in a "Stage 2 Water Shortage level" since 2014 and has consistently maintained 20 percent reductions in water demand from the guideline 2013 water usage levels.)
Although recent historic rainfall has alleviated drought conditions across the state, the City needs to use water efficiently and continue to conserve water where possible to adapt to climate change impacts on our water supply.
Single family, multi-family and landscape customer’s water demand is projected to increase slightly as a conservative estimate for a potential dry year. The projected water demand for industrial, commercial and institutional customers also indicates an increase from 2022 water usage, due to economic recovery effort from the pandemic. Finally, fire demand and water loss are projected to remain the same as average levels.
Santa Monica’s state of the art Sustainable Water Infrastructure Project (SWIP), while promising to significantly increase the City’s capacity to capture and reuse water, is still awaiting official activation with no timeline in place as testing and inspection continues.
Council will also hear an environmental impact report on the proposed Santa Monica Pier-bridge replacement project and the City will seek authorization and approval to proceed with the final design. The existing structure does not meet current seismic standards and the new design, whatever that turns out to be, is meant to alleviate both pedestrian and vehicular congestion.
