Pismo Beach, CA Business Licensing & Operations: Pawnbrokers (2026)

Two parts of the Pismo Beach Municipal Code govern pawnbrokers. Section 5.04.200, the flat-amount business license tax, requires every person carrying on a business named in its table to pay an annual license tax, and the table lists Pawnbroker at 100.00 under the Annual Fee ($) column. Section 5.11.170(C), in Article III on other personal services businesses, defines a pawn shop as an establishment that receives jewelry, precious stones, valuables, firearms, clothing, personal property or any other article in pledge for loans, as security, or in pawn for the repayment of monies and exacts interest, or one that purchases articles and agrees to resell them to the vendors, or their assigns, at prices agreed upon at or before the time of purchase. Banks, trust companies and bond brokers otherwise regulated by law are outside the definition.

Section 5.11.180 adds the proximity limit. No personal service business defined in the article can be established or operated within one thousand (1,000) feet of any like establishment. The distance is measured between the closest points along the boundaries of the parcel holding the existing business and the parcel proposed for the additional one, as determined by the community development director or designee.

The same article defines the neighboring businesses that share this limit: check-cashing establishments, gold and silver exchanges and smoke shops. The gold and silver exchange definition covers precious metals, and it sends establishments that exchange money for other valuable articles back to the pawn shop definition. Both zoning codes printed under Title 17 list the pawn shop among the uses subject to a 1,000 foot separation (§ 17.105.190 in the 1983 Zoning Ordinance and § 17.38.135 in the 1998 Zoning Code) and each prints its own pawn shop definition (§ 17.006.0814 in the 1983 Zoning Ordinance and the definitions chapter 17.62 in the 1998 Zoning Code).