Residents and visitors to Wildwood Crest are now prohibited from using cannabis products in public spaces such as parks and recreational areas. Additionally, all marijuana establishments, distributors and delivery services are banned within the borough limits.
The new restrictions will take effect June 7 as the summer beach season at the Jersey Shore gets underway.
As other Cape May County towns move to block cannabis-related businesses, Middle Township officials may be heading in the opposite direction.
The Township Committee already supported a proposal for a medical marijuana facility on Indian Trail Road, and members are now considering a request to expand that use to grow for the new adult-use market.
And while voters throughout the state — and in Cape May County — supported marijuana legalization by a wide margin in a November referendum, some governing bodies in the county have introduced zoning ordinances that would ban cannabis businesses.
Wildwood Crest seems poised to join that number.
On Wednesday, borough attorney Ronald Gelzunas presented a draft ordinance that would ban cannabis sales within the small borough. He said the ordinance has been sent to the borough Planning Board for review and would ban cannabis sales in all zones.
In the meantime, municipalities like Cape May, Middle Township, and Avalon have until Aug. 27 to decide the best course of action in the best interest of their community.
“We have 180 days to review the new law,” said Cape May's Interim City Manager Michael Voll. “It’s a whole new challenge for us. We are a law-and-order community, but we are open-minded. We will review what we can permit, prohibit and allow while protecting the health and safety of our community.”
As part of the Middle Township’s ongoing efforts to boost job creation and economic development, Mayor Tim Donohue, Administrator Kimberly Krauss and a group of township department heads met in early July with the principal owners of INSA, a cannabis cultivation and distribution company based in Massachusetts.
Avalon Borough Council scheduled the public hearing and potential adoption of its proposed marijuana ordinance for Feb. 27, after procedural difficulties had forced the borough to remove consideration of the ordinance from its first meeting that month.
Once again, the ordinance failed to come up for consideration as council formally tabled it. Assistant Business Administrator James Waldron explained that additional changes needed to be made, which would necessitate starting over with the two-step process required for new municipal laws.
Avalon is amending its zoning code to “reaffirm that the sale of marijuana is a prohibited use within all zoning districts in the borough.” The move comes as the state continues to inch forward on legislation that would legalize recreational marijuana sales.
Emmett Vandergrift, a representative of Evergreen Curative Care LLC, a New Jersey-based medical marijuana organization, recently presented Lower Township Council with a request to consider supporting a medical marijuana dispensary in Lower Township. He said that his company would manage such a facility in partnership with Sea Hunter Capital Management.
Three speakers told Cape May County Chamber of Commerce members June 21 of the widespread negative effects legalized, recreational marijuana could have.
Legislation is pending in Trenton that could make the drug legal for recreational use. It is legal for medical applications with a physician's prescription.
NJ R.A.M.P.
Grace Hanlon, represented New Jersey Responsible Approaches to Marijuana Policies, and showed slides and video clips of the impact legalized marijuana has had in Colorado.
Many New Jersey cities and towns are not waiting for the state to legalize recreational cannabis before enacting ordinances to regulate it.
In December, Point Pleasant Beach voted to ban sales of both medicinal and recreational marijuana. The Point Pleasant Beach cannabis ordinance prohibits businesses from selling medicinal or recreational marijuana within a quarter-mile of schools, churches, residential areas and marine commercial and general commercial districts. Doing so effectively bans all sales within town limits.