PENDLETON — The city of Pendleton could add a fifth cannabis dispensary later this year.
The Pendleton Planning Commission at its upcoming meeting will consider a conditional use application from an unnamed dispensary with a proposed location of 31 S.W. Nye Ave., sandwiched between the Social Security Administration office and the Hampton Inn.
The owner of the store is Bimalpreet Bath of Walla Walla, who owns a chain of head shops called Vape ‘N Goods in Walla Walla and Milton-Freewater. Also attached to the development is Wave Design Group, a Kennewick-based firm that’s designed restaurants, office spaces and government buildings in the Tri-Cities area.
The dispensary’s application states the building will be a 5,000 square foot store that shouldn’t have any traffic or security impacts on the surrounding area.
Should the planning commission approve the dispensary, the business would take one of the few remaining locations a marijuana business could establish itself.
After Oregon voters legalized marijuana consumption and sales in 2014, the state’s only requirement for cannabis business locations was they not be within 1,000 feet of a school. But the state allowed cities and counties to make their own rules, and even opt out of legal marijuana sales entirely.
As Pendleton voters approved marijuana sales in 2016, the city council approved more stringent location requirements: cannabis businesses could not be located within 1,000 feet of a park or another marijuana business. Given that cannabis businesses only could exist in commercial or central mixed use zones, it left a handful of areas where they could locate.
That didn’t stop three dispensaries — Kind Leaf Pendleton, Pendleton Cannabis and High Desert Cannabis — from opening their doors in 2017, the first year legal marijuana sales were allowed in Pendleton.
Thur’s Smoke Shop tried to join their ranks the same year, but the site the business was targeting on Southwest Tutuilla Creek Road ran into opposition from members of the neighborhood and the Pendleton School District, which objected to the proposed dispensary’s proximity to school bus stops and student walking routes. The owner of Thur’s eventually pulled his application, found a different property on Southeast Court Avenue and opened the dispensary in 2019.
While Pendleton could have five cannabis dispensaries in the near future, the city remains one of the few communities in Eastern Oregon that allows for legal marijuana sales.
On the same night voters in Pendleton gave cannabis sales the green light, Hermiston and Milton-Freewater residents voted to maintain their bans. The rest of Umatilla County’s city and county governments kept their prohibitions in place as well through council or board action. Today, Pendleton is not only the sole city with legal marijuana sales in Umatilla County, but the nearest place to buy legal weed for many residents in neighboring Union and Morrow counties.
The planning commission will hold a public hearing on the proposed dispensary on Nye Avenue at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 24, in the city council chambers at Pendleton City Hall, 500 S.W. Dorion Ave. The meeting also can be accessed online through Zoom by visiting bit.ly/3I89uDd.
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