Bristol, PA Business Licensing & Operations: Pawnbrokers (2026)

The Bristol Borough Zoning Code treats a pawn shop as Use 4V in § 27-320. It is a business engaged in lending money on the deposit or pledge of personal property, securities, or written evidences of indebtedness; purchasing personal property with an expressed or implied agreement or understanding to sell it back at a subsequent time at a stipulated price; or lending money upon goods, wares, or merchandise pledged, stored, deposited as collateral.

The core standard is separation. The building or structure of the pawn shop must be located no less than 1,000 feet from any residential use or district, school, place of worship, day care center, recreation facility, public park, check cashing facility or another pawn shop. Check cashing facilities (Use 4I) carry the mirror-image rule, a 1,000 foot separation that names pawn shops, so the two uses keep each other 1,000 feet apart as well as clear of homes, schools, churches, day care centers and parks.

A pawn shop can sell convenience-type products as an accessory use, limited to a maximum floor area of 250 square feet. The sale of firearms shall be in accordance with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms federal firearms licensing requirements, which the Code writes into the use standard itself.

In Bristol Borough the HC-1 Highway Commercial West district use list shows Use 4V Pawn Shop among the uses permitted by right. The standards above are the pawn shop rules in the Code's zoning chapter, and the Borough enforces them through the notice and civil enforcement procedure of §§ 27-811 and 27-812.