CITY COUNCIL AGENDA ITEM
ACTION REQUESTED:
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Pass the ordinance amending Sections 3-3 and 3-6 of the Naperville Municipal Code to prohibit the retail sale of kratom
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DEPARTMENT: Legal Department
SUBMITTED BY: Jennifer Bonner, Senior Assistant City Attorney
BOARD/COMMISSION REVIEW:
On July 9, 2026, the Liquor Commission unanimously recommended prohibiting the retail sale of kratom. Attached are the July 9, 2026 Liquor Commission meeting minutes.
BACKGROUND:
On September 3, 2019, the City Council adopted an ordinance that restricted youth access to kratom. The measure prohibited the local retail sale of kratom to individuals under 21 and barred possession by those under 18. This action supplemented the Illinois Kratom Control Act by establishing a local minimum sales age of 21 while aligning possession prohibitions with state law.
Kratom is derived from the leaves of a tropical evergreen tree native to Southeast Asia.
The leaves can be brewed as tea, crushed into powder, smoked, snorted, or taken in capsules or tablets. People have used kratom as a mood enhancer, energy booster, and pain reliever, and some advocates claim it may help with opioid withdrawal.
However, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration warns against its use due to risks such as liver toxicity, seizures, and substance use disorder.
Several municipalities have responded to rising kratom use by adopting tighter controls.
Rockford prohibits the sale of synthetic 7-hydroxymitragynine (7-OH) kratom products, while Winnetka, Plainfield and Bloomington have implemented full retail sale bans.
DISCUSSION:
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has issued multiple warning letters regarding the unlawful addition of synthetic 7-OH to commercial kratom products. This concentrated form can exceed the potency of morphine, significantly increasing the risk of rapid tolerance, severe substance use disorder, and accidental overdose. Laboratory testing frequently shows intentional adulteration, with 7-OH levels reaching up to 500 percent higher than concentrations naturally present in raw kratom leaf.
At the July 9, 2026 Liquor Commission meeting, several speakers addressed the negative impacts of kratom. Resident Ashley Ware spoke about the lack of public information concerning kratom’s addictive potential, its marketing as an herbal supplement, and the harmful health effects she personally experienced from using it.
Alex Cochran of the Fox Valley Institute noted that kratom dependence is treated similarly to opioid use, often requiring medications such as Buprenorphine and Suboxone. She explained that attempts to stop or reduce use can trigger a withdrawal syndrome closely resembling opioid discontinuation.
Ari Bernstein of Linden Oaks Behavioral Health discussed testing of kratom products, showing that product contents frequently did not match their labels. Many products contained undisclosed compounds, synthetic derivatives, or inaccurate ingredient lists, leaving consumers unaware of what they were ingesting.
360 Youth Services referenced data from the 2025 Monitoring the Future Survey, which found that 1.2 percent of 12th-grade students had used kratom within the past year. They further emphasized that age restrictions alone do not adequately protect youth, noting that most underage individuals who obtain alcoholic liquor do so through someone of legal age rather than purchasing it themselves.
Beyond banning the retail sale of kratom, the draft ordinance cleans up the Municipal Code by removing redundant language and updating key terminology. Specifically, it replaces "palcohol" with "powdered alcohol" and "smoking alcohol inhalation" with "alcohol vaporizer," while updating all related Code sections. Additionally, the sections regarding synthetic alternative drugs, tetrahydrocannabinol, and kratom have been moved into Section 3-6A, which regulates retail establishments.
On August 18, 2026, the City Council conducted the first reading of the proposed revisions. The City Council directed staff to provide additional information regarding kratom, including how other municipalities enforce restrictions, the feasibility of testing product composition in a laboratory setting, the ability to restrict marketing and advertisements, and the current landscape of state and federal regulations.
If the City chooses to prohibit the retail sale of kratom, it can also restrict related advertising as an incidental measure. For example, Wheaton implemented a full sales ban and concurrently enacted a prohibition on kratom advertising.
Laboratory Testing & Enforcement
When exploring the feasibility of product testing, City staff contacted the DuPage Lab and confirmed that they do not test drugs or compounds seized during municipal ordinance investigations. Further, kratom is inherently difficult to analyze, as laboratories currently lack standardized and validated methods for conducting both quantitative and qualitative testing.
To evaluate practical enforcement strategies, City staff reached out to multiple municipalities that currently enforce kratom restrictions. Bloomington, which enacted a total ban, initially notified local businesses of the new ordinance and followed up with compliance checks a month later, resulting in two citations. Rather than incurring the expense or logistical hurdles of laboratory testing, Bloomington bases its enforcement entirely on product labeling that explicitly identifies the substance as kratom. Other contacted municipalities had either not yet performed compliance checks or did not respond to staff inquiries.
Legislative Activity
At the state level, the Illinois Legislature introduced several kratom-related bills during its last session, including proposed amendments to the Kratom Control Act and a new Kratom Consumer Protection Act. The bills ranged from a total prohibition on purchasing, possessing or selling kratom to regulatory-oriented bills restricting synthetic products and establishing labeling standards and fines. None of the proposed bills became law. Staff recommends including any City-approved kratom regulations in the City’s 2027 state legislative priorities.
On the federal front, the DEA previously announced and later withdrew a 2016 proposal to temporarily schedule mitragynine and 7-OH. More recently on July 1, 2026, the DEA issued a new notice of intent to temporarily schedule 7-OH under Schedule I. The proposed thresholds under this notice include 0.05% 7-OH for raw kratom plant material, alongside a threshold of either 0.05% 7-OH or 1 milligram of 7-OH for synthetic or processed products like extracts, concentrates, edibles, and pressed pills. The DEA rule is scheduled