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Crescent City councilors weren’t laughing when Police Chief Richard Griffin told them a local tattoo shop was selling nitrous oxide.

Four members approved banning the sale and distribution of cartridges, canisters and other devices dispensing the odorless non-flammable gas within city limits. The proposed ordinance included a list of exceptions, which takes into consideration nitrous oxide’s use in food production, vehicle maintenance and in a medical or dental setting.

Councilor Kelly Schellong was absent.

Griffin pointed out that under California law possessing nitrous oxide for the purposes of getting high is illegal. The city’s proposed ordinance removes a mechanism some might have for obtaining the substance for illegal use, he said.

“This is present in our city as far as teens using this, people using this,” Griffin told councilors on Monday. “We’ve had a few DUIs where we came on upon people. One was at a local gas station and the person was basically huffing the nitrous oxide out of a balloon. It’s called cracking the canister and you fill up a balloon, most often, and then you inhale it.”

The person at the gas station was passed out, Griffin told the Outpost. The high is short-lived, he said, but it can cut off a person’s oxygen supply. He said his officers will often find discarded cartridges just dumped on the street.

On Monday, Griffin told councilors that they’ve come across 50 to 100 cartridges at minimum sometimes 300 to 400.

Since 2017 it’s become a popular recreational drug among teenagers and young adults, City Attorney Martha Rice told councilors. She cited a 2022 Global Drug Survey report that found 70 percent of users were between 16 and 24.

Health complications associated with recreational nitrous oxide use include low blood pressure, low oxygen, fainting, heart attack and nerve damage. Long-term impacts from nitrous oxide use include depression, psychosis, memory loss, muscle spasms, ear ringing, numbness in hands and feet and weakened immune systems.

Rice said she and Griffin brought an ordinance restricting the sale of nitrous oxide before the City Council because of its cartridges and canisters being available over the counter at convenience stores, gas stations and smoke shops.

In Crescent City, this included the smoke shop Griffin had mentioned, according to Rice.

“What the store is doing is currently not illegal in the State of California,” she said. “It’s legal to sell nitrous oxide unless you’re aware that the buyer is going to use it to try to get high. So as long as you don’t ask, you don’t know, and it’s legal to sell it.”

Rice mentioned the ordinance’s exceptions, adding that nitrous oxide is often used in food products like cans of whipped cream sold at grocery stores. Restaurants also purchase nitrous oxide cartridges to make their own whipped cream.

The gas is also often used to enhance a vehicle’s performance, which is another exception to the city’s proposed ordinance.

According to Rice, violating the city’s ordinance would constitute a misdemeanor. Violators could also receive administrative citations, she said.

Crescent City Manager Eric Wier said the use of nitrous oxide as a recreational drug came to his attention from city managers in Humboldt County. Crescent City isn’t the only municipality considering an ordinance.

“This is a problem we’re seeing on a statewide level,” Wier said. “A lot of times in talking with Chief Griffin, it does sort of ake its way up into Del Norte, and that’s where staff got a hold of this and started talking about it. We wanted to get out in front of it as much as possible.”

Crescent City Mayor Blake Inscore pointed out that people using nitrous oxide to get high isn’t isolated to California. He said he hadn’t heard of it being used as a recreational drug until about a month prior, but when he started researching it he learned that it’s “become a huge issue in the United Kingdom.”

“I guess I’m old enough I remember kids sniffing glue. It’s not like it’s a new thing,” he said of people trying to get high. “But I don’t know that we need to be creating pathways for things like that that are damaging to our youth.”

In October 2023, the Crescent City Council approved an ordinance aimed at preventing kids from accessing tobacco. That ordinance created a tobacco retail license, though new licenses wouldn’t be issued until the number of businesses selling cigarettes and similar products decreased to fewer than the state average of two per 2,500 people.

The impetus for creating a tobacco retail license came from local high school students who said their peers were getting addicted to flavored e-cigarettes.

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