Bartels doesn’t see big market for medical marijuana in South Dakota  (Audio)

October 13, 2021
Mike Tanner

WATERTOWN, S.D.–The Watertown City Attorney’s Office issued a press release recently notifying the public that applications for those people that want to sell medical marijuana in the city are now available.

The applications can be picked up at the Finance Office at City Hall, and have to be filed by November 1st.

The Watertown City Council recently passed an ordinance that sets the application fee at $25,000, with a limit of no more than three dispensaries in the city.

Republican State Representative Hugh Bartels of Watertown says cities were allowed the leeway to set the application fee at whatever “reasonable amount” they wanted…

There were some members of the city council that supported an unrestricted number of dispensaries in Watertown, but Bartels says as he sees it, the demand just won’t be there….

The recreational marijuana issue is being challenged in the South Dakota Supreme Court, but the justices have yet to issue their opinion on whether the ballot question approved by voters last November is constitutional.