JUNE POT SALES NET CITY $51,500

Medical marijuana has Colorado Springs seeing green.

The June sales of the green leafy substance and marijuana-infused
products like brownies generated nearly $51,500 in sales tax revenue.

It's a record high -- and a 21 percent increase from the month before.
Still, it's a miniscule bit of the $10.5 million the city collected
for all June sales.

Since January 2009, the city has pocketed nearly $327,500 in sales tax
revenue from the sale of medical marijuana and marijuana-laced products.

Last year, the city collected $111,000. So far this year, the city has
collected nearly twice that amount.

"I never thought that watching our local economy go up in smoke would
be a good thing, but now I need to reconsider," mayoral candidate
Buddy Gilmore said jokingly on Facebook.

The jump in sales tax revenue may be tied to a June 30 deadline for
medical marijuana businesses to register with the city. Businesses had
to certify "the timely remittance of sales tax."

But officials aren't ready to say whether that contributed to the 21
percent increase.

"We need some time to confirm that it was because of the June 30th
deadline," Candice Bridgers, the city's revenue and collections
manager, said Thursday in an e-mail.

"We had a number of prior period filings, and we want to check and see
if they were from existing or new customers," she said.