If you’re wondering why so many legal cannabis stores are cropping up in Cambridge, you’re not alone.
The City of Cambridge is wondering the same thing.
In a report headed to council next week, the city’s deputy city manager for corporate enterprise, Cheryl Zahnleiter, explains how the city’s input on places to sell legal weed have largely been ignored by the province.
Now she wants the province’s commenting criteria for municipalities to be repealed because the informal policy to provide input has proven to be a waste of time.
The city has only backed three applications out of 17 proposals made to the Alcohol and Gaming Commission of Ontario in the two years since Cambridge opted in to allow retail sales.
The AGCO, however, has approved 13 and denied only four.
In her report, Zahnleiter expresses some frustration over this fact since the commenting procedures require “an extensive amount of staff time to monitor the AGCO website, notify council and senior staff, and review and provide comments.”
The city reviews the applications based on a store’s proximity within 150 metres of schools, childcare centres, post secondary institutions, parks, addiction service providers and other social services.
It didn't matter when 14 applications made for cannabis stores didn't meet that criteria as outlined in comments from the city's chief planner and a no vote from council.
In 2019, the city received funding from the Ontario Cannabis Legalization Implementation Fund in the amount of $175,412 to cover costs related to increased enforcement, responding to public inquiries, increased paramedic and fire services and bylaw policy development.
The city says its total costs to date have reached $91,159, with the balance being held for future costs.
The city’s bylaw division says there have been no “significant concerns” related to public consumption of cannabis or enforcement of the Smoke Free Ontario Act, which permits it in most outdoor areas.
In addition to permitting retail locations, current city-wide zoning bylaw permits manufacturing and processing of cannabis in some industrial zones provided the plants aren’t grown there.
A new bylaw is being proposed for the city’s M4 industrial zones to allow growing of medical cannabis.
Zahnleiter’s report suggests that instead of repealing the commenting criteria, council could choose to continue to “advocate the Province for more stringent criteria surrounding the potential cannabis retail locations as part of the AGCO’s application and review process.”
