I. RECOMMENDATION:
Staff is seeking direction from the Council as to whether or not to renew the City's contract with CannaRegs.
II. BACKGROUND:
In June of 2018, the City of Coalinga entered into CannaRegs who is a web-based subscription service that provides access to all cannabis-related rules and regulations from state, county, municipal and federal sources, and aggregates these rules and regulations in an intuitive, easy-to-use database.
By organizing the laws into distinct categories (such as taxation, zoning, application & licensing, and packaging & labeling) and sorting them by license type (such as cultivation, dispensary and testing), the City will be able to find and use the information we need in a few easy clicks. CannaRegs continuously monitors jurisdictions for any revisions to the laws, so the City is always up-to-date on any changes within the regulated industry.
CannaRegs currently provides comprehensive cannabis laws for the states of California, Colorado, Florida and Nevada, to be followed by all other states that permit medical and/or recreational marijuana. This allows the City to see what other states are doing as it relates to cannabis activities.
III. DISCUSSION:
Since the City entered in to a contract with CannaRegs in 2018, the subscription costs have increased each year from initial contracted amount of $8,500.00, however, this year, prior to renewal CannaRegs advised the City that they made some updates to their subscription plans and the price was increasing to $12,000 per year and we have an option to commit to (3) years at $11,400 per year. The cost is significantly less than that of a new subscriber's ($54,000).
Staff is seeking direction from the Council to see if they would like to continue using the CannaRegs services and if so would recommend the 3 year contract to save the City $1,800.00 over 3 years.
Staff uses the service occasionally when certain cannabis related issues arise such as tax reviewing, regulation review for particular uses, and various ordinance samples. Staff feels it is a good asset but there is a significant cost for the service considering the limited time staff utilizes its service.
IV. ALTERNATIVES:
V. FISCAL IMPACT:
The total cost for CannaRegs is $11,400 for a one (1) year renewal contract or $34,200 for the commitment of a (3) year contract. This cost would be a general fund expense that would be paid for out of the MMO professional services account (Account No. 101-404-8812) in the Community Development Departments budget that is partially recovered through the collection of Cannabis license fees and taxes. |