St. Louis County, MN Public Conduct: Public Marijuana Use (2026)

Cannabis Ordinance No. 68, adopted by the St. Louis County Board and amended September 9, 2025, defines a public place broadly under Section 3.A to cover any public park, any property owned, leased, or controlled by a governmental unit, and any enclosed indoor area used by the general public: restaurants, bars, other food or liquor establishments, retail stores and other commercial establishments, non-public educational facilities, hospitals, nursing homes, auditoriums, arenas, meeting rooms, and the common areas of apartment rental buildings. A private residence, its curtilage or yard, and private property not generally accessible to the public are excluded, unless the owner has explicitly barred consumption there. The premises of a business licensed for on-site consumption are also excluded.

Section 3.C incorporates the state penalty directly: under Minn. Stat. § 152.0263, subd. 5, a person who unlawfully uses cannabis flower, cannabis products, lower-potency hemp edibles, or hemp-derived consumer products in a public place is guilty of a petty misdemeanor. A petty misdemeanor under Minnesota law is not a crime but carries a fine, generally capped near $300 plus surcharges, and creates no criminal record.

Section 2 limits the ordinance's geographic reach: it covers only the areas where St. Louis County itself exercises planning and zoning authority, meaning the unincorporated county and any township that has not adopted its own controls. It does not apply inside any city or town that exercises its own planning and zoning authority, so Duluth, Hibbing, Virginia, Eveleth, and other incorporated municipalities set and enforce their own public-use rules separately.