The Signal Hill City Council decided on Tuesday, Feb. 8, not to move forward with a ballot measure allowing voters to decide whether cannabis businesses can operate in the city—reversing a decision it made on Jan. 25.
The council agreed on Jan. 25 to allow Signal Hill voters the opportunity to approve or deny a resolution allowing up to two cannabis businesses and taxing them to provide revenue to the City.
On Tuesday, however, in reviewing a “cannabis roadmap” with steps for getting the resolution onto the November 2022 ballot, the council voted 3-2 in favor of a motion by Vice Mayor Tina Hansen not to proceed forward.
Councilmember Lori Woods seconded the motion, with Hansen, Woods and Mayor Keir Jones voting in favor of tabling the ballot measure. Councilmembers Robert Copeland and Edward Wilson voted against the motion.
At the Jan. 25 meeting, however, Jones voted with Copeland and Wilson to move forward with a ballot measure while Hansen and Woods voted against.
Jones confirmed with the Signal Tribune after Tuesday’s meeting that the City will not proceed with placing a cannabis resolution on the November 2022 ballot and explained changing the direction of his vote between Jan. 25 and Feb. 8.
“When it became apparent to me that there was not enough council support to get a 4 out of 5 vote on the roadmap—which is what is needed to put a revenue measure on the ballot—I decided staff time would be better served for our residents by working on more pressing priorities,” Jones told the Signal Tribune.
Per City Manager Hannah Shin-Heydorn’s “cannabis roadmap” report, since the cannabis resolution would include taxation, the council could only legally approve it for the ballot with a “supermajority” vote of four out of five council members in favor instead of the usual three out of five approving.
The City would also have to pay $15,000 for a consultant to help create a cannabis licensing, permitting and taxation structure to put in the resolution, plus pay an estimated $20,000 in legal fees, according to Shin-Heydorn.
The City would further conduct four public workshops—including two with the Planning Commission and Parks and Recreation Commission—and a subcommittee would meet several times afterward to draft the resolution.
In answer to questioning by Hansen, Shin-Heydorn said that since most of the presentation and coordination work would fall to her, she would have to put aside land development negotiations for the new State-required affordable housing the City is planning to build.
Shin-Heydorn also said the City may not know until August whether the two legal buffer zones in which cannabis businesses could potentially operate—at least 600 feet from residences, schools, places of worship and public spaces—would be impacted by the new housing plans if the State requires them to be changed.
“It depends on how the State responds,” Shin-Heydorn said of how the buffer zones might be impacted.
After consulting with City Attorney Matthew Richardson, Hansen motioned that the council not continue with putting a cannabis resolution on the ballot, citing continuing costs and the potential impact of the City’s new housing.
“We are at a critical time in our development negotiations,” Hansen said. “That could be put by the wayside. The buffer zones could be impacted by where the affordable housing is located.”
Hansen did say, however, that she would support the council’s decision to draft its own resolution allowing cannabis businesses for its own approval “as a way to slow this down,” but no council member motioned to do so.
“It just seems unreasonable to me to keep moving forward on this freight train when it can be derailed by other things along the way,” Hansen said. “My motion would be to not move forward with it at this time at all.”
Once the council voted to approve Hansen’s motion, there was no further council discussion on the matter during the meeting.
