Citizens have filed a lawsuit against the city of Colorado Springs, just days after the city council voted to put the question of recreational marijuana sales back on the ballot in April.
In November, 54 percent of Colorado Springs voters supported Ballot Question 300, which would allow existing medical dispensaries to sell recreational marijuana.
But city council members last week said a revote was warranted because voters must have been “confused” when they approved one pro-cannabis ballot question, Ballot Question 300 while rejecting another, Ballot Issue 2D.
If it had passed, 2D would have amended the city charter to ban retail marijuana businesses within the city limits. While recreational marijuana sales have never been permitted in the city, the charter amendment would have trumped any city ordinance.
The lawsuit was filed Friday by the leader of a Colorado Springs-based veteran group and a local cannabis shop owner.
“It is pretty wild that some of these city council members — they get elected by a few thousand votes — and then they're trying to inflict that vision on a city as large as us, the second largest city in Colorado,” Adam Gillard, Executive Director of El Paso County Progressive Veterans and one of the plaintiffs, told CPR News. “These seven folks think that they can just overturn the will of the people.”
Gillard, who filed the lawsuit alongside Renze Waddington, the owner of The Epic Remedy, a medical marijuana shop, said the goal of the lawsuit is to “keep the issue off the April ballot.”
Their lawsuit argues that while Colorado’s Amendment 64 allows local governments to ban recreational marijuana sales, any ballot measure to do so must appear in a general election during an even-numbered year. They claim the city’s plan to hold a vote in April 2025 violates that requirement.
“It is not only outrageous that this council believes it can overturn the will of the voters simply because they don’t agree with the result, but it is blatantly unconstitutional,” said Tom Scudder, president of the Colorado Springs Cannabis Association. “We look forward to the courts enforcing the voters’ will and sending a message to this city council that they do not have absolute authority over its citizens.”
In a statement to CPR News, the city said it “cannot comment on any pending litigation.”
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