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Oak Park trustees heard from the village’s public health director last week on a new ordinance banning sales of kratom and unregulated THC products to people under 21.
The discussion was the latest event in a months-long dialogue between the village and the board over what to do about the sale of these products, whose industries have operated in legal gray areas for years.
The proposed ordinance could see fines as high as $750 per infraction laid on businesses who sell the products to underage people, or who sell the substances in packages that could be mistaken for candy or snacks.
“I know that there’s at least five local municipalities that when they banned the sale of [unregulated THC] they banned the sale of kratom, so they generally go hand-in-hand,” said Greg Olsen, director of Public Health for Oak Park.
The ordinance would also require businesses selling the products to display a sign advertising the new age limit and require them to only sell the products from behind a service counter. It is on the board’s March 18 consent agenda for a second reading and “anticipated final adoption,” according to the village.
If enacted, the ordinance would go into effect June 1.
Oak Park is a few years behind the first village governments in Chicagoland to pass policies regulating hemp sales. For example, in 2023 Elk Grove banned businesses from selling unregulated THC products after reports that a store in the community had knowingly sold an 11-year-old a psychoactive product.
Trustee Chibuike Enyia said that he’s heard from constituents that similar things have been happening in Oak Park.
“There are business owners that have already shown they’re willing and able to take those first steps forward, but we also have to find the bad actors who are doing this. And I can tell you I know where some of them are,” he said. “I was approached by a mom the other day who said ‘I followed my son, watched him go purchase this, go right out of the store and begin to smoke right after he walked out of the store.’”
Last fall, village public health officials recommended that the board approve an outright ban on these products, but the majority of the board said that they’d prefer to pass an ordinance regulating their sale instead.
The unregulated THC products in question, sometimes described as hemp-derived THC products, owe their origin to the 2018 Farm Bill, which made the sale of hemp products federally legal so long as they contained less than 0.3% by dry weight of THC, the chemical in marijuana that gives it its psychoactive properties.
While this provision opened the door for the boom in non-psychoactive CBD products, it also created a loophole for an industry to sell products chemically engineered to provide the “high” of marijuana that don’t surpass the federal 0.3% THC limit.
In 2023, the hemp-derived THC market was valued at over $3 billion nationwide, according to an analysis by Brightfield Group.
There is no age-limit for buying these products in Illinois, although many vendors self-impose an age limit of 18, according to the American Trade Association for Hemp and Cannabis.
Kratom is another unregulated plant-based substance, often sold in the same tobacco shops and convenience stores as hemp-derived THC products. The state of Illinois already imposes an age limit of 18 on kratom sales, but the ordinance will raise that limit to 21 in Oak Park.
Kratom is known to produce an opioid-like effect in high doses and a stimulant-like effect in small doses, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.
It’s often marketed as a mood and energy stabilizer, but the FDA has issued a warning against the substance, citing the damage it can cause to user’s livers, hearts, lungs and neurological systems as well as its addictive potential.
“Consistent with FDA’s practice with unapproved substances, until the agency scientists can evaluate the safety and effectiveness of kratom (or its components) in the treatment of any medical conditions, FDA will continue to warn the public against the use of kratom for medical treatment,” according to the FDA. “The agency will also continue to monitor emerging data trends to better understand the substance and its components.”
While kratom is considered a “substance of concern” by the DEA, it remains federally unregulated. Fourteen states have banned the sale of kratom, including Indiana and Wisconsin.
A state bill last year sought to enforce an age limit of 21 for hemp-derived THC products, but it failed to make it to a final vote before the end of the legislative session. For now, regulating the sale of those products is left in the lands of local municipal bodies like the Oak Park Village Board.
“Keeping our young people safe is the paramount thing,” Enyia said. “There definitely needs to be some type of penalty so people understand the severity of this. “Creating a damaged mind at a young age, they shouldn’t have to be exposed to things like this.”
“}]] Oak Park trustees heard from the village’s public health director last week on a new ordinance banning sales of kratom and unregulated THC products to people under 21. Read More
