Leon commissioners schedule marijuana workshop, pause on homeless shelter and CRTPA proposals

Leon County Commissioners scheduled a workshop for this spring that looks to explore alternatives to arrest for people caught with small amounts of marijuana. 

The issue has been on the wish list for several years and has had some success already after a 2018 program launched by State Attorney Jack Campbell aimed at issuing civil citations for such offenses. 

Still, on March 22, Campbell is likely to join Leon County Sheriff Walt McNeil and county commissioners to address continued efforts to reduce penalties for possession of marijuana. 

McNeil will also join a workshop the same day where issues with bail, reentry initiatives and a review of the County’s electronic monitoring program will be addressed.

For years, a committee formed by McNeil has looked to examine monetary bail and Leon County’s pretrial release program.

Marijuana is considered a “Schedule I” substance by the feds, and selling marijuana is still a federal crime despite several states allowing medical use of marijuana, including Florida, or approving its recreational use by adults as in Colorado. 

In 2019, the Leon County Commission passed a largely ceremonial measure to move forward with an ordinance to make possession of small amounts of marijuana a civil offense. What it amounts to is a policy that urges law enforcement to consider alternatives to arrest.

We cannot decriminalize marijuana in Leon County,” then-County Attorney Herb Thiele told commissioners before the vote. “We don’t have the authority to direct law enforcement agencies to do anything.”

In other business:

Siting homeless shelters

Commissioners tabled changes to land development ordinances that would have put in place more stopgaps to locating a temporary residential facility that looked to include more neighborhood input and collaboration with the Big Bend Continuum of Care (CoC).

The regional coordinating agency often helps secure resources but under the ordinance, put on hold until December, the group would have more of an active role in deciding the need and location of a homeless shelter. The CoC operates in eight counties around Tallahassee. 

County Administrator Vince Long said a number of policy initiatives surrounding the  Tallahassee and Leon County homeless population would be coming before the board next month. They include management and a regulatory framework for how the county fits into the solution. 

Under the proposed ordinance, a proposal by a shelter to come into the community would require extensive neighborhood engagement, a recommendation by the CoC which would evaluate need and recommend security and staffing levels. Any applicant would need to also submit a statement as to purpose, justification and need.

“This will ensure that applicants communicate with the CoC and demonstrate that the proposed development has addressed other concerns such as, but not limited to, adequate staffing, proper security measures and a sufficient financial plan prior to submitting a proposal for the establishment of a transitional residential facility in the county,” staff wrote.  

The shelter later sought to rezone the property as a permanent transitional residential facility but was denied.  

County Commissioner Kristin Dozier, whose district includes the City Walk property, said until the city is in a position to make concurrent changes, the ordinance may be premature.

“We need to make sure we have alignments not just on the land development rules,” she said. “We’ve taken more steps this year than we have in a long time, but I am very concerned we are not seeing that (collaboration) with the city as robust as we may need in the future.”

Reorg of the CRTPA put on pause

Commissioners also unanimously tabled a decision to give up a portion of their voting weight on the Capital Regional Transportation Planning Agency under a request by the group’s director Greg Slay. Any decision wouldn’t come until at least January.

Currently, the CRTPA is made up of elected officials from Leon, Gadsden, Jefferson and Wakulla counties and the city of Tallahassee. There are three commissioners from Leon County and Tallahassee and one Leon County School Board member on the panel.

The proposal looks to move from a weighted voting structure to a single member, single vote structure, with the school board member serving only as a non-voting advisory member.

Slay said the changes would not affect an upcoming vote on the Thomasville Road Multi-use path, a controversial trailway being proposed to connect Midtown to Market Square. CRTPA bylaws would have to be amended for any new voting structure to go into place. The vote to determine the route of the Thomasville Road pathway vote could come as soon as January. 

If the changes are approved by the County Commission, it would reduce the local voting power of it and the city from 74% to 60%.

Gayle Nelson, the first woman elected to the County Commission who served from 1978 to 1992, said doing so would mean less attention to improvements in Leon County and Tallahassee. It also leaves each body in a position where it would have to seek approval from other counties if there is a divide among local boards.

She likened it to giving the state more preemption power, a move the Legislature attempted in 2018 to allow the state to overrule CRTPA votes across Florida.