Gloversville officials are preparing to extend the city’s moratorium on smoke shops.
After an initial six-month ban was enacted in August, officials in the Fulton County city say they need more time before more smoke shops open.
No building permits have been approved for stores where more than 25% of sales would consist of items like vapes, cigarettes, and pipes since the summer.
Democratic City Councilor Marcia Weiss of the 1st Ward says she wants to give consideration to the health risks posed by increased access to smoking products.
“I think it’s important for health that they’re not close to health places in particular. And elderly places, senior places, because I think we all know that smoking, and inhaling smoke, and second-hand smoke isn’t good. So, I don’t think any of this should be near those areas. I’m not against having smoke shops, I’m against having them in particular areas,” said Weiss.
Weiss adds banning smoke shops near school zones was a focus of the council – making the connection to when video game stores first arrived.
“And I remember my son was going to school and there was a video shop that opened very close to where the school was. And that created a large problem for attendance at schools with children. They were leaving early, they were getting dropped off at school but not going into the school, going over to the video shop. So, I think this is the same type of thing – that it’s really important for us to get this right and make sure that there’s a distance so that children don’t end up in these shops instead of going into where they should be in school,” explained Weiss.
Speaking with WAMC Monday, Democratic Mayor Vincent DeSantis said he backs the moratorium in favor of public safety.
“The legalization of marijuana is something that has a lot of unintended consequences, necessarily. And we want to make sure that we are very, very thoughtful about what we do with that. We are not one of the communities that opted out, so, you know, we didn’t want to try to fence the world out, but by the same token we want Gloversville to be a healthy place to raise children,” said DeSantis.
Gloversville building inspector David Fox says the moratorium does not affect existing smoke shops.
“The only way this moratorium would affect those stores and their business is if they were to somehow getting to lose their licenses from any state agency, DTF or Department of Health, they would no longer be able to reopen. But as them being existing, they should be able to stay,” said Fox.
Fox outlined how the moratorium initially came about through concerns he had over a growing number of potential smoke shops.
“I’d started seeing a number of people coming in, wanting to get permits and whatnot to open the smoke shops in various parts of the town and the city. And some of them happened to be right across from—well one was across from the spray pad down here they just put in last summer. And having that being said there’s a few issues that came through planning board stages and whatnot where they were right in line with the children walking home from schools,” said Fox.
Fulton County senior planner Aaron Enfield works in tandem with the Gloversville planning board. He says it would be the first municipality in the county to have legislation regarding smoke shops.
“We just got done doing a zoning ordinance update and looking at the development of the city which was passed at the end of 2023. And we’re actually taking one of those new zoning districts which basically classifies city parks and public places, and looking at potentially having buffer zones from those areas,” explained Enfield.
DeSantis supports the legalization of recreational marijuana and wants Gloversville to reap the potential economic benefits, but says it’s important to keep such products away from sensitive areas.
“We don’t want to eliminate, and I don’t think it’s really legal to eliminate any sort of type of business that’s legal from your community. But we want to regulate them so that they’re not attractive to children, and that young people aren’t encouraged to start smoking or use vapes or anything of that nature,” explained DeSantis.
The Gloversville City Council is scheduled to vote on the extension at 6.
