01-25-2012 Council Agenda - Laserfiche WebLink

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C. Limitation of total product display area for tobacco - related products The basis for the proposed regulation is that tobacco stores in the Metro area and elsewhere are common places to find drug paraphernalia. This is not necessarily a criticism of the tobacco shop owners. There essentially is no line between a "tobacco pipe" and a pipe used for lighting and smoking illegal drugs; the same is true of rolling papers and similar products. Market economics would predict that if a store is attracting more customers interested in drug paraphernalia than in tobacco, the store will adapt to its customers and make more effort to stock pipes /paraphernalia instead of tobacco. At some point, the shop can effectively cease to be a tobacco store (example: "Still Smokin" on West 7'h in Saint Paul has a tobacco license, but labels itself as an "herbal smoke shop" and sells no tobacco. http:/ /www.myspace.com /thegreenmonkey /photos /31780992 for pictures). The 90% tobacco - related revenue requirement is intended to discourage a transition to non - tobacco products, but does not address those tobacco products that are readily used for illegal drugs. Limiting the total display space which a licensee can devote to the display of pipes and non - tobacco items is intended to prevent such a shift in inventory. However, while this is a phenomenon with some tobacco stores, it is certainly not limited to tobacco stores. The two most prominent "head shops" in St. Paul don't appear to sell tobacco at all. The store in Duluth that was the focus of news stories in the fall about the State's recent ban on the sale of synthetic drugs appears to sell cigarettes, but apparently as a very minor facet of the business. At first glance, the problem would seem to call for a broader drug - paraphernalia ordinance which would apply to all retailers. The City of Northfield recently reviewed a proposed drug - paraphernalia ordinance as a companion to revisions of the City's tobacco ordinance. The combination was spurred by a local tobacco store with an abundance of non- tobacco items (and an owner who had been run out of Minneapolis for failing to control drug activity at his store there). 1 have some concerns about this approach, though, that keep me from recommending a similar ordinance. State law does criminalize the sale and possession of "drug paraphernalia." State controlled- substance laws, like the criminal code in general, are generally held to pre -empt any local regulation on the same subject. So even though the State's paraphernalia laws are remarkably weak (if an item is not found in the immediate presence of illegal drugs, a person pretty much has to tell the police that they use the item to take drugs in order to effectively prosecute), it's not likely that the City could improve upon them. A very common dodge of the State's paraphernalia laws for general retailers is to state that the product in question is intended only for the smoking of tobacco. While it would not reach every form of paraphernalia, the City could reach a substantial portion of it by enforcing the requirement of a Tobacco Store license in order to sell "tobacco - related devices." Doing so would prevent other types of retail stores (novelty stores, etc.) from offering the products at all, or if 6 7