Minnesota
Minnesota may open some of the first government-run cannabis dispensaries in the U.S.
Minnesota could become the first state in nine years to open cannabis dispensaries that are run by cities and counties.
That’s because of one line in the state’s new cannabis laws that allow for cities and counties to “establish, own and operate a municipal cannabis store.” The law appears to be the first of its kind in the country and has prompted cities to research whether they want to open their own dispensaries.
But there’s only one city that’s been successful with running a cannabis store. The City of North Bonneville in Washington was the first city in the country to open a municipal cannabis dispensary back in 2015, but was no longer operating it as of 2021.
Municipal cannabis stores are of particular interest to local governments in Minnesota that don’t already operate their own liquor stores. In cities like Edina and Isanti, liquor stores serve as a revenue stream that helps reduce taxes for residents and businesses.
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Because of conflicts with federal law, other states have shied away from adopting the state-owned liquor store model for cannabis retailers.
“The idea has been floated and rejected in various states, such as New Mexico and New Hampshire. Lawmakers have done so because cannabis remains illegal (Schedule I) under federal law and they do not wish to enact policies that place state-employees in a position where they are engaging in activity that is in positive conflict with federal law,” said Paul Armentano, deputy director of NORML, a national cannabis advocacy group.
According to state Rep. Zack Stephenson, DFL-Coon Rapids, who helped author the legislation that legalized recreational cannabis last year, the idea of municipal cannabis stores came directly from cities and counties in Minnesota.
“When we were putting the bill together, we weren’t copy-pasting from other states. We were trying to come up with a Minnesota-specific model. And one of the things that works well for many communities across Minnesota is municipal liquor stores. They are important to a lot of cities all across the state. And building from that successful model, there were cities that had some potential interest in taking the same approach with cannabis that they take with liquor. And we wanted to enable them to do that, if they chose to do it and if it was workable,” said Stephenson.
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Government officials in the City of Osseo, the City of St. Joseph and Cook County have been weighing the pros and cons of operating a cannabis retail store, despite the fact that Minnesota’s Office of Cannabis Management won’t come out with official cannabis regulations until early 2025.
The Office’s rules will dictate what municipal cannabis dispensaries could look like. But the Office is still in the process of drafting those rules, and most municipalities are still in the early stages of discussion on cannabis dispensaries.
Country’s first government-run dispensary struggled to break even
North Bonneville Mayor Brian Sabo said when the idea of a government-run marijuana store came forward, before he was mayor, marijuana stores were still an uncharted concept in Washington after the state legalized recreational cannabis use and sales in 2012.
Soon after, the city formed a public development authority for the purpose of opening a cannabis retail store. The plan was to use the profits to pour back into North Bonneville, like upgrading street lights and rebuilding a central park playground.
An “aggressive business plan” was put forward outlining the customer base needed to support the store would come from other areas throughout the Northwest, according to Sabo.
“On paper, the plan appeared to be a good one but critics were warning it was far too aggressive given how far out and secluded North Bonneville is within the Gorge, and the number of retail stores that were planned to be opened throughout Washington State,” Sabo said.
The store, known as the Cannabis Corner, opened in 2015 and was widely reported as the first municipal marijuana store in the U.S. Sabo said it did fairly well the first couple years, but as more retail stores opened in the state and in Oregon, business drastically fell off.
By 2018, the dispensary was struggling to break even.
“A request by the PDA was granted to move the store and license to a larger market of Stevenson, Washington, the next city 10 miles east of North Bonneville. Although the store did better in the larger market, sales never exceeded break-even status, negating the promise of a financial windfall for the city,” said Sabo.
In 2021, their city council decided the business was more of a liability than an asset. They dissolved the public development authority and sold the store.
Government officials and cannabis experts from multiple states were not aware of any other government-run dispensaries in the U.S., meaning Minnesota appears to be poised to be the second try after North Bonneville failed.
Minnesota cities say revenue from a cannabis dispensary could help reduce property taxes, offset budget increases
The Minnesota cities of Osseo and St. Joseph, along with Cook County, are a few municipalities that don’t operate a liquor store and are exploring the idea of a cannabis store.
