Painesville officials are proposing new regulations for new marijuana facilities, vaping stores and small-box discount stores.
Each of the proposed regulations was discussed and recommended by Painesville’s Planning Commission in September. They are set to be introduced at Painesville City Council’s Oct. 7 meeting, and the city administration is planning public hearings for council’s Nov. 4 meeting.
The proposed marijuana regulations would allow for medical and adult-use dispensaries as conditional uses within the city’s B-2 General Business district. The B-2 district includes a number of properties located north of downtown Painesville and in other pockets of the city, according to the city’s 2016 zoning map.
Medical marijuana cultivation and processing facilities and adult-use cultivation facilities, processing facilities and testing labs would only be allowed as conditional uses within the M-1 Light Industrial and M-2 Industrial districts, which include a number of properties along the city’s two railroad tracks and in other pockets of the city.
No marijuana facilities would be permitted within 500 feet of a school, church, public library, public playground or public park in the city, according to the proposed regulations.
No medical marijuana facility would be allowed within a mile of another medical marijuana facility under the proposed regulations. The city would only allow one medical marijuana facility for every one square mile of the city and one adult-use marijuana facility for every two square miles of the city.
Applicants would also need to comply with state requirements and submit security plans to the Painesville Police Department.
The proposed vaping regulations would allow businesses that sell e-cigarette products as conditional uses in the B-2 district. These businesses would not be able to open within 500 feet of another facility selling those products, schools, churches or parks.
Vaping devices and products could not make up more than 20 percent of a store’s product sales under the proposed regulations. Stores selling those products would not be allowed to operate in standalone buildings, advertise those products with flashing or electronic lights or be open outside of hours set by the planning commission.
Existing stores that sell vaping supplies would be grandfathered in, according to the proposal.
Finally, the proposed small-box discount store regulations would apply to retail, variety or discount stores that are no larger than 15,000 square feet and sell a limited number of products directly to customers.
Those products would include “food or beverages for off-premises consumption, that generally cost less than $10 or cost 20-40 percent lower than the same type of good, products or merchandise sold at grocery or drug stores.”
The small-box discount stores would be allowed in the B-2 district, though one small-box discount store would not be allowed within a circumference of one mile of another small-box discount store. Existing stores would be grandfathered in.
City Council passed six-month moratoriums on new marijuana and vaping facilities in December and extended them for another six months in June. It approved a one-year moratorium on new small-box discount stores in May.
No marijuana facilities are currently licensed to operate in Painesville City, according to the Ohio Division of Cannabis Control.
Before the moratorium on new vaping businesses was implemented in December, Painesville Public Information Officer Kathleen Sullivan said that city officials were aware of one tobacco store in the city that sold vaping supplies. The city had no standalone vaping establishments at that time.
City Manager Doug Lewis said in May that three small-box discount stores operate in Painesville.
