A Durango retail and medical marijuana seller says he is feeling squeezed by lost revenue from marijuana legalization in nearby states and the city’s higher-than-average licensing fees.
Jonny Radding, a resident and co-owner of Durango Organics ‒ the first retail marijuana store to open in Durango ‒ said the city’s cannabis license fees are too high.
He asked Durango City Council to consider revisiting the fees and lowering the rates.
“The city of Durango right now has some of the most expensive licensing fees that we could find in the state,” Radding said. “They haven’t been changed, really, since 2014. They haven’t been reevaluated or re-looked at.”
He said the city was progressive in 2014 by allowing recreational marijuana stores to operate within city limits after statewide legalization, but times have changed.
Durango Organics owns four recreational marijuana stores: in Durango, La Plata County, Cortez and Crested Butte. Radding said it pays the highest fees, by far, in Durango. In total, the company pays $16,000 in business license fees, half of which go to the city of Durango.
Durango licensing fees
The city of Durango’s cannabis business licensing fees for recreational marijuana stores are as follows:
- $2,500 new license fee to the state for a retail marijuana store or retail marijuana testing facility.
- $2,500 for a new license to the city.
- $250 for a co-location with a current medical marijuana business license or to convert to a retail marijuana store.
- $5,000 operating fee.
- $2,500 application fee for the license transfer of location or ownership.
- $3,000 license renewal fee, plus a $500 fee for late renewal applications.
- $1,000 LLC or Corporate Stock Structure change fee.
- $250 fee per person for background investigations.
- $2,000 modification of premise fee.
- $1,000 fee for changing a trade name.
- $50 fee for acquiring a duplicate license.
“Originally, (the city) talked about the cannabis licenses reflecting the alcohol license fee and we would sure appreciate it if we could get somewhere close to that,” Radding said. “I think you guys have noticed the declining revenue of the industry.”
State marijuana sales tax revenues peaked in 2021 at almost $423.5 million, according to the Colorado Department of Revenue. Last year, revenues totaled $255 million.
The trend was similar in Durango, with $659,295 in marijuana sales tax revenues in 2021, which dropped to $349,239 in 2024.
“A number of different states surrounding Colorado have gone legal,” said CJ Poulin, Durango Rec Room dispensary manager, told The Durango Herald in February. “So the people from those states and the people from the states surrounding those states no longer feel as though they need to come to Colorado to purchase legal marijuana.”
Carolynn Raish, a cannabis regulator and consultant and a former employee of La Plata County who helped the county develop and implement its marijuana regulations, spoke to councilors on behalf of Durango Organics.
She said many jurisdictions around the state, including Cortez, have streamlined their application processes and reduced licensing and renewal fees.
“They noticed those declining revenues from the tax base after COVID, and they reached out to all those businesses in their town and asked if we can all sit down and look for a solution,” she said. “And though lots of comments were had, the common ground was that making the fees match the actual effort that it took to regulate there and (bringing) that down for businesses was the win there.”
Near the end of the City Council meeting, Councilor Jessika Buell proposed a briefing from city staff about the state of business licensing fees, including cannabis licensing fees, at a later meeting.
cburney@durangoherald.com
A previous version of this story misspelled Carolynn Raish’s first and last name.
