MAYOR’S ON-SITE POT SMOKING PLAN SUFFERS SETBACK
Move to license locations for recreational weed consumption stalls
Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s plan to create licensed places for on-site consumption of recreational marijuana stalled in a City Council committee Wednesday after aldermen from across the city complained about rigid state rules that tied the city’s hands.
It was the second time in a month that Lightfoot had suffered a legislative embarrassment on the issue of recreational marijuana.
In December, the City Council’s Committee on Contract Oversight and Equity voted 10 to 9 to delay recreational marijuana sales until July 1 over concerns that there were no African American or Hispanic dispensary owners. The following day, however, Lightfoot was able to convince the council to kill the sixmonth delay by a vote of 29 to 19.
Although the mayor ultimately won, it was a tense test of her City Council muscle that uncomfortably pitted her against members of the Black Caucus.
This time, the License Committee recessed, sparing the rookie mayor more embarrassment.
Paul Stewart, the mayor’s point person on recreational marijuana issues, was asked to explain the false start as he hustled out of the committee meeting just ahead of a crowd of reporters shouting questions.
“You can speak to the chair,” Stewart said. “We anticipated a vote. I don’t know [why it didn’t happen]. I didn’t call for the adjournment.”
Committee Vice-Chair Brian Hopkins (2nd) said he recessed after Ald. Gilbert Villegas, the mayor’s City Council floor leader, left early to attend a civics class at a school in his 36th Ward.
Hopkins said he thinks the mayor had the votes. “But without the floor leader, it didn’t seem appropriate.”
Villegas insisted he had the votes, but it didn’t make sense to hustle back to City Hall.
The Chicago Sun-Times reported earlier this week that the mayor’s consumption ordinance had run into a buzz-kill of opposition during closed-door aldermanic briefings.
African American aldermen were concerned it will pave the way for a new wave of drug arrests because there are no free-standing smoke shops on the South and West sides — and even if there were, cigarsmokers and recreational marijuana users don’t mix.
Ald. Roderick Sawyer (6th) argued Lightfoot’s plan to limit consumption-on-premises licenses to retail tobacco stores that derive 80% of their revenue from the sale of tobacco-related products is ill-conceived because there’s not enough money to make it worthwhile.
Wednesday, downtown Ald. Brendan Reilly (42nd) made a similar argument. Noting that smoke shops would be asked to invest in expensive, “high-tech ventilation systems,” he wondered how they could turn a profit.
Hopkins agreed the state “seems to have handcuffed” the City Council by allowing consumption licenses and dispensaries in the same building. His constituents don’t want that.
The mayor’s office later Wednesday blamed the setback on the absence of “key” committee members.
“Despite the lack of a vote based on today’s attendance, we are confident that we had and still do have the votes to pass this ordinance,” the mayor’s office said in a statement.
Nevertheless, “based on what we heard today, we will continue working with City Council members to refine the ordinance by working within the confines of the state statute,” the statement said.