Madison City Council Work Session on Five-Year Capital Plan and Hemp Law – October 14, 2026

The Madison City Council met in a work session on Wednesday, October 14, 2026. Roll call established a quorum. The two agenda items were the proposed five-year capital improvement plan and Alabama's new hemp law. No formal votes were taken. No written agenda or minutes were included in the source materials.

Five-Year Capital Improvement Plan

• Finance staff explained that this is the city's first five-year capital plan. Each project is identified by project ID, name, category, funding status, estimated cost by fiscal year, five-year total, and annual operations and maintenance (O&M) impact. The first 14 highlighted items reflect council priorities.
• The top council priority is 20 police cars, with 9 planned in 2027 and the remaining 11 in 2028 if approved, reflecting different funding sources.
• Engineering staff recommended funding-neutral adjustments: reduce County Line Road resurfacing (engineering 34) from $750,000 to $350,000 by limiting the project to the Madison Boulevard-to-Production segment, because the railroad overpass-to-Production portion is already funded this year with gas-tax dollars; consolidate the paving of Church, Arnet, College, Front, and Maple (engineering 33) and delete the separately listed engineering items 36–39 because they are already covered; and move the Town Madison/565 signal project (engineering 11 and 12) into the current year by moving the Madison Boulevard bridge project (engineering 40) to 2028.
• Engineering staff said they have roughly $24–$25 million in road projects and plan about $6 million per year. Major priorities discussed included Mill/Sullivan, the Powell/Burger Green school signal, the Garner extension, and the Balch/Browns Ferry roundabout.
• The Balch and Gooch roundabout is scheduled for contractors to start in November 2026, pending utility relocations. The Hughes and Old Madison Pike right-turn lane project has been bid and awarded; right-of-way acquisition is ongoing, with two closings complete, two closing, and one in condemnation. An early-spring 2027 start was described as a rough estimate.
• Facilities staff said City Hall renovations have $1.7 million available for 2026, consisting of a $1 million placeholder from the previous council and $700,000 funded in August, and will need an additional $1.3 million in 2028. The work will occur in six phases. Bids are due in two weeks, award is scheduled for the November 9 council meeting, and construction would start 60 days after award.
• The aquatic center appears on the schedule as roughly $3 million because those amounts are amortized annual payments over a proposed 30-year borrowing by the park and recreation board, not the total project cost. Council would authorize a funding agreement before any borrowing.
• The mayor and councilmembers described the plan as a living document rather than a final appropriation. A council prioritization list is to be presented at the last council meeting in October. Finance committee members emphasized reviewing O&M costs, labor needs, and funding sources before each project comes forward.

Alabama Hemp Law Discussion

• Staff presented Alabama's new hemp law, codified at Title 28, Chapter 12 of the Alabama Code. Hemp is defined as cannabis with no more than 0.3% delta-9 THC by dry weight. Smokable hemp and synthetic psychoactive cannabinoids are prohibited statewide.
• The law caps THC content: 10 milligrams per beverage, with servings no larger than 12 ounces and packs of no more than four; 40 milligrams per container for topical and sublingual products; and 40 milligrams per package for edibles, with each piece individually wrapped. Products must have certificates of analysis, follow packaging and labeling rules, and cannot contain alcohol except as a flavoring or any other intoxicant.
• Retail food stores must devote at least 75% of selling area and at least 14,000 square feet to food, with hemp beverages behind glass and hemp-only areas not visible from children's product sections.
• The ABC Board licenses retailers, but a city letter of approval must be issued before a license can be granted. Eligible retailers include pharmacies, retail food stores, liquor stores, hemp-only retailers, and specialty vape retailers. On-premises consumption, vending machines or self-service displays, and online/delivery/drive-thru/shipping sales are prohibited.
• The state imposes a 10% tax on the retail price of consumable hemp products; 10% of that tax is returned to the city where the sale occurred and is earmarked for enforcement, making the local share modest.
• Staff reviewed Alabama's 10 largest cities. Five, including Madison, have no regulations on record. Among cities with regulations, buffer distances from sensitive uses range from 200 feet (Dothan), 250 feet (Auburn), and 500 feet (Huntsville) to 1,000 feet (Hoover). Huntsville also uses a 1,500-foot spacing rule between specialty retailers in some districts.
• Madison Police Department said at least two vape shops and two liquor stores have already asked about selling hemp products. MPD maps showed existing vape and liquor sellers overlapping with the city's busiest drug-, alcohol-, and paraphernalia-related contact areas. The chief cited unreliable testing, hidden stronger products, increased loitering and crime in comparable cities, children consuming entire bags of gummies, and a local 19-year-old who ran into traffic during a psychotic episode linked to Delta-8/Delta-9 products.
• During discussion, a councilmember observed that hemp products are already being sold in at least one Madison store, even though no city letter of approval has been issued. Staff responded that unauthorized sales could be reported to ABC and that local enforcement could be addressed if the council adopts penalties.
• Staff recommended that Madison prohibit the sale of all consumable hemp products in the city and adopt penalties for unauthorized sales. If the council chooses to allow sales, staff recommended a minimum ordinance with distance buffers from sensitive uses, a ban on city property, local licensing with public notice and council approval, revocation procedures, a local fee of at least $1,000, and penalties or site reviews.

Council Positions on Hemp Sales

• One councilmember questioned whether prohibition would simply push sales and tax revenue to Huntsville, noting that hemp is legal and that Madison cannot stop residents from buying the products elsewhere.
• Another councilmember said he leaned against allowing sales, arguing that ease of access changes behavior, the stores change the character of the city, and the concerns outweighed the limited revenue potential.
• The police chief reiterated MPD's opposition, emphasizing law-enforcement burden, unreliable testing, and Madison's limited geographic size of about 30 square miles.

Key Outcomes

• No ordinance, resolution, or appropriation was adopted at the work session.
• Councilmembers will email their hemp-policy positions to staff by Monday, October 19, 2026. Staff will use those positions to prepare possible ordinance language, which could go through a first reading and another work session.
• The council is expected to provide its completed capital-plan prioritization at the last council meeting in late October 2026.
• City Hall renovation bids are due in two weeks, with a possible award vote at the November 9, 2026 council meeting.