Officials in Osseo want to open a city-run dispensary when recreational cannabis sales start in Minnesota next year.
“Our goal is to be the first facility to open in the Twin Cities, municipal or otherwise,” City Council Member Mark Schulz said at a council work session in late January. “We are way further along than anybody else, which is a really good thing.”
An ad-hoc committee has been exploring the idea for months. In January, the council passed a resolution paving the way to join the Minnesota Marijuana Association. Tougher decisions loom as the council starts assembling a plan for how such a store would operate, and where it would be located.
Multiple Minnesota cities run retail outlets for liquor, though Osseo is not among them. Still, said City Administrator Riley Grams, “We want to be ready when the state opens the application window. We want to submit.”
The state’s newly formed Office of Cannabis Management, which will oversee licenses, is still working to finalize rules and regulations for the state’s fledgling cannabis industry. Part of that will be presenting a path for cities to obtain a municipal dispensary license, Grams said.
Wedged between the much larger cities of Brooklyn Park and Maple Grove, Osseo had a population of just over 2,500 people in the last census.
Among the bigger decisions city leaders would face by opening a cannabis store is where to put it. One idea is incorporating it into the building that houses City Hall and the Police Department, but Riley said that could be tricky because customers might shy away from an establishment in proximity to law enforcement even though the product will be legal to buy.
A second option would be to house it in the former Osseo Press building. It’s spacious enough, but “it needs a lot of love,” Grams said. An unidentified building in the city’s industrial area is also under consideration.
