I understand that the city of Turlock will not have any legal retail sales of cannabis or marijuana scheduled for the near future. However, I think planning for the retail end of the market needs to be planned very soon indeed.

Like, the City of Modesto has Measure T going on the November ballot which will impose a 10 percent tax on the gross receipts of any marijuana sales. This would be a general tax with collected revenues going into the general city fund.

This cannabis business tax would help insure that the cost of the needed expenses in the City's administration of the marijuana end will be paid by the levy of such a tax. It would insure that current city finances allocated like for police, fire and everything else in the current budget would have a much less of a chance to be impacted on. It should mean that other taxes will not have to be increased. If such a tax ordinance would be offered to the city of Turlock voters, it would most likely only need a simple majority to pass.

I can understand the reluctance of the Turlock city government not to let retail marijuana outlets. But for such, maybe such a tax should be approved by voters before the establishment of marijuana retail outlets in the city of Turlock, just like they are asking Modesto voters to do with Measure T. So, let's do a bit of fiscal planning for the near future.

— Daniel Marsh