Cannabis law change clarifies buffer measurements near schools, houses of worship

Gov. Kathy Hochul has signed legislation amending New York’s Cannabis Law to clarify how the state measures required minimum distances between adult-use retail dispensaries and nearby schools and houses of worship.

The legislation locks in a statewide “door-to-door” standard for measuring required buffers between dispensaries and schools or houses of worship. It also defines which doors count as entrances, excluding emergency-only exits and doors not regularly used by students or the public. The amendment replaces language in the Cannabis Law that did not explicitly specify how those measurements must be taken.

The bill, signed into law by Hochul on Feb. 11, was advanced after a court challenge exposed conflicting interpretations of the statute and state guidance about how proximity should be measured. The measure passed the State Legislature in a largely party-line vote. Local state lawmakers, includng First District Assembly Member Tommy John Schiavoni (D-Sag Harbor) voted against the bill.

State cannabis regulators had originally used a door-to-door approach in the early years of the adult-use rollout. But after an internal practice review in June 2025, OCM said it would begin applying a different standard — measuring from a dispensary entrance to the nearest boundary of a school’s grounds — a change that jeopardized more than 100 previously approved locations statewide and affected another 47 businesses with pending applications.

In late September, a state Supreme Court in Albany blocked state regulators from using the revised proximity standard with respect to the affected businesses, allowing them to move forward under the earlier door-to-door measurement method through Feb. 15, while the administration and legislature worked on a permanent solution. 

The new legislation is intended to resolve that uncertainty by writing an entrance-to-entrance standard directly into the statute. The new subdivision maintains the statutory minimum distances for adult-use retail dispensaries near schools and houses of worship and specifies that the measurement is taken between entrances, not property lines. It also includes provisions addressing how the state will treat existing licenses and certain pending applications during the transition.

Local implications in Riverhead

The change in state law comes as Riverhead continues to litigate the scope of municipal authority over retail cannabis siting.

Riverhead’s cannabis zoning provisions increase separation requirements from schools beyond what state law requires —1,000 feet rather than 500 feet — and use the property-line rather than door-to-door standard. The town also added a setback tied to residential uses that is not included in the state statute. Riverhead’s code also expanded the state’s 1,000-foot minimum distance between dispensaries, requiring a 2,500-foot distance instead.

Riverhead’s property-line standard led to denial by the Zoning Board of Appeals of an application for relief from the code’s requirement filed by a cannabis licensee for a location on the north side of Route 58 because the site is located 735 feet of the property line of Riverhead High School.

The property-line standard also led to denial by the ZBA of an application for relief from the town code’s distance requirement relating to residential uses, blocking a dispensary at a former bank branch site on Ostrander Avenue, north of Route 58.

Those differences are part of why a Suffolk County Supreme Court justice last year found Riverhead’s approach pre-empted by state law, after both businesses appealed the ZBA decisions. The town’s measurement method effectively rewrites the state siting standard by enlarging separation distances and changing how compliance is determined, the court ruled.

The court also held that Riverhead’s local code exceeded the limited “time, place and manner” authority the state law allows for licensed dispensaries. 

The town has appealed both court decisions, and those appeals are pending. 

The state Cannabis Control Board last year also issued opinions concluding that aspects of Riverhead’s restrictions are “unreasonably impracticable” and pre-empted by the state Cannabis Law.

Riverhead, together with Southampton and Brookhaven, is also suing the state, arguing that cannabis regulators are unlawfully overriding local control over where retail marijuana shops can locate. 

What happens next

With the statutory measurement standard now spelled out, the law is expected to reduce disputes over how the state calculates proximity to schools and houses of worship for dispensary applicants and licensees. 

But the law does not resolve the separate question at the center of Riverhead’s ongoing disputes with the state: how far municipalities may go under the Cannabis Law’s narrow “time, place and manner” provisions without running afoul of state preemption and the state’s “unreasonably impracticable” standard.

Editor’s note: This article has been amended to clarify that the town code’s rule concerning distance from houses of worship does not refer to property lines, as originally stated in the article. Rather the buffer distance is measured from the entrance to house of worship to the center of the cannabis establishment.