Elected Leaders Mull Options for Psychedelic Healing Centers
Trevor Phipps
A few months before a Colorado state law went into effect this year allowing license facilitators to conduct therapeutic sessions using psilocybin (the active ingredient in magic or psychedelic mushrooms), the Woodland Park City Council enacted a moratorium on issuing healing center licenses within the city.
The idea was to buy time to evaluate what regulations to enact and to further study the situation with magic mushrooms, which are now legal in Colorado under a controlled environment.
But now, the “magic mushroom “clock is ticking as this moratorium will expire in March. As a result, city leaders recently opted to hold a work session to hear more details from their attorney about possible steps they should take. Although no decisions were rendered regarding possible future psychedelic healing centers, the forum generated mixed comments and opinions, both pro and con. Regardless, the city is faced with definite legal obligations in dealing with the pro-mushroom law, approved by Colorado voters, and just can’t say, no way in Woodland Park.
The work session started with Woodland Park City Attorney Betsy Stewart addressing the council about what they can legally due within the law. She also provided samples of regulations that have already been drafted by other Colorado cities, including Castle Rock, Frederick and Parker.
The law currently only allows licensed facilities to administer doses of psilocybin. But starting in 2026, the healing centers could expand to hallucinogenic drugs such as DMT and mescaline.
“We can’t prevent a facility, a healing center, cultivation or anything in the city, just by law we can’t,” Stewart said. “And we can’t adopt an ordinance or regulation that essentially makes it non-existent and that’s by state law.”
Although the city is limited in what it can do to regulate hallucinogen healing centers, they do have some regulative powers. The city can enact regulations that deal with where the facilities can be located and the time of operation.
The city is also allowed to enact distance requirements around schools, child care centers and residential areas. “The state law has 1,000 feet,” Stewart said. “You can extend it a little bit, but 1,000 feet is what I’m also seeing around the state in different municipalities. It seems to be a pretty common expectance of allowed distance.”
It was brought up during the meeting that Colorado Springs enacted a distance from school and other locations of one-mile. But the WP council members believe that Colorado Springs’ ordinance will be legally challenged.
The Value of Psychedelic Healing Centers
Local addiction counselor and longtime Woodland Park resident Jason Friesema then took the floor to educate the council on the benefits of natural medicine healing centers. Friesema described the process of how counselors will help patients with counseling sessions.
As part of his presentation the counselor fielded questions from the city council including describing to them what he describes as a “journey.” According to Friesema, he considers a journey as more than a micro dose of psilocybin that can give people a psychedelic experience.
One major concern voiced by the city council dealt with the fear of people leaving the centers under the influence of the hallucinogenic drug. However, Friesema said that some of that responsibility is by default placed on the providers like himself.
“I never let anybody drive,” Friesema said. “If somebody does it in the community and not at their home then they need to have somebody pick them up or make other arrangements. I honestly treat it like going to get a colonoscopy or something where patients have to make sure they get a ride home. Being a licensed addiction counselor if people aren’t all the way honest with me or if they come to therapy sessions high, I will ask them for their keys and tell them I will call the police of they try to drive under the influence. That is the social responsibility that comes with my license to kind of protect the public.”
The council also asked whether or not there was a way for law enforcement to detect the drug if people were driving under the influence. “I’m fairly confident that most standardized exercises for the detection of impaired driving would definitely fit into this ballpark,” Woodland Park Police Chief Chris Deisler said. “The standardized sobriety exercises or tests as they are sometimes called would definitely be all we would need to detect someone’s inability to drive. A lot of the concerns that I have are very well addressed in the laws and policies already put in place.”
During the work session, three audience members also had a chance to take the podium and address the council. Dalton Lane who is a former Woodland Park resident and firefighter told the council that he once suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after his experiences as a first responder and he struggled to find treatment that helped him.
“About five or six years ago, I was introduced to psilocybin and I can basically say that there was my life before psilocybin and my life after psilocybin,” Lane said. “All of my suicidal ideations just vanished never to come back. I was able to deal with my PTSD symptoms. Unfortunately, it was a little bit late. I actually had to leave the fire department after 19 years with an official PTSD diagnosis. Part of me wonders what would have happened if I had access to this medicine halfway through my career and I if I would have been able to deal with some of this stuff while I was working because I really did love that job.”