By Dave Golembewski
Last year the council approved another location for legal recreational Marijuana to be sold in town. Jar’s Cannabis’s already has one location in town in Tonto street but wanted another very high profile, in fact probably the highest profile location we have in our town. Only 2 council members voted against it. This vote allowed Jars to open up another facility at the property on 260/87 the old Carl’s Jr. and bank next door. Now they asked for changes in town ordinances to allow for a drive thru and delivery service and something about a 1000 ft rule I think about growing? Anyway the new council just voted 5-2 again to approve yet ANOTHER marijuana dispensary. Oh, by the way, on the first vote to allow 2 locations it was Mayor Morrissey, Vice Mayor Higgins, Nossek, Underwood and Schinstock for the “Yes” vote and Tubbs and Ferris the two “No” votes. Now the “Yes” votes were Mayor Higgins, Vice Mayor Underwood who is also shockingly on the School Board, Nossek, Flaherty and the newly appointed councilman Mona. The two council people that voted “No” were Suzy Tubbs again thank you Suzy and a yuuge. Thank you to Jolynn Schinstock for her “No” vote and standing up for the kids this time. I believe Jolynn voted with her conscience and told me personally she didn’t want to own this vote and in my opinion the beginning of the destruction of the Morality of this town. Thank you again Suzy and Jolynn.
Reasons for this? The council’s reasoning doesn’t make any sense. When Mayor Morrissey was in office the big push and propaganda for the approval of the first Jars location, the lawyers from Jars were boasting the town would be making all this money from the sales of this marijuana. This was unequivocally FALSE. In the Roundup article on Tuesday claims that the Jars Store paid over $200,000 in taxes to Payson, but it doesn’t specify who the taxes were collected for (was it the state of AZ who gets 24% on recreational marijuana vs. the town of Payson only gets 2.88% of that tax collected). So, at that number of $200,000 the only way that much money would have been collected would be that Jars sold 7.5 million dollars in marijuana over the past year? 10 years? It doesn’t say. Another unsubstantiated claims made by the Roundup that only discredits them further.
Mayor Higgins had told me at a basketball game, “Kid’s are going to get Marijuana anyway, but at a dispensary at least it wouldn’t be laced with Fentanyl.” I have a real problem with this statement from our Mayor, first of all kids aren’t allowed by law to smoke, take, even be need to know about Marijuana until till they are 21 years old, secondly, all our kids and everyone else seeing the sell out of our town to a drive through marijuana sign on the busiest intersection in town for years to come is just a travesty. I repeated this to the Council, and it’s a good thing Higgins said he won’t seek another term in the future. As for allowing the drive thru I told the Council Jars may seek another site if the Carl’s Jr. old building site on the 260/87 was not allowed. Sorry I don’t want to give Carl’s Jr. a bad name but I keep thinking drive thru get a 1/4 pounder is going to have a completely different meaning now. And I must say I miss their Western Burger. Also now we will be stuck with Yuuge Jars Cannabis signs on the corner of 87/260 right in the heart of Payson. Does Payson have any heart left. I had to do one emoji I’m trying to break that habit but these votes and new ordinances break my heart ♥️ for all the children in town who now will think we adults promote Marijuana. Next story will be the effect of Marijuana on kids and their growing minds but for now one last emoji 😢. It’s a sad day in Payson. Dave Golembewski
