Article 31

Concord Finance Committee will present Article 31 at Town Meeting. It would create a 3 percent local tax on retail marijuana sales in Concord.

Finance Committee Chairman Karle Packard said it’s difficult to determine how much local revenue retail marijuana sales would generate.

Packard cited Durango, CO – a state that legalized recreational marijuana – as a comparison, because its size is similar to Concord. According to Packard, Durango has 10 marijuana retail establishments, and they generated $716,000 in local tax revenue in fiscal 2017.

″(Concord) would probably not get anywhere near that (amount to local tax revenue),” Packard said.

Article 32

There is a third article pertaining to recreational marijuana that will be presented at Town Meeting.

The Concord Planning Board drafted Article 32, and it would extend the moratorium on retail establishments to Dec. 31, 2018. Town Meeting last year approved a moratorium to July 1, 2018 so the town could study the issue, and have time to prepare a bylaw governing local sales.

Since the Cannabis Control Commission won’t have its regulations in place until mid-March, the board believes it might need until the end of 2018 to review the regulations.