Madison residents to vote on drug treatment, marijuana shop ordinances at special town meeting

MADISON — Two ordinances that residents previously instructed town officials to develop are set to go before voters for approval at a special town meeting this month.

One proposed ordinance would restrict the allowed locations of outpatient substance use disorder treatment programs in Madison. The other would allow retail sales of medical marijuana in Madison, letting five existing businesses to continue to operate while limiting future permits.

A special town meeting to vote on the ordinances is scheduled for 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Oct. 22, at Main Street Middle School at 205 Main St.

Voting on the ordinances will be by secret ballot, according to Town Manager Denise Ducharme. The full proposed ordinances can be viewed online at madisonmaine.com.

TREATMENT PROGRAMS

At the annual town meeting in June, Madison residents, by a vote of 179 to 9, passed a 180-day moratorium that prohibited the opening of facilities that dispense controlled substances.

The moratorium was presented to residents to give town officials time to develop the ordinance that is being reviewed at the Oct. 22 special town meeting.

Town officials had responded for months to concerns about the proposed location of a treatment center operated by Tennessee-based Acadia Healthcare at the former Taylor’s Drug Store at 2 Old Point Ave.

Acadia was under contract to buy the building, in the center of Madison, and planned to open a clinic offering a variety of treatments and services. Those included medication-assisted treatment for substance use disorder using methadone and Suboxone, a combination medication containing buprenorphine and naloxone, a representative said at a select board meeting in April.

More than 200 residents signed a petition asking the town and Acadia to reconsider the location, which led the Board of Selectmen to put the moratorium before voters in June.

The proposed ordinance, drafted by the Planning Board and reviewed by the Board of Selectmen, applies only to outpatient substance use disorder treatment programs, such as those for alcohol use disorder and opioid use disorder.

Under the proposed ordinance, such programs could only be located on the eastern side of the Madison Business Gateway — a business park off Route 148 — and parcels on the approximately 2.5-mile stretch of U.S. Route 201 between White School House Road and the Skowhegan town line. On U.S. Route 201, the facility would need to be at least 500 feet from neighboring structures.

The proposed ordinance also specifies other requirements for outpatient substance use disorder treatment centers, such as the list information a license applicant must submit to the town’s code enforcement officer, and the application review process for the Planning Board and the Board of Selectmen.

Acadia has been looking at another site for its treatment center that would comply with the restrictions of the proposed ordinance, said Ducharme, the town manager. The company is no longer interested in the 2 Old Point Ave. site, which does not comply with the proposed ordinance.

The town, meanwhile, was considering purchasing 2 Old Point Ave., but the Board of Selectmen decided Monday against putting the acquisition on the Oct. 22 special town meeting warrant.

MEDICAL MARIJUANA

Also in June by a vote of 142 to 67, residents approved changing the town’s ordinance on drugs and drug paraphernalia to allow retail sales of medical marijuana products.

The Maine Office of Cannabis Policy informed the town this winter that since an ordinance passed in June 2018 prohibiting retail sales of marijuana did not explicitly allow for retail medical marijuana sales, existing stores selling the product were doing so illegally, Ducharme said.

The June town meeting vote allowed the five existing medical marijuana shops in Madison to continue operating, while the Planning Board worked this summer to revise the town’s ordinance with review by the Board of Selectman.

The first article of the proposed ordinance specifies that the town has opted out of permitting adult use, or recreational, cannabis establishments. The second article specifies that the town is opting into allowing “licensed operation of medical use cannabis caregiver retail stores and medical use cannabis dispensaries.”

The five such establishments operating in Madison will not be affected if the ordinance is approved, Ducharme said.

“They’ll continue to be licensed, provided that they follow the rules, they pay their fees, they do whatever they’re supposed to do to maintain that license,” Ducharme said in a recent interview. “The state will continue to license them once we provide the certificate that they’re doing everything on the local level that they’re supposed to.”

The proposed ordinance sets the number of permits for medical marijuana shops in Madison at three. It also specifies that medical marijuana shops cannot be located within 1,000 feet of designated safe zones, such as recreation areas.

But even with the new ordinance, the five existing shops would be allowed to continue operating, including one that is in a safe zone, Ducharme said.

Under the proposed ordinance, if a shop were to close, a new business could not apply for that permit with the cap at three shops, according to Ducharme. If another were to close, a new business could not apply for that permit, either.

“When it gets down to three (shops), and one or more of those three decides that they’re going to discontinue their business,” Ducharme said, “only then would one of those licenses be available to somebody new to come in and open up a new shop.”

The proposed ordinance also sets requirements for license applications and lays out the application review process, among other rules.

It would not permit medical marijuana manufacturing facilities and testing facilities, both of which are prohibited in Madison.