Salinas, CA Business Licensing & Operations: Pawnbrokers (2026)

Municipal Code Section 19-35, "Miscellaneous businesses enumerated," lists pawnbroker among the trades taxed at a fixed annual rate rather than by gross receipts: $500 per annum, separate from bootblack ($25), handyman ($50), route salesman ($50) and warehouse space ($100). The city's earlier substantive regulatory scheme for pawnbrokers, background checks, recordkeeping, hold periods, lived in Chapter 23, "Pawnbrokers, Secondhand Jewelry Dealers and Junk Dealers," but the code now reads "Article I. - Repealed by Ordinance No. 2299 (NCS)" where those pawnbroker-specific rules once stood. What remains of Chapter 23 is Article II, which regulates junk dealers and secondhand goods sellers; Section 23-22 separately bars any junk shop or junk yard owner from taking pledges or pawns on the same premises as the junk business.

Like every other Chapter 19 licensee, a pawnbroker must post the license certificate conspicuously at the business premises (Sec. 19-19) and pay by the chapter's standard due dates, February 1 for gross-receipts licenses or August 1 for other annual licenses (Sec. 19-20). Pawnbrokers also fall under the city's zoning code, which requires a conditional use permit for a pawn shop in commercial districts and bars any pawnshop from locating within 750 feet of another pawn shop.