Opting in or out; Municipalities reach decisions in Tioga County

As the Dec. 31 deadline for opting in or out for allowing the sale of marijuana neared, municipalities throughout Tioga County began to announce their decisions. While some have decided to opt out, that will not be the final word on the matter potentially. Any municipality that votes no will have to put the matter before residents for a vote if 20 percent of registered voters submit a petition within 30 days from when the vote to opt out took place. 

In the village of Owego, the village appears to have decided to opt in to allowing both on site sale of marijuana and on site consumption of marijuana. While the board had originally scheduled a second hearing on the matter for Dec. 20, the hearing never took place. 

“We had the hearing at our normal board meeting and it was the same outcome. No one came to oppose marijuana and the laws to ban the sale of marijuana came up and did not receive a second,” said Owego Mayor Mike Baratta. 

While the village of Owego has decided to opt in, the Town of Owego has decided to opt out. Previously Baratta said that if the village was to opt in and the town was to opt out, money generated from the sale of marijuana earmarked for local municipalities would go solely to the village and not need to be shared with the town. 

Newark Valley took a somewhat unique approach by opting into the sale of marijuana but opting out of on site consumption. While opting in would not require a general vote, opting out will require a vote from residents to affirm the decision. 

Candor has likewise decided to opt in to both the sale and on-site consumption. 

Spencer voted to opt out of both the sale and on-site consumption of marijuana, but did so with an eye towards potentially opting in later on.

“The majority of the Village Board therefore felt it prudent to keep options open and opt out at the present time as they can opt in at a later time,” said Gilbert Knapp, Village of Spencer mayor.

At issue Knapp said, was the fact that he believes that the regulatory framework of the law that allowed the sale of marijuana was far too vague. 

“Even though the regulatory framework and rules are unknown, the State has set a deadline of Dec. 31 for municipalities to make a decision to opt in or out. If a municipality does nothing, they are opted in and cannot later opt out,” Knapp said. 

In Richford, the decision has apparently been made to opt out. According to an article published in the Nov. 7 print edition of The Owego Pennysaver, a proposed amendment on the Nov. 2 general election ballot that would have allowed the establishment of retail cannabis dispensaries within the jurisdiction of the Town of Richford was voted down in November by residents, but only by a narrow margin of eight votes out of the 204 rendered. 

Waverly, N.Y. voted on Tuesday, Dec. 28 to opt out. However, instead of waiting for a petition to trigger a referendum, the board voted to waive the petition requirement.