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A marijuana shop in Cedar Mill?
By Virginia Bruce

In September of last year, Sherwood resident Sheri Ralston held a Neighborhood Meeting at a small house on Dale Ave., just south of Cornell, to talk with neighbors about her proposed business. She is one of the owners of Western Oregon Botanicals, a company based in Newberg that both grows and sells marijuana products for medical and recreational use.

In a July 2015 article in Pamplin Media’s Newberg Graphic, Ralston’s testimony before the Newberg Planning Commission was quoted, “I think that my age (55), my business-ness and my concern about it being run quietly and efficiently and working with the city on it will benefit the medical marijuana business and just (offset) the stigma,” Ralston said.

Ralston bought the Dale Ave. house in August 2015, and rented it as a residence until she was ready to move forward with the marijuana business there. After the Neighborhood Meeting, she continued to develop her plans, and submitted her development application in February 2016. It was deemed complete and was accepted by Washington County Land Use and Transportation in July. The complete application, with building plans and specifications, is on file at the Cedar Mill Library. Check with the reference desk to view the document.

A small storm of protest erupted among neighbors and others who don’t believe the facility belongs there, as the public comment period neared its end. Opinions expressed on a NextDoor discussion ranged from vehement opposition to marijuana legalization altogether, to fears of crime, to worries about children being exposed to the now-legal substance. Ever-present parking and traffic worries were also an issue.

A protest meeting was held on October 29 near the house, at the corner of Murray and Cornell. The day before, Ralston asked the county to put her application on hold.

As we wrote in the September issue, zoning that has been in place since 2000 designates several properties south of Cornell on both sides of Dale and Joy as TO:RC—Transit-Oriented Retail Commercial. Further down the street the zoning allows fairly dense multi-family residential development. These changes were made in hopes that the Cedar Mill Town Center would become a denser, more urban shopping and residential area.

The Board of County Commissioners voted in October to amend the county code with Ordinance 804, which among other provisions, allows marijuana facilities in TO:RC districts through a Type II application. “Type II land use actions are presumed to be appropriate in the District. They generally involve uses or development for which review criteria are reasonably objective, requiring only limited discretion. Impacts on nearby properties may be associated with these uses which may necessitate imposition of specific conditions of approval to minimize those impacts or ensure compliance with the Code.”

A page on the county website has information about all the county rules controlling marijuana. The specific section of the code dealing with TO:RC is 430.80, and a link to that is on the page. Regulations include requirements regarding hours of operation, signage and lighting, and specify that dispensaries and shops must be 1,000 feet away from schools or THPRD facilities, and from other marijuana facilities.

We reached Ralston just before publication and she indicated that the protests were not the reason for the suspension of her development application. “I know that it’s a tight-knit little bedroom community there, I acknowledge that. Our shop will close at 8 pm, so it won’t be a late-night operation,” she said.

“Western Oregon Dispensaries has two businesses open now, in Newberg and Sherwood,” she continued, “and they’re both running quietly and efficiently. We still anticipate opening in Cedar Mill in 2017.”

Ralston has worked in both wholesale and retail business for over 25 years, and is part of the growing number of professionals who are engaging in this new business. With the eyes of their neighbors on them, they know they have to toe all the legal lines to stay in operation.

Customers entering a marijuana sales facility are required to pass through an entry area and show their ID before they can access the sales floor. Minors aren’t even allowed in the entry area. None of the products can be consumed on-site.

Oregon is still fine-tuning its regulations. A website, “What’s Legal,” maintained by OLCC, which now regulates recreational sales, offers information and an extensive FAQ with hundreds of answers to typical questions.

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