A court injunction issued Monday afternoon blocks Colorado Springs’ attempted ballot measure to repeal the recreational marijuana rules enacted by voters last year.

In her ruling, 4th District Court Judge Hilary Gurney sided with plaintiffs who sued the city to prevent the repeal vote from appearing on the April 1 municipal ballot. Gurney ruled that because the repeal would effectively prohibit retail marijuana stores from operating in the city, the Colorado Constitution did not allow the vote to take place in April.

“(sic) The lack of permanency of the Referred Ballot Question, if approved by voters, does not alter the result: immediate prohibition of all retail marijuana establishments as of the date of the 2025 vote,” Gurney wrote in her ruling.

The court challenge was the latest twist over the past six months as Colorado Springs voters and the City Council took divergent paths on allowing marijuana sales in Colorado’s second-largest city.

4th Judicial District Court hears arguments in recreational marijuana repeal lawsuit

The Colorado Springs City Council voted Jan. 28 to place the repeal on the ballot to clarify and potentially reverse Question 300, which the city’s voters passed in November to begin allowing recreational marijuana licenses and sales in the city.

Council members spearheaded by Dave Donelson said they believe voters were confused during the last election, either by the phrasing of the ballot question or the presence of a second question asking voters about a charter amendment to ban marijuana sales. Donelson claimed he heard from multiple voters in his district who thought Question 300 did not clearly convey that it would fully allow recreational sales in the city limits.

Days after the council vote, medical marijuana business owner Renze Waddington and Adam Gillard, executive director for the El Paso County Progressive Veterans, filed a lawsuit to oppose the ballot question. The plaintiffs argued that the timing for the repeal election and the ballot title approved by the City Council were both inappropriate.

City attorney, Brian Stewart, and the attorney for the plaintiffs, Mark Grueskin, argued their cases before the judge Friday .

Gurney’s decision was based on a clause in Amendment 64, the section of the state Constitution added when Colorado voters first approved recreational marijuana sales in 2012, which required that any local vote to prohibit recreational sales had to appear during a general election in an even numbered year.

“The purpose of the amendment in question here appears to have been to prevent an ordinance prohibiting the operation of marijuana retail stores from being approved at an election in which only a fraction of the total electorate would be likely to vote,” Gurney said in the ruling.

Lawsuit filed to keep recreational marijuana repeal off Colorado Springs’ April ballot

Proponents of retail marijuana had argued to the city that the April election would be smaller and less representative than the November election. More than 238,000 voters cast a ballot on Question 300 last year. In contrast, Colorado Springs’ last similar municipal election in 2021 had 83,500 total ballots cast.

Stewart argued the repeal did not count as a prohibition vote because it would leave the city charter with a “blank slate” on recreational marijuana. According to Stewart, there was no mechanism to enact an explicit ban on marijuana licenses and the city could pass new rules to govern retail sales in the future.

In Gurney’s decision, she cited a clause the City Council had included in the zoning ordinance it passed for recreational stores. The clause stated that the ordinance would be repealed in its entirety if there was a successful repeal vote in the spring 2025 election, which Gurney wrote would reinstate the zoning rules against retail establishments.

Gurney did not issue a decision on the legal questions about the fairness of the ballot title, saying the injunction rendered the argument moot.

Question 300, which received just under 55% of voter approval in the last election, allowed the current medical marijuana businesses in Colorado Springs to apply for recreational sales licenses from the city. The successful measure followed a string of rejected attempts for voters to allow and regulate recreational sales in the city since 2012.

The challenge to the repeal was expedited in part because of the short time frame before Colorado Springs prints and mails out ballots for the April election. The city was scheduled to mail out overseas and military ballots beginning this Friday.

City spokeswoman Vanessa Zink declined to comment after the ruling until she could speak to the City Attorney’s Office.

Donelson said Monday that he believed the city would appeal the decision to the Colorado Supreme Court. Donelson declined to comment further until he got approval from the city attorneys.

Reached after the ruling, Gillard, with El Paso County Progressive Veterans, said that he was very happy with the judge’s ruling. While he anticipated that the city would appeal the decision, he said in the meantime the ruling was a win for voters and possible recreational marijuana businesses.

“The city should be issuing licenses. The stores should be able to flip that sign over to recreational and start collecting tax revenue for the city,” Gillard said.