AURORA | Aurora’s marijuana enforcement division will look at 57 applicants to decide who gets the city’s 24 limited retail marijuana licenses.
City staff are not giving the names of the applicants, but have released numbers for who has applied where in Aurora. Under a 22-page retail marijuana ordinance passed in May, the city limited the number of retail pot stores to four in each ward.
Ward III, located between East Sixth Avenue and East Mississippi Avenue heading west from South Airport Boulevard, received the most applicants at 15, vying for four locations.
That was followed by Ward I (located in northwest Aurora) and Ward II (primarily northeast Aurora), who both received 13 applications. Aurora’s Ward IV received eight applications, Ward V received five applications and Ward VI received three applications.
“The next step is to review all of the applications to make sure they meet the minimum criteria set by Council,” said Aurora Finance Director Jason Batchelor in a statement. Batchelor is also a part of the interdepartmental marijuana enforcement division. Applications for wards where there are more than four applicants will then be reviewed under a first-of-its-kind point system to decide who gets a license.
In the case of Ward VI, Batchelor said all three applicants will be awarded a license if they meet the city’s minimum criteria.
“Any ward that doesn’t have all four licenses awarded, we’ll open another window for applications after we know the results,” he said.
The city began taking marijuana applications July 1 and closed them on July 31. The city expects to start issuing licenses by September, and have stores open in October, Batchelor said.