Committee Directs Ban on Standalone Smoke Shops After Meth Pipe Findings

The City Council's Land Use Committee moved Dec. 8 toward banning standalone smoke shops after city staff found employees openly selling methamphetamine pipes and drug paraphernalia at locations throughout the city.

Committee Chair Councilmember Sean Mill said that city staff conducting compliance checks visited smoke shops where employees, without hesitation, identified pipes as being used "to smoke methamphetamine."

"When we're trying to clean up our community, but we have businesses operating in our city selling pipes to smoke methamphetamine," Mill said. "We need to stop this."

The committee's direction comes during a moratorium on new tobacco retail permits that extends through August 2026.

According to Riverside Police Department data, the city has 226 locations selling tobacco products. Of those, 20 operate without valid permits—and 13 of those unpermitted locations are smoke shops.

The moratorium was adopted in September. Police seized nearly 5,000 cannabis products, almost 80,000 illegal tobacco units, 535 nitrous oxide tanks and 182 psilocybin mushroom units from 13 smoke shops during the first eight months of 2025.

"I can think of pretty much every school that's in Ward 3 has a smoke shop just across the street from it," Falcone said.

"I don't have an issue with convenience stores, grocery stores, pharmacies or whatever you have selling tobacco products," Falcone said. "My issue is just the standalone ones."

Mill said smoke shops also sell kratom and tianeptine—substances he called "gas station heroin."

"You can walk into a store right now, I can go right now over on Magnolia Avenue, buy me a meth pipe, buy me a torch lighter to cook my fentanyl, my heroin, my meth," Mill said. "I can go and buy kratom, which has the same effects as heroin does."

The committee heard from Paloma Montes of Blue Zones Project Riverside. One-third of all tobacco retailers are within 1,000 feet of a school, affecting two-thirds of RUSD's 50 schools.

She said 126 California municipalities in 29 counties regulate tobacco retail density or proximity, with 107 restricting proximity to youth-populated areas.

Councilmember Clarissa Cervantes raised concerns about the impact on small business owners. Some Ward 2 smoke shops are family-owned operations. She suggested the city explore helping legitimate operators transition to other retail businesses, potentially with reduced rent.

Falcone said he had little sympathy for operators engaged in illegal activity.

"I don't have much sympathy for people that are trying to make ends meet on the back of doing illegal things, especially for the ones who have the 20 that are just going totally rogue and have not even communicated with the city on their permitting," Falcone said.

"I have sympathy for the families whose members are struggling with drug addiction and the people that we see wandering our streets that are strung out on drugs," Mill said. "And we have stores in our community that are making it easier for them."

City staff presented four potential regulatory approaches. The committee expressed preference for a combination approach that would ban standalone smoke shops while maintaining distance requirements and allowing tobacco sales at traditional retailers like gas stations and grocery stores.

Staff indicated the ordinance development would require significant administrative work and stakeholder outreach, particularly to establish procedures for existing businesses that would be affected by new regulations. The committee directed staff to move forward with ordinance development.

Draft regulations will go to the Planning Commission for review before returning to the committee and ultimately the full City Council for final consideration.