The biggest draw for them is the potential revenue a dispensary would bring in.
“It really comes down to dollars and cents. In the time when the costs of providing the high-quality city services to our residents and business owners only continues to go up each and every year, we are looking for any potential revenue stream that can help offset our budget increases,” said Riley Grams, Osseo city administrator.
The sales tax on cannabis product sales in Minnesota is 10 percent, in addition to state and local taxes. Local governments are barred from imposing their own tax on cannabis.
In Cook County, commissioners are divided on the idea. County administrator James Joerke said Cook County currently doesn’t have any enterprise funds or operate any utilities.
“There are some who see this as an opportunity to generate revenue that can be used to offset property taxes. There are others who I think have concerns about playing a role even selling a product that could have harmful effects to residents. And there’s also some sentiment that this is really something that the private sector should handle,” said Joerke.
Similar discussions are happening in the City of St. Joseph. Mayor Rick Schultz said 30 percent of the city’s land is exempt from property taxes and the income from a dispensary could help relieve some of the tax burden for residents and businesses.
Both Osseo and Cook County have formed committees to look more closely into what it would take to run a cannabis store. Cook County is partnering with the City of Grand Marais for the committee, while St. Joseph has had only a few conversations about the topic.
Now, all that’s left to do is to wait for the state’s Cannabis Office to come up with official rulemaking. The Office has until this summer to draft rules and plans to adopt them by early 2025, when licensing applications are also planned to open.
While St. Joseph and Cook County are still in the early stages of exploring a cannabis store, Osseo wants to be ready to submit as soon as the application window for licensing opens.
“We didn’t want to be reactionary. We wanted to get out ahead of the game and be ready as or as ready as we possibly could be once the final rules and regulations were implemented and approved by the state legislature,” said Gram.
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Between the summer and early 2025, the rules are subject to change. Depending on those changes, it could elongate the timeline the Office has in mind for opening cannabis sales.
“Realistically, even if we were able to offer full licenses in early 2025, the process of obtaining a license and actually opening your doors is a lengthy one. And so I think that 2025 is always the goal, but OCM is very focused on making those license applications available,” said Charlene Briner, Minnesota’s interim cannabis director.
The Minnesota Department of Human Services is reexamining over 5,000 Medicaid service providers across the state in an effort to combat fraud.
The federal government said it would pull $2 billion in annual Medicaid funding from Minnesota in January if the state didn’t make changes.
The Minnesota Department of Human Services set out to revalidate thousands of providers in programs deemed high risk for fraud by asking providers to submit verification paperwork and making unannounced site visits. The deadline passed on Sunday.
The latest data, published on May 27, shows 1,009 providers approved, 1,151 disenrolled and over 3,000 providers with pending applications.
Paige Berland and Camille Heyman run Minnesota Behavioral Specialists, providing autism care to children through two locations in the metro area. The women say that after submitting their paperwork, they received letters from DHS with determinations for both locations: the Bloomington center was terminated and the Eagan office was approved.
“It doesn’t make sense, everything is the same minus the location,” Berland said. “So why was one approved and one wasn’t approved?”
The termination letter said the Bloomington center was denied because they failed to disclose a managing employee during a site visit. Berland disputes that and said she already submitted an appeal.
“We were told to keep running, keep continuing as we are while we go through this process,” she said. “It just means that we don’t have the money coming in.”
Josh Berg with Accessible Space says they’re also in limbo. Berg said they offer integrated community supports, which means caretakers provide in-unit assistance for people with spinal cord injuries and disabilities.
“Most of the folks that we support are wheelchair-bound,” Berg said. “Helping with meals, helping with medications, helping them just live their lives.”
Berg said that of the seven locations where people are housed, the Department of Human Services terminated five and approved two. He believes the timeline to conduct this revalidation process was too aggressive. He said Accessible Space has also submitted an appeal.
