Richland forced to reconsider retail cannabis sales. It’s one vote away from lifting it

A dozen years after it banned local cannabis sales, the Richland City Council is just one vote away from allowing a store to open in its city limits.

An unofficial poll of the city’s elected leaders during last week’s workshop revealed a 4-3 split in favor of keeping the ban, with Mayor Theresa Richardson providing the tie-breaking voice to keep cannabis sales out of town.

The council is being forced to revisit the ban after Shanna Kaiser of Fire Cannabis Co. formally applied to the city to amend its code to allow a store at 2415 Robertson Drive, in the Horn Rapids Industrial area.

Fire Cannabis has stores in Omak and Yakima and is part of a larger cannabis network with stores across Washington state. Fire is owned by Kaiser, along with Randy Lentes and Clifford Olsen.

Kaiser declined to comment on their plans.

Application forces review of ban

The application triggers a review by the city’s planning commission and a decision by the city council.

Before proceeding, Heather Kintzley, Richland’s city attorney, reviewed the situation with council members in the workshop session so they could advise staff on their current thinking.

The discussion offered a preview to the more formal deliberations to come and the promise of more opportunities for citizens to share their views.

Richardson along with Mayor Pro Tem Sandra Kent and Councilmen Ryan Whitten and Shayne VanDyke indicated they still support a ban.

Council members Ryan Lukson, Johanna Jones and Kurt Maier said it’s time to let it go.

Still, the Fire Cannabis plan is likely doomed on legal grounds. Kintzley said staff will recommend the council reject it because it does not establish a full legal framework for cannabis shops to operate in the city.

Advisory ballot, sort of

The council was divided on the ban, but not on keeping it off the ballot, which they called a waste of tax dollars.

Instead, they’ll use an upcoming vote in neighboring West Richland as a proxy for what their own voters might be thinking.

West Richland faces a similar challenge to its own cannabis ban. After a heated recent public meeting, the city council opted to ask its voters to weigh in via an advisory vote on the Aug. 6 primary ballot.

Maier argued it’s the Richland council’s responsibility to make a clear decision one way or the other.

“I don’t want to waste money on a public referendum. The folks who voted for us know who we are,” he said.

The cost of adding it to the November general election ballot is estimated at $20,000 to $30,000.

I-502 and the Tri-Cities

Washington voters decriminalized the possession and sale of recreational amounts of cannabis via Initiative 502 in 2012, with 55.7% of the statewide vote favoring legal weed.

It passed in 20 counties and failed in 19, including both Benton and Franklin.

The popular vote carried the day and I-502 became the law of the state in 2013.

Most, though not all, local governments opted out. Franklin County and the cities of Kennewick, Pasco, Richland and West Richland enacted local bans.

Benton County, notably absent from the initial round of cannabis banning, embraced the idea after retail cannabis shops opened in unincorporated corners in Finley (Green2Go) and just outside West Richland (Nirvana Cannabis).

Twelve years later, enthusiasm for bans has eased.

Benton City and Prosser, the only communities that allowed cannabis sales, were joined by Pasco in 2023 on a 4-3 city council vote. Two stores, Lucky Leaf and Green2Go, opened in November, on Road 68 and near Road 90.

Cannabis is heavily taxed, with a 37% excise tax along with regular sales taxes. The state, however, keeps most of the revenue, leaving cities and counties with little financial incentive to encourage cannabis businesses.

In fact, cities and counties get laughably small checks from the state and none at all if they outright ban sales.

Benton County received $450,000 in 2023; Franklin received nothing. Yakima received $258,000, Prosser $23,000 and Benton City $5,900.

Pasco will get its first distribution in September, according to the Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Board. It won’t make much of a dent in the city’s budget. Auburn, with a similar population as Pasco, received $246,000, according to LCB distribution figures.

Freedom of choice and ‘old hippies’

Richland flirted with lifting its ban in 2018 and a Libertarian Party-led effort tried to put it on the ballot.

The signature gathering initiative was a success, but it never made it to the ballot. Washington law reserves the right to change zoning to local jurisdictions — cities and counties — not the ballot box.

At the time, though, some in city hall were friendly to the idea of letting voters have a say.

Councilman Ryan Lukson was one of them.

He and then-Mayor Bob Thompson favored putting it before voters. Thompson left the council, but Lukson said he embraces the Libertarian view of letting people, not government, make their own decisions.

“This is not an access issue. This is freedom of choice,” he said. And the point may be moot, he added: A future Legislature is likely to force local governments to accommodate I-502.

“I would rather control it ourselves,” he said.

Jones said crime stats shared by the city attorney show police are called to grocery stores far often than cannabis stores.

“I just found out that going to the grocery store is more dangerous than going to get pot,” she said.

Noting that customers are often seniors or people using cannabis for pain relief, she said the industry has put its back alley days behind it.

Opponents cited traditional concerns, such as crime, addiction and the widespread availability in neighboring communities.

Kent, the mayor pro tem, said this is one occasion where Richland can be the last to embrace change.

“If we have folks in Richland who want to go buy, they can buy somewhere in the Tri-Cities,” she said.

Whitten said cannabis doesn’t come up often in conversation. When it does, people “adamantly” oppose it in Richland, even if they’re regular users.

Whitten said he visited stores and observed that customers were “all old hippies.”

“It was hilarious, actually,” he said.

Mayor Richardson cited crime, including a recent smash-and-grab incident at Green2Go in Pasco, along with rising potency. Legal cannabis is widely available, she noted.

“Why do we need another one?” she asked. “If we were talking about a Trader Joe’s, it would be a different conversation, but if anything, I think I would favor going for an advisory vote or waiting until we see what happens in West Richland.”

Follow Richland agendas at richlandw.portal.civicclerk.com.

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