shops had their Tobacco Retail Licenses revoked. The revocations were a result of multiple local ordinance violations within the last five years, ranging from expired licenses to selling illegal drugs from hidden compartments. This signals a new posture of enforcement for the over 100 tobacco retailers in the City of Hayward.
Help with enforcement yields results
According to the staff report, inspection and enforcement was, in the past, not as effective as it could be. In 2025, the city received a Department of Justice grant which allowed them to centralize inspections under one Code Enforcement Inspector, which has allowed them to better coordinate with state and federal enforcement efforts.
In January of 2026, the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration (CDTFA) conducted an enforcement with the city inspector, some of which revealed a number of extra violations. These included hidden doors and compartments containing illegal merchandise, ranging from flavored tobacco products, out-of-state menthol cigarettes and sellable amounts of psilocybin mushrooms.
Absentee owners
A common theme among the retailers who were present was that they were frequently owned by someone who was rarely present in the building. Multiple owners said that day-to-day operations were handled by someone else. They insisted that they had no idea that anything illegal had happened.
However, an attorney with the city and city staff argued that the lack of oversight was an argument in favor of license revocation, not an excuse. According to the ordinance, it is up to the business owner to ensure that their business is following the law. “It’s kind of ignorance of the law is no excuse,” planning commissioner Jeffery Haman said.
The lawyer with the city and the city inspector said that the ongoing behavior required enforcement. “The presence of these concealed storage areas, particularly after multiple years of inspections and documented violations, demonstrates that the violations were not isolated or inadvertent,” the inspector said. The planning commission is required to revoke the licenses if there is good evidence of wrongdoing.
Lawyers push commission’s buttons
Two retailers brought attorneys with them. The attorney for Smokey’s Smoke Shop and Gifts, James Anthony, repeatedly spoke—via Zoom—during public comment to take issue with the process. “I am challenging your jurisdiction to proceed without proper due process,” he said during his eight minutes of comment.
The lawyer for Gr8 Smoke Shop took an even more adversarial tone, frequently talking out of turn and over commissioners—including chair Carla Goodbody. During his eight-minute presentation, the attorney took a similar angle by attacking the process. “We’ll let the courts decide what due process actually means,” he said.
During commissioner questions and deliberations, the attorney spoke over commissioners, interjected commentary out of turn and treated the commission and city staff as hostile or ignorant. Despite the attorney alleging that the commission did not have the right to revoke the license, commissioners Robert Stevens and Vasko Yorgov took to municipal code to confirm their authority. Stevens read that a Tobacco Retail License “conveys a limited conditional privilege and nothing more.”
Sympathy without leniency
The owner of Smokey pleaded ignorance. “I did not know [that] was going to lead to a revocation,” he said. He said he cooperated with code enforcement for five years while they figured out the regulatory landscape together.
The owner of Smokey’s said that part of the problem is how he orders products and the more restrictive regulations in Hayward. He said that he orders batches of products from a supplier in California who does not necessarily know what is allowed and not in Hayward.
While the commission seemed sympathetic to many owners, most said it was important to be consistent with enforcement. Stevens said, “There’s a rule… the stores violated it. There’s definitely consequences if we make mistakes.”
Commissioner Ron Meyers was the only one who supported a more lenient penalty for Smokey’s, after admitting that he is a patron of the store. “I’m all for rule of law,” he said. “I just feel like four years ago we had some bad judgement calls…but since then, it seems he’s been pretty darn close.”
The Tobacco Retail Licenses of all 10 establishments were revoked. It is unclear if any shops filed an appeal, which they can do within 10 days of the decision.
Collin Thormoto is the editor of Hayward Herald, haywardherald.org.
