Not long ago — all the way back to 2021 — it was legal in Longmont to sell pot to anyone under 21.
That hole in the local marijuana sales ordinance led to four tickets against two local pot shops getting tossed last year, said Longmont Public Safety spokeswoman Robin Ericson.
The city council gave its preliminary approval last week to amend the Longmont Municipal Code to make the fix and prohibit marijuana sales to those under 21 years of age. The second reading and public hearing on the amendment is scheduled for Nov. 15.
After stings conducted in collaboration with the Marijuana Enforcement Division in 2021, “staff found that the local code did not explicitly prohibit the sale of marijuana to minors,” a city staff report to the city council states.
The amendment adds “sales” to possession or consumption of marijuana to be prohibited in the city code.
City prosecuting attorney Rodrigo Rangle said he didn’t know if the State Enforcement Division then chose to proceed against those local businesses that had their local citations dropped. “… As the city State Code did explicitly prohibit the sale to persons under 21,” Rangle said in an email.
The staff report also states that there would likely be some fines collected if a marijuana dispensary failed a sting, however, it is difficult to anticipate or project the fiscal impacts of the ordinance.
“Ideally, no dispensary in Longmont would fail any sting!” the staff report states.