“We’re not able to bill for services, we’re not able to start new services for anybody or change any of the supports that they receive,” he said.
Both Berg and Berland say they agree fraud needs to be dealt with, but they hope Minnesotans who truly need services aren’t left without the services they need.
“Not just the clients rely on services, but the families do too, so we can’t stop services; that’s not an option on our plate,” Berland said. “We want to continue to provide these services; they are medically necessary.”
The Minnesota Department of Human Services said a disenrollment letter could be sent for a few reasons, including failure to submit revalidation application after two notification attempts, failure to provide all requested documents within the required timeframe and failure to meet the criteria required during an on-site visit.
A spokesperson for the Department of Human Services said it’s currently in the process of compiling data from the thousands of applications, but didn’t say when the department would share those final numbers.
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The Minnesota Republican Party is distancing itself from a moment of silence held for Derek Chauvin during its state convention, saying the gesture was not part of leadership planning, not included in the official program, and should not be interpreted as a party position.
GOP officials said in a Monday, June 1 Facebook post that the recognition of the former Minneapolis police officer, who was convicted in the killing of George Floyd in 2020, emerged from a spontaneous delegate motion on the convention floor and was not initiated or endorsed by leadership.
The controversy quickly escalated after state leaders, civil rights attorneys and Democratic lawmakers condemned the action, describing it as deeply harmful to Floyd’s family and inconsistent with accountability under the law.
The moment of silence took place during the party’s annual gathering in Duluth on May 30 and comes just days after the sixth anniversary of Floyd’s murder in Minneapolis, an event that reshaped national debates over policing and racial justice.
Republican Party of Minnesota says gesture was not leadership action
In a statement, the Republican Party of Minnesota said the recognition of Derek Chauvin originated as a delegate request during floor proceedings at the convention in Duluth and was handled under standard rules of order.
Party officials emphasized that convention leadership, including chair Danny Nadeau, did not propose the motion. The statement said leadership’s role was procedural only, and that presiding over the motion did not reflect agreement with or endorsement of its subject matter.
Officials reiterated that the convention agenda itself did not include any planned recognition of Chauvin and said the episode should not be interpreted as a leadership-driven decision or policy stance.
Minnesota attorney general calls action ‘profound cruelty’
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, who led the prosecution of Chauvin, sharply criticized the gesture, calling it an “act of profound cruelty” toward the Floyd family.
Ellison said the timing, so close to the anniversary of Floyd’s death, compounded the harm.
He said honoring Chauvin “dishonors the memory of George Floyd and wounds his loved ones all over again,” and called it “disturbing” to recognize someone convicted of violating his oath as a police officer.
Ellison also said the action was “disrespectful” to law enforcement officers who serve honorably, and reaffirmed that courts had already upheld Chauvin’s conviction through multiple appeals.
Broader backlash and political fallout
Democratic state Rep. Jamie Long called the moment of silence “disgusting,” arguing that Republicans chose to honor a convicted murderer rather than victims of violence or service members.
The gesture also drew criticism from civil rights attorneys Ben Crump and Antonio Romanucci, who represented George Floyd’s family in its civil case after his death. The attorneys called the moment of silence immoral and demanded a retraction and apology, saying it disrespected both the Floyd family and the broader public record of Chauvin’s conviction.
Floyd was killed on May 25, 2020, when Chauvin, a white former Minneapolis police officer, knelt on his neck for more than nine minutes. Chauvin was later convicted of second-degree murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter, and sentenced to 22½ years in state prison.
The killing sparked global protests and became a defining moment in the Black Lives Matter movement and debates over policing in the United States.
Chauvin’s conviction has been upheld through multiple appeals, including a denial by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2023, and he is serving his sentence in federal custody.
Party officials say despite the controversy, their focus remains on candidate endorsements and upcoming elections, not the floor action that triggered the backlash.
Reporter Anthony Thompson can be reached at ajthompson@usatodayco.com, or on X @athompsonUSAT.
Minnesota
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All times Eastern and accurate as of Tuesday, June 2, 2026, at 6:33 a.m.
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