It's 4/20. So where can you get weed in Merced County?

This Friday is expected to be the last unofficial cannabis holiday in Merced without local dispensaries where residents can pick up bud, edibles, oils or other consumable weed.

April 20 marks the unofficial day to appreciate getting stoned, and Merced city staffers are stillworking on processing applications for cannabis businesses.

The city has so far received 31 applications to open cannabis-based business in Merced with 24 applicants looking to score one of the four dispensary spots allowed in Merced, according to Scott McBride, the city's director of development services. Applications for cultivation, manufacturing and distribution make up the other seven, but no one has applied for cannabis testing so far.

"We're making progress," he said. "We're basically at the end of phase one."

The second and more stringent phase comes next for any applicants whose paperwork is complete, he said. That process, which includes public hearings in front of the Planning Commission, could take another three months.

That means it could be about another six months before dispensaries are able to open for customers, according to Michael Hren, principal planner for Merced. Once the applications go out, it's up to the business owners to make the security or other necessary upgrades to their buildings.

Most of the applications estimate 90 to 120 days before they could open once awarded a permit, city staffers said.

"We're going into this process and making it detailed and thorough, because we want to make sure that we get it right," Hren said.

Merced will also ask voters in June to pass a special tax on cannabis-based businesses. The plan would start most types of weed businesses off with 3 percent to 4 percent taxes with the option to raise taxes up to 10 percent in the future. The new money would go to police, fire, and parks and recreation services.

Merced is the only city in Merced County this far along in opening dispensaries. Other city's leaders have discussed changing their minds, but nothing is official yet.

Hren said the dispensaries in Merced may see competitive, though likely temporary, advantage because there are no dispensaries in Merced, Madera and Fresno counties. There are several in Stanislaus County.

Industry officials say the local bans harm cannabis patients, threaten the financial viability of California’s new commercial market and do not reflect the will of voters, who approved Prop. 64 by 57 percent. Local government officials say not all communities with bans expect them to be permanent.

According to a Sacramento Bee analysis:

• 30 percent of state is within 30 miles of at least one dispensary. These are mostly the metro areas for the state’s biggest cities, including Los Angeles, San Francisco and Sacramento.
  
  
• 29 percent of the state is between 30 and 60 miles of a dispensary.
  
  
• The biggest part of the state, 38 percent, is between 60 and 120 miles of a dispensary.
  
  

This story was originally published April 19, 2018 at 4:27 PM with the headline "It's 4/20. So where can you get weed in Merced County?."