This bill is about where cannabis businesses can and cannot be located. Specifically, SF3740 would give cities and counties the power to prohibit cannabis stores and other cannabis businesses from operating within 500 feet of congregate housing facilities that serve children. Think group homes, residential treatment centers, foster care facilities, and similar housing where vulnerable young people live.

Under current Minnesota law, local governments have some zoning authority over cannabis businesses, but the rules about how close they can be to sensitive locations like schools and daycares are already in state law. SF3740 is asking for an expansion of that protection to cover a category - congregate housing for children - that advocates say was overlooked in the original framework. Senator Carla Nelson introduced the bill.

The bill is quite new, introduced in February 2026. It sits in the tension between two legitimate interests: the desire to protect children in vulnerable housing situations from being surrounded by cannabis retail, and the need for cannabis businesses to find viable locations in communities that increasingly need tax revenue and economic activity from the legal market. Both sides have reasonable arguments.