A Texas retail chain that sells CBD and smokable hemp is suing a suburb of Austin for “intentional acts of harassment” after city officials wrongly decided it is an illegal head shop.
The owner of Planet K Gifts, Michael Kleinman, filed a federal lawsuit against the city of Cedar Park for allegedly trying to force the shop closed by cutting water service and filing numerous complaints after it opened last November.
The city does not allow head shops or stores that sell items that are “commonly used, intended to be used, or commonly known to be used” to ingest or inhale an illegal substance.
Planet K Gifts, which operates 21 locations across Texas, said in its suit that the ban is outdated now that hemp is legal.
City zoning “does not take into account that certain items that were once considered to only be used to smoke marijuana and other illicit substances are now used to legally smoke CBD hemp flower,” the shop argues in its complaint.
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“Smoking hemp is a perfectly legal and oftentimes preferred method of obtaining the medical benefits of CBD.”
Kleinman seeks to have water service restored at his store as well as unspecified damages.
The city has not yet responded to the lawsuit.
