COLORADO SPRINGS — Colorado Springs voters passed Ballot Question 300 in November. It allows current cannabis businesses that sell medical cannabis in Colorado Springs to opt into selling recreational cannabis.
The total number of retail cannabis dispensaries the city could have is capped at the current number of medical marijuana locations.
In September, the city council passed an ordinance that bans recreational businesses from operating within a mile of a school, residential child care center, drug or alcohol treatment facility, or another business selling marijuana.
Many cannabis businesses are now calling on the city council to change the rules to allow for recreational cannabis to be sold with a less stringent mile radius rule.
"I was happy with it," said Renze Waddington, owner of the Epic Remedy.
He was happy to see Ballot Question 300 passed last November because he and other owners have been pushing for a law to sell recreational cannabis in Colorado Springs.
However, Waddington says he's still concerned about the future of recreational cannabis sales.
A separate city ordinance passed by the council before the election blocks recreational marijuana stores from operating within one mile of schools and child care.
Waddington says this ordinance makes it difficult for existing cannabis stores to sell in city limits.
"People voted 300 because they want to buy marijuana locally in Colorado Springs," said Waddington.
News5 reached out to the Colorado Springs Safe Neighborhood Coalition for comment. The statement from them below says Ballot Question 300 was confusing for many voters.
"There is objective evidence that 300’s misleading language succeeded in tricking a significant number of voters. On election night, when about half the votes had been counted, both 300 and 2D were passing with a nearly identical 54% of the vote. That means that thousands of people who voted for 2D, which asked voters in plain-as-day language to ban recreational marijuana sales, also voted for 300. The reason? They thought 300 was limiting sales rather than authorizing them for the first time. That evidence of confusion flies in the face of the marijuana industry’s claims in this letter that “voters understood” 300’s language the same way the industry would like to pretend they did. 300 tricked voters just like in 2010 a question on the El Paso County ballot tricked voters into extending commissioner term limits from 2 to 3 by asking whether terms should be 'limited' to 3."
News5 also reached out to the city council for comment, but the members declined our request.
"We want to make sure the will (of) voters is uphill. 300 will be implemented as it's written and voted on by the people," said Waddington.
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