Skip to main content
Portland City Hall still doesn't know whether the Oregon Legislature will allow it to levy a 10-percent sales tax on marijuana.
But city officials are already considering another way to pay for local marijuana regulation: a $1,500 permit to operate a pot business in Portland.
A city budget document shows officials in the Office of Neighborhood Involvement still aren't sure if such a permit is allowed under Measure 91, which legalizes recreational weed. But they are planning to make the price steep.
"ONI is continuing to work with the City Attorney and the Office of Government Relations on what the city may be able to do locally due to the preemption language," the City Budget Office report says. "The bureau has noted that if it is able to do a non-regulatory permit, then the fees would have to be relatively high to offset program costs—possibly $1,500 or more per permit."
That charge would be nearly 15 times what a bar or pub pays the city for a liquor license. That cost is $100 for the initial application, and another $35 to renew each year.
WW first reported last July that Portland City Hall was seeking a 10-percent weed sales tax. Last month, Mayor Charlie Hales submitted a budget request for a $440,000 city "Marijuana Permitting Program," with three regulators hired to oversee recreational dope.
In its new report, the City Budget Office—the office that vets the financial requests of bureaus and elected officials—suggests Hales trim back that plan.
Budget officers suggest that until the Office of Neighborhood Involvement knows what kind of permits and taxes the legislature will allow it to enforce, the bureau can get by with just two regulators. That would cost the city $303,773.
Other than its estimate of permit costs, the most interesting part of the budget office's recommendation is its detailed list of what the Marijuana Permitting Program would do. Here's that list of what the $1,500 permits might fund:
WWeek 2015