PEKIN, Ill. – The Pekin City Council approved the zoning for the sale of recreational cannabis in the city, but not for a dispensary.
Earlier this year, the city asked for the public’s input on the legal sale of cannabis through an online survey and by a mailed survey through the waste water billing system.
The results for the mailed survey were 2,207 voted yes, 1,852 voted no, and 164 voted unsure.
The online results were 345 voted yes, 49 voted no, and 13 voted unsure.
Pekin Mayor Mark Luft said those results do not include other forms of communication with the community.
“That doesn’t count all the emails, that doesn’t count all the phone calls, that doesn’t count all the stopping in person,” Luft said. “And we gave it time. We could have done this back in October. We could have actually done it before then. We wanted to reach out to the community.”
While recreational cannabis will be legal in the state of Illinois, individual cities can still prohibit dispensaries from operating within city limits.
If a dispensary wanted to operate in Pekin, there is a long process that must be done beforehand.
“They have to go through the state first to get a license, which is a stringent process. So, once they get the license, then at that point they can come to Pekin if they choose with that license and apply for a special use permit here,” Luft said.
After that process, the idea would be brought in front of a committee, which would then bring it to the city council by a recommendation from the committee.
“This was not necessarily approving a dispensary. This was to approve the zoning in case a dispensary wanted to or tried to come here,” Luft said.
The law states that three dispensary licenses will be issued through a five county radius.
Luft said that this is new ground that has not been covered.
“For the municipalities in Illinois this is new ground. You could make reference to Colorado or other states that have done this. But, ultimately it comes down to this is our state and this is our community,” Luft said. “Regardless of what others have done, we want to make sure we are doing our due diligence for our community.”
The use of medical cannabis was also amended to the ordinance.
Possession of recreational cannabis and drug paraphernalia will be legal beginning January 1, 2020 for those 21 or older.
