SPRINGFIELD — The city’s attempt to make its medical marijuana ordinance less restrictive did not receive the necessary two-thirds vote from the City Council during its Jan. 27 hearings meeting.
The proposed amendment was to update the medical marijuana ordinance, originally drafted and passed in 2014, which would have brought the ordinance into more conformity with the looser adult use marijuana ordinance, which was passed in 2018.
The changes would have also allowed existing adult use operations to co-locate medical marijuana use within the same building.
During the council meeting, Phil Dromey, the city’s director of deputy planning, said the amendment to the ordinance would allow medical marijuana use in more districts.
“You still would have to go through the full special permit process for a new medical marijuana use if they wanted to open up in the city, but it would basically allow them to go into the areas where adult recreational use retail operations are currently located,” Dromey said.
If an already existing adult-use retailer wanted a medical marijuana facility within its business, it would just need an administrative site plan review by the city, according to what was the propsoed amendment.
In his remarks to the council, Dromey noted that the amendment would not have major negative impacts on Springfield because a lot of the concerns the city had about cannabis facilities, like traffic, never came to fruition.
“As more of these uses have opened, we found that the impact to the surrounding land use is certainly not anywhere near what people had originally thought,” Dromey said. “So, I don’t see this as a significant impact to neighborhoods or to the uses themselves.”
The city passed the medical marijuana ordinance in 2014. At the time, a number of restrictive guidelines for the new use were put in place, and echoed underlying state laws, including the fact that medical marijuana facilities needed to be at least 500 feet away from elementary schools, high schools, colleges/universities and childcare facilities.
The ordinance also states that medical marijuana facilities need to be at least 500 feet away from a residence, a building containing residences and a residential zoning district.
In 2018, the city then passed an adult use marijuana ordinance to reflect the statewide referendum on the legalization of recreational use of marijuana. That ordinance features less restrictive guidelines and allows adult-use marijuana in more districts.
Also, the 500-foot distance from a school was limited to pre-existing public or private school providing education in kindergarten or any grades 1-12. Unlike medical marijuana, adult use can be less than 500 feet away from colleges universities and child day care centers.
During the council meeting, Dromey said the city’s Planning Board and the Office of Planning and Economic Development were in favor of amending the medical marijuana ordinance to align with the adult use one.
He added that the city worked with the law department on the proposed changes.
“This is probably long overdue,” Dromey said.
Despite the city’s desire to make these changes, only eight councilors voted in favor of the amendment, which is not two-thirds of the council. City Councilors Kateri Walsh and Tracye Whitfield voted no, and City Councilor Malo Brown abstained.
City Councilor Maria Perez was absent from the meeting and City Councilor Brian Santaniello was away during the vote.
There was little discussion about the proposed amendment during the meeting.
