Cathedral City, CA Cannabis Regulations: Buffer Zones (2026)

Section 9.108.070 of the Cathedral City Municipal Code sets the locational requirements for cannabis businesses in Cathedral City, Riverside County, California. A conditional use permit cannot be approved unless the business sits in a zoning district that conditionally permits its type, and unless every distance rule below is met. The section carries an amendment dated October 22, 2025 (Ordinance 892).

Dispensaries must stay out of three areas: within six hundred feet of a school, day-care center or youth center; within two hundred fifty feet of a residential zone; and within two hundred fifty feet of the RR (Resort Residential) zone. Cultivation, manufacturing and distribution sites face the same six hundred foot rule for schools, day-care centers and youth centers, but the residential and Resort Residential distances are three hundred feet. The printed list names schools, day-care centers, youth centers, residential zones and the RR zone. Parks are not on it.

Subsection C fixes how distance is measured. Every distance runs in a straight line, without regard to intervening structures or topography, from the nearest point of the building or structure housing the cannabis business, or from the nearest point of the suite when the business is in a multi-unit building. For schools, day-care centers and youth centers the measurement ends at the nearest property line of the parcel where that use sits. For residential zones it ends at the nearest point of any legally permitted structure, or at the nearest property line when the land has no legally permitted structure, unless that line is in the public right-of-way, in which case it ends at the edge of the right-of-way furthest from the proposed business. For the Resort Residential zone it ends at the nearest property line of the parcel.

Section 9.108.030 defines a youth center as a facility operated by a public agency or non-profit entity with the sole purpose of providing educational and/or recreational services to minors. Section 9.108.060 requires the planning commission to find that all applicable locational restrictions in Section 9.108.070 are satisfied before it grants a permit.