The city of Brooklyn Center is placing a moratorium on the licensing of any additional tobacco retailers while it studies, drafts and considers a proposal to raise the minimum age to purchase tobacco from 18 to 21-years-old.

The ban was unanimously approved at the city council’s Sept. 10 meeting and goes into effect immediately. It does not affect the renewal of any existing licenses. In a memo to the city manager, the city clerk said that the suspension of new licenses is in the public’s best interest.

The ban will be lifted once the age increase has gone through the legislative process, a timeline that has yet to be determined.

The Minneapolis area has seen a number of cities pass such increases to the tobacco purchasing age, including Minneapolis itself, which also recently enacted a moratorium on new shops out of concerns about the number of new tobacco products shops that have been proposed since the city council passed an ordinance in 2017 prohibiting the sale of menthol tobacco in convenience and grocery stores.

The neighboring city of Minnetonka just passed its own increase, joining Plymouth, Edina, Bloomington, Richfield and St. Louis Park.

Brooklyn Center is home to nearly 31,000 residents and is located about 10 miles to the north of downtown Minneapolis.

Avatar photo

Patrick Lagreid

I strive to capture the essence of a cigar and the people behind them in my work – every cigar you light up is the culmination of the work of countless people and often represents generations of struggle and stories. For me, it’s about so much more than the cigar – it’s about the story behind it, the experience of enjoying the work of artisans and the way that a good cigar can bring people together. In addition to my work with halfwheel, I’m the public address announcer for the Colorado Rockies and Arizona Diamondbacks during spring training, as well as for the Salt River Rafters of the Arizona Fall League, the WNBA's Phoenix Mercury and previously the Arizona Rattlers of the Indoor Football League. I also work in a number of roles for MLB.com, plus I'm a voice over artist. Prior to joining halfwheel, I covered the Phoenix and national cigar scene for Examiner.com, and was an editor for Cigar Snob magazine.