Salem City Council members are discussing the possibility of reversing their moratorium which bans any recreational marijuana dispensaries from opening up in the city. 

The State of Ohio is considering capping the amount of dispensaries to 350, which pushed council to once again bring up the idea.

“I’ve seen some very negative effects of it and I don't believe, even though there could be an opportunity for revenue generation by the city, I personally I don't want to see it in our city,” Councilman Jake Gano said. 

Councilman Gano told 21 News his biggest concern is with children getting a hold of the drugs and coming to school under the influence or accidentally ingesting it.

“It makes it too accessible in my opinion and I think it’s dangerous,” Councilman Gano said. 

Councilman Evan Newman said he’s against allowing a dispensary right now because of safety concerns he's heard from residents and business owners.

“A lot of these dispensaries are having to hire private security and they’re having to keep a lot of funds on hand because it’s not secured through any type of banking locally or nationally,” Councilman Newman said. 

However, he said he’s willing to have discussions on the possibility of bringing one to the city.

“I do think that if we were to consider anything like this it could and should be limited to the industrial park district or something of that nature,” Councilman Newman said. 

Cities like Austintown and Girard have previously reversed their moratoriums and allowed dispensaries to open up. The area where each dispensary operates gets a cut of the sales through taxes.

“I think there's a lot of other ways the city can generate revenue. I chair economic development and I think there are a lot more sustainable ways to build,” Councilman Gano said. "We want to focus on manufacturing type jobs and long term sustainable job growth not necessarily just getting a big chunk of tax revenue because we’re scraping the cream off a highly regulated product.”

Salem council would need a majority of members to vote yes to reverse the ban.

After that, council could leave it up to the voters to decide if a shop can move in on November's ballot. 

“With that being said we need to take it one step at a time and not rush it,” Councilman Newman said. 

City leaders will meet next week to discuss reversing the moratorium again but are not expected to vote on the issue.