AURORA | After numerous amendments, Aurora approved new licensing tools aimed at keeping youth from getting nicotine products and other illicit substances.
“Schools cannot solve this problem alone,” said Andre Bala, principal at Smoky Hill High School. “When age-restricted products remain too easy for minors to access, schools are left managing the fallout instead of preventing the harm.”
Young people from Aurora schools, health professionals and advocates from Adams and Arapahoe counties and within Aurora have been giving testimonies regularly at city council meetings for months, hoping to create local legislation in Aurora to stop the youth from obtaining tobacco products and other illicit drugs.
On Monday, city council unanimously, tentatively passed a new permitting system with amendments from Councilmember Curtis Gardner, including replacing the use of the “good moral character” definition with restrictions to those who have committed more serious felony crimes. He also changed the language to allow tobacco sellers to hold festivals, such as a cigar festival, or sell in mobile spaces if they are city-permitted. Finally, Gardner struck packaging minimums for cigars and cigarettes, allowing items such as single-cigar sales.
The proposed ordinance will establish city-level licensing for retailers selling tobacco, Kratom, certain hemp-derived THC products and related paraphernalia.
“The primary purpose is to reduce youth access,” said Aurora Manager of Licensing, Trevor Vaughn, in a previous meeting.
A group of young people with United for Better Futures, a branch of the Aurora Partners for Thriving Youth Coalition, has been working together for months to build awareness through regular testimony at “public invited to be heard” sessions during city council meetings.
“If we want to prevent lifelong addiction, we must prevent youth initiation,” said Program Coordinator for Children’s Hospital Colorado, Joyce Baker. “This is why strong local action matters. Our kids deserve to grow up free of addiction, free from preventable lung disease and free from lifelong consequences of nicotine exposure.”
If the ordinance passes second reading, the city would begin conducting compliance checks twice a year, with a penalty structure more aggressive than the state’s current tobacco enforcement system, according to Vaughn.
A fourth violation within 36 months could result in a company losing its license to sell such products.
“A tobacco retail framework is not a standalone solution,” said Haley Foster, the coordinator of United for Better Futures, a branch of the long-standing Aurora Partners for Thriving Youth coalition. “It has never been intended to be one. Rather, it’s a policy lever that complements education, family engagement, school support and youth‑led efforts.”
The proposed Aurora license would also create local oversight and extend enforcement authority to psychoactive hemp products and paraphernalia, including items marketed with youth-oriented branding, such as Hello Kitty pipes.
“It’s been one of the biggest disciplinary actions that we have to take in the schools any given day, you can go into a bathroom, into a classroom sometimes, and you will see students who are vaping,” said the Dean of Students at Rangeview High School, DeLisha Boyd.
She said she knows students buy vapes in bulk and sell them to their peers, creating a black market for them inside the schools. Vaping has also caused violence in schoo between students from addiction, such as when one student borrows another student’s vape and doesn’t return it.
Boyd said vaping has even caused plumbing issues because students will vape in the bathrooms and if a staff or faculty member walks in, the students will flush their vapes, causing the school thousands of dollars in damages.
“Doing something from the city council that limits the amount of vapes that students have access to, children have access to, can greatly help our clients in making sure that our students are safe at school and that they are not fighting the addiction,” Boyd said.
Colorado law already restricts the sale of tobacco, Kratom and certain high-THC hemp products to those 21 and older. Though Vaughn said that state licensing does not comprehensively cover all product categories.
The ordinance underwent amendments requested by industry lobbyists and small businesses, as well as by the Business Advisory Board.
The state licenses tobacco retailers, and Kratom is regulated through the public health department, and certain hemp products through the Attorney General’s Office. Vaughn said those agencies have limited resources for compliance checks, leaving enforcement gaps.
While the state focuses primarily on sales to minors and advertising, this proposed city program also addresses public health, safety and neighborhood impacts by including:
- License regulation of Kratom and age-restricted hemp products with proactive retail enforcement.
- Compliance with the city’s nonscheduled psychoactive substances and drug paraphernalia ordinance.
- Restriction of marijuana and tobacco paraphernalia sales to licensed retailers.
- Prohibition of youth-targeted paraphernalia using cartoon or copyrighted characters such as Pokémon and Star Wars.
- Limiting marijuana paraphernalia sales to customers 21 and older.
- Operational standards prohibiting loitering for drug or prostitution purposes.
- Authority to inspect books and records.
- Ability to source illegal psychoactive products.
- The licensee hasn’t committed a crime of moral turpitude in the past 10 years, including any extreme felonies.
The four strikes of penalties according to city information:
- First violation: Minimum $1,000 fine (vs. state’s $250 fine).
- Second violation within 36 months: $2,000 fine and 7-day suspension.
- Third violation within 36 months: $2,650 fine and 21-day suspension.
- Fourth violation within 36 months: Revocation of license.
The ordinance includes new spacing restrictions: 1,500 feet from schools, 500 feet between “incidental” retailers, such as grocery or convenience stores, 2,000 feet between vape and smoke shops, and two miles between hookah lounges.
Vaughn said existing businesses would be grandfathered in and allowed to transfer licenses to new owners, provided they operate lawfully.
The ordinance could add additional enforcement costs and revenue.
Aurora has approximately 335 retailers affected by the proposal, including 272 incidental retailers and 55 smoke shops, according to Vaughn.
A proposed $500 annual license fee is expected to generate roughly $170,000, Vaughn said. Enough to fund a new full-time supervisory position. Vaughn projected an additional $30,000 in potential fine revenue based on last year’s compliance failures under state enforcement.
Data from the Healthy Kids Colorado Survey, administered by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, showed that in a local survey of approximately 1,400 Aurora students reported not being refused a sale of tobacco products due to their age when attempting to obtain them.
The statistic does not necessarily mean that 85% of retailers sold to minors; rather, it indicates that most youth knew where to obtain products, Vaughn said while presenting details about the city bill.
The survey also found that one in four students who reported tobacco use obtained products directly from retailers. National research showing most smokers begin before the age of 18 was also cited in support of stronger local oversight.