Palmer council discusses marijuana prohibition change

PALMER — The most crucial discussion made by the Palmer City Council at their meeting on Tuesday resulted in the cancelation of a discussion on the repeal of Palmer Municipal Code 5.32 that had been scheduled for Wednesday.

A citizen’s initiative gathered enough signatures to place the question on the upcoming ballot repealing 5.32 and allowing marijuna retail and cultivation facilities to operate within the city of Palmer.

“This could potentially generate, they were guessing about $50,000 annually for the city,” said Councilwoman Jill Valerius. “The fears that we had around what kind of business would this generate and what would this look like — I think those have been allayed.”

Ordinance 20-008 was moved from the consent agenda to new business by Councilman Richard Best, who then moved to cancel the public hearing on Wednesday and allow the issue to go to the public at the ballot box. Councilwoman Julie Berberich said that she saw the issue as purely economic, noting the changes in perception and non disruptive operation that dozens of marijuana businesses around the Valley have established. Valerius said that already 30 percent of Palmer voters have weighed in on the issue during the signature gathering process and hoped to engage the public, noting the recent repeal of plastic bag ban that went against the majority of public comment.

“Marijuana industry is divisive. In the discussion where so many folks don’t want to have it and just as members have already spoken that there was perceptions of things, so to look at this as simply a economic question I think is disingenuous. We have a culture and a lifestyle and a persona of Palmer and people have cultivated, truly cultivated the image of Palmer. I think this is an important question that must go to the voters, that this is the question of who we are and what we express ourselves to be as a city and I think this is a very important question to be put in the hands of the voters themselves,” said Best. “I do take offense to the idea that we as the city council are not paying our employees living wages or appropriate wages.”

The only member of the public to provide comment on Ordinance 20-008 which would have facilitated the scheduled Wednesday discussion was Brian Daniels, who is running against Councilwoman Sabrena Combs and Deputy Mayor Linda Combs for the two available council seats.

“I look forward to hearing the public’s input on this issue,” wrote Daniels.

Council members argued over the effectiveness of public process with and without council input and the value of waiting until voters had cast their ballots. After an issue dealing with conflict of interest previously in the meeting, Mayor Edna DeVries asked aloud if there were any conflict of interests on the council pertaining to marijuana, which was restated by Best.

“I will ask again for you to ask if there is many member on this council that has a direct or indirect financial interest,” said Best to DeVries.

Members of the council took offense to what they felt was an assumption and began to declare no conflicts of interest.

“I don’t think that anyone on this council needs a lesson from councilman Best on what conflict of interest means but it does sound like he is personally insinuating that someone on this council isn’t being forthcoming,” said Sabrena Combs.

After lengthy debate, the motion to cancel the public hearing passed 4-3. Councilman Steve Carrington, Best, Mayor DeVries and Deputy Mayor Combs voted for the cancelation while Berberich, Valerius and Sabrena Combs voted against.

The council unanimously passed Resolution 20-019 issuing a question to the voters for no more than $8 million in utility revenue bonds to finance Wastewater Treatment Plant improvements. Under a federal consent decree by the Environmental Protection Agency, Palmer is required to install and operate two secondary clarifier units at the WWTP that are sufficient in treatment and setting capacity to meet all effluent limits. The bond would allow for the system to be configured with a third clarifier and run a maximum monthly flow of 1.5 million gallons per day if necessary. Palmer City Manager John Moosey had presented the program to ensure the reliability of Palmer’s WWTP.

Moosey also reported that 61 applications had been approved for small business grants from the CARES act monies and an additional 13 were being processed with approximately $350,000 of the $3 million in total having been distributed. For nonprofit grant applications, six have yet to be processed and four have been received. Both nonprofit and business applications for CARES grants from the city of Palmer are due Friday. Moosey also detailed that he hopes to change staff policies in response to the employee or employees at the Community Development building who had tested positive.

“We are having staff choose in some cases choose between being safe, healthy and keeping us safe or coming to work and being able to pay their rent. We’re really too tight on that and I want to bring back a policy change to the city council,” said Moosey. “I think we need to make some of those changes. We’re finding that this virus is lasting longer than I think anybody anticipated.”

Moosey also said that city staff will be receiving training in microaggressions, unconscious bias and diversity and encouraged all city council members to access the trainings as well. Following lengthy discussion during previous meetings about the possibility for council members that own businesses to apply for CARES grants from the city, Attorney Michael Gatti provided guidance to the council members. Councilman Carrington immediately declared a potential conflict of interest and was followed by Berberich and Sabrena Combs. Gatti provided definitions for substantial financial interest and noted that similar funding is available to everyone without council input.

“I think we did the best job we could to build a wall between the elected officials and any decision made,” said Moosey. “I want to give the best opportunity for the selected folks to be able to participate in each of those programs.”