The Town of Gibsons is looking to finalize a policy on cannabis retail and production, as council also gets ready to evaluate a temporary use permit (TUP) application for a cannabis store in upper Gibsons.
Both the draft policy and the TUP application were before the Town’s planning and development committee Feb. 4.
The TUP application was filed by Coastal Bay Cannabis, which operates the only shop in Gibsons with a provincial licence, and one of two currently holding a TUP.
Coastal Bay is hoping to establish a second location in a commercial building at the intersection of Highway 101 and Pratt Road – opposite the Gibsons Park Plaza shopping centre. As well as a TUP, Coastal Bay also requires a separate provincial licence for the new location.
Brenda Harris of Coastal Bay Cannabis said while they hope to keep their Marine Drive store open for a long time, they can foresee the day they outgrow it.
“We’re trying to set ourselves up for five or 10 years down the road by having that second location to be our main one,” she told the committee.
Although the committee, and council later the same day, only voted to send the application to the next step of gathering referrals and feedback from neighbouring property owners and not on approval of a TUP, some councillors said they were inclined to favour the application.
Coun. Stafford Lumley, who said he remains opposed in principle to having any cannabis retailers in lower Gibsons, credited Coastal Bay with running their Marine Drive store “very smartly,” and said he thinks the proposed upper Gibsons location is “a move in the right direction for the town” when it comes to where cannabis retailers should be allowed.
“I appreciate the fact that the applicant has gone to the trouble of complying with all the rules and regulations that were set out by the first TUP [for Marine Drive]. They’ve met the provincial regulations and guidelines, which some of the other people that have applied for TUPs haven’t done,” Coun. David Croal said. “If someone’s willing to play by the rules, I’m certainly willing to support them.”
Discussion of the Coastal Bay Cannabis TUP application bled over into the discussion about the draft policy on cannabis, which once adopted, will be used to help guide decision-making around future applications.
Planning department staff were looking for approval to start public consultation on issues like whether there should be a limit on the number of cannabis stores, what sort of buffers should there be between stores and around schools, and whether the Town should regulate the appearance of stores beyond the regulations already imposed by the province.
The draft policy doesn’t propose a limit on the number of stores, but it does included a proposed 150-metre buffer around schools and 100 metres between stores or production facilities and says the Town will only take applications for areas zoned mixed use commercial or “service commercial/business centre.”
Mayor Bill Beamish said he’d also like to hear from the community on whether, if council adopts a policy limiting the total number of cannabis retailers, it should also have a policy limiting how many of those locations can be under the same ownership to avoid creating a monopoly.
“We are a small community. I would be concerned if we had one operator in a community controlling all the cannabis retail.”
Former councillor Silas White, now working as a consultant for Impact Resolutions, which has been advising the Town on cannabis issues, told the committee he was not aware of any other jurisdictions that have moved in that direction.
The committee voted in favour of launching public consultations on the cannabis policy, including an online survey, and its recommendation was endorsed at the council meeting that evening.
Sechelt council adopted a policy last year that limits the overall number of cannabis retailers to six, with no more than five of them in the downtown core.
The province already has applications pending for three downtown locations and one in Wilson Creek.
