Proposed zoning by the City of Billings will limit the recreational marijuana industry to those areas in the city that are zoned industrial and heavy commercial, and sit at least 1,000 feet from neighborhoods, schools, churches, parks, addiction recovery centers and youth centers, everything in the map highlighted in pink.
Recreational marijuana goes on sale in Montana on Jan. 1 and officials with both Yellowstone County and the City of Billings, tasked with regulating it, are working to figure out just how to move forward.
Billings voters last week rejected allowing recreational marijuana storefronts to operate within city limits, but businesses that focus on cultivation, manufacturing, testing, storing and transporting adult-use cannabis will be legal.
Monday night Billings City Council voted 10-1 on a second draft of regulations, including rules that will allow for eight medical marijuana dispensaries to operate in town. Council also approved zoning requirements on a 9-2 vote that will regulate where cultivation, manufacturing, testing, storing and transporting will operate within Billings.
Medical marijuana dispensaries and the non-storefront elements of the recreational marijuana business will be limited to those areas in the city that are zoned industrial and heavy commercial, and sit at least 1,000 feet from neighborhoods, schools, churches, parks, addiction recovery centers and youth centers.
Drafts for the new zoning requirements and the new regulations will be back for a third and final reading in two weeks. Council members made enough adjustments to both that they will require one more pass with with the public’s involvement.
While recreational marijuana storefronts will be banned in the city, they will be legal in Yellowstone County. County commissioners are looking at putting in place interim zoning requirements for the various businesses and will hold a hearing on Nov. 23 to seek feedback from county residents on their proposals.
“Commissioners (are) concerned the sale and production of marijuana may adversely affect areas of the county,” stated the county resolution for the public hearing. “To better understand how the sale and production of marijuana may adversely affect areas of the county, the board (of commissioners) would like to enact interim zoning regulations on the sale and production of marijuana so it can study the potential adverse effects.”
Interim zoning is valid for only a year, after which the county will have to put in place something more permanent.
The county has little zoning and few controls for how the industry will operate — much of it will be dictated by the state Department of Revenue. In the parts of the county with no zoning at all, which is the majority of Yellowstone County, nearly any kind of business can set up shop how it likes.
The areas within the county that are zoned sit close to Billings city limits. In those areas, recreational marijuana storefronts must be separated at least 600 feet from schools, churches, youth centers and addiction recovery centers, and 350 feet from residential areas.
Under state law, when recreational marijuana becomes available to the public it will be sold first by medical marijuana dispensaries.
HB 701, the legislation that formalized the ballot initiative legalizing recreational marijuana, gives an 18-month window to medical marijuana shops to sell recreational pot when the law becomes active on Jan. 1. The caveat is that in order to sell recreational pot those shops must be in good standing with their municipal authorities.
Medical marijuana shops will then have those 18 months to apply for a recreational marijuana business license if they intend to continue selling recreational pot.
The county is already home to 42 medical marijuana dispensaries, 27 of them active in the areas the county has zoned. Some of these dispensaries sit closer to schools, churches, youth centers, addiction recovery centers and residential areas than the distance allowed in the county’s proposed interim zoning.
For those dispensaries they will be “legally non-conforming,” in other words, legally allowed to continue to operate.
However, for those dispensaries, if they choose to continue to sell recreational pot after the 18 months, they’ll need to comply with the permanent zoning that the county puts in place in order to obtain a recreational pot business license from the state.
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