Frisco is getting ready to thin out its crowded field of smoke and vape shops, as city leaders move toward stricter rules on where those businesses can set up. A recent vote by the city’s planning commission has put a new zoning proposal on the fast track to City Council, with the goal of pushing future shops farther from neighborhoods, schools and other sensitive spots.
Planning panel signs off
The Planning & Zoning Commission unanimously backed the zoning text amendment at its meeting last Wednesday, according to the City of Frisco. That vote sends the proposal to the City Council and sets up a formal public hearing as the next step in the process.
What the ordinance would do
The draft ordinance would carve out a standalone “smoke shop” land use category and tighten where those businesses can operate. It defines a smoke shop as “an establishment primarily utilized for the sale and/or sampling of tobacco products, smokeless tobacco products, liquid nicotine, e-cigarettes and other smoking-related supplies or accessories,” according to Community Impact.
Under the proposal, new smoke shops would be barred from opening within 1,000 feet of homes, schools, places of worship, hospitals, licensed child care centers and other smoke shops. In other words, the easy clustering of vape and smoke retailers that residents have been seeing around town would get a lot harder to replicate.
Grandfathering and nonconforming rules…