City Council Votes to Approve Easing of Restrictions for Pot Selling ; Michigan Avenue in Sloop Has Restrictions Though

Looks like city council is easing restrictions on pot dispensaries and making it easier to setup shop (via WTTW):

The Chicago City Council voted 33-13 Monday to allow cannabis to be sold legally downtown — while keeping rules in place to prevent Michigan Avenue from becoming a “pot paradise.”

Backed by Mayor Lori Lightfoot, the loosened rules are designed to help Black and Latino residents of Illinois — as well as those who’d been punished or sent to prison for using and selling marijuana when it was a crime — to get a piece of the lucrative legal pot business.

“No one believes that Springfield has delivered a perfect statute. Far from it,” Lightfoot said, pushing back on calls from several alderpeople to wait to change the rules until new restrictions are in place to ensure that Black and Latino entrepreneurs get their fair share.

Interestingly, Michigan Avenue in the Sloop is still included in the restrictions (via WTTW):

The new rules narrow those restrictions to include a strip between Michigan Avenue and State Street from Division Street on the north to Van Buren Street on the south, as well as from Michigan Avenue between Ohio and Illinois streets east to Navy Pier. In addition, dispensaries are banned from opening on south Michigan Avenue between Van Buren and 16th Street.

As of now we're unclear if and where the Sloop might get a dispensary.  There was movement at 1420 S. Michigan but that was eventually pulled back due to protests by neighbors and parents of nearby Old St. Mary's school.  We also posted about some businesses supposedly scouting locations on South Wabash (900 s. Wabash and 418 s. Wabash).  We're unsure if those are still being considered.