City voters will decide whether to allow permits for bars, other businesses that obtain neighborhood group OK

Days after rejecting a competing measure for the November ballot, the Denver Elections Division on Thursday approved a proposed initiative that would allow social use of marijuana in some businesses.

City voters will decide whether regular businesses, such as bars or cafes or even yoga studios, should be able to create indoor or outdoor consumption areas for bring-your-own marijuana products, under certain conditions. The most significant condition would require that an application for an annual or temporary permit receive backing from a neighborhood group, such as a city-registered neighborhood organization or business improvement district.

That provision would give the neighborhood group the ability to suggest conditions on operation as city licensing officials consider a permit application.

In early August, backers including Kayvan Khalatbari of Denver Relief Consulting turned in ballot petitions containing what they said were 10,800 signatures in support of the initiative they’ve named the Neighborhood-Supported Cannabis Consumption Pilot Program. It takes 4,726 valid signatures from registered Denver voters to make the ballot.