Marijuana is legal in California for medical and recreational use, but very few cities in the San Gabriel Valley allow any kind of cannabis-related business. This election season, South El Monte wants to join the small crowd, and Baldwin Park wants to make an addition to its stable.
South El Monte has two cannabis measures on the Nov. 8 ballot, Baldwin Park has one. All three ask for a yes or no response, and each would require a simple majority to win.
Baldwin Park has on its ballot Measure CB. It would allow “cannabis retailers to sell and deliver medical cannabis and cannabis products to adults, and adult-use cannabis and cannabis products to persons 21 years and older, with retailers paying a .5% tax and 4% tax on gross receipts from sales, respectively.” It would generate between $300,000 to $3 million annually for general government use, also authorizing the City Council to modify rates to up to 5%, until repealed by voters, according to the measure.
Measure CM in South El Monte would permit and regulate limited cannabis retail businesses — one adult-use/medical with the option of up to three total after the measure’s first year. It would establish a general tax at a maximum of 8% “of noncultivation cannabis business proceeds and $25/square foot of cultivation space. It would generate about $720,000 annually for general City services” such as police and maintenance, according to the measure.
Measure X would permit and regulate cannabis businesses (5 dispensaries, 2 cultivation, 1 testing facility, 2 manufactures/distributors), while establishing a maximum 6% special tax on retail cannabis/edibles sales. It would generate about $126,000 each year until, until ended by voters, for specific municipal programs.
Baldwin Park, El Monte, Monrovia and Pasadena are the only San Gabriel Valley cities currently allowing any kind of business related to cannabis, according to the state’s Department of Cannabis Control website.
At it stands, the type of cannabis business currently allowed in Baldwin Park is manufacturing.
“The measure does not expand zoning for cannabis, it instead allows for two retail stores in industrial areas, where manufacturing or cultivation is already taking place,” Baldwin Park Mayor Emmanuel J. Estrada said.
Estrada and his counterpart in South El Monte, Mayor Gloria Olmos, have contrasting perspectives on the similar measures in each city.
“This can help increase attention to those areas, increasing attention to safety and aesthetics,” Estrada said. “Cannabis is a recession-proof industry. This would be an opportunity to increase revenue without it being at the expense of residents and taxpayers, overall.”
Estrada also noted what he said would be the measure’s emphasis on union jobs “with benefits for our community,”
“The measure also calls for labor-organized retail, meaning high-paying union jobs with benefits for our community,” Estrada said.
In South El Monte, Olmos wasn’t against marijuana per se, especially from a medical standpoint.
“I understand that people need it,” she said. “I get that.”
But she doesn’t like the way either measure is written, and opposes both of them.
“Measure X is an excessive amount for a 2.5-mile radius city,” she said, alluding to the five dispensaries proposed.
She’s concerned about reports of rises in crime in cities with dispensaries, as well. Sure, some of the funds are going to be intended for public safety.
“However, they’re going to need more sheriffs because of the crime’s going up,” Olmos said.
She’s also not convinced that the potential funds generated from the measures will go where they are earmarked to go, adding that if the measures fail, she would be open to endorsing re-written measures.
South El Monte’s neighbor — El Monte — in November 2021 opened its first marijuana dispensary. It was No. 8 for Catalyst Cannabis.
Catalyst – which has emerged as a leading backer of efforts to get such measures passed in cities that have traditionally not allowed them — opened its first dispensary in 2017 in the Belmont Shore section of Long Beach, which began to allow medical marijuana dispensaries in 2009. Ultimately, Catalyst opened severals stores after christening the first legal dispensary in the city of El Monte last year.
Such efforts come as the industry itself struggles to gain footing, six years after voters approved Proposition 64, which allows residents 21 years old or older to buy, grow and use cannabis for recreational purposes.
Despite the fact the measure won, reports have noted that many public officials remain on the fence about dispensaries. And in many cases, issues over dispensaries have been mired in politics, lawsuits and scandal.
In 2018, Pasadena voters passed Measure CC, which along with allowing a certain number of dispensaries, also outlined a process intended to create more equitable ownership and employment opportunities for people who have been adversely affected by the war on drugs.
Instead, the process quickly became a furious “race to the window,” according to city documents, as retailers flocked to become the first to submit applications that would secure one of six conditional-use permits. Those permits, according to the city, were valued at millions of dollars. But the process led to charges of unfairness.
This month, longtime Baldwin Park City Attorney Robert Tafoya resigned, after allegations that he came up with the idea of a bribery scheme in which the city’s former councilman, Richard Pacheco, collected at least $170,000 in payoffs from cannabis companies.”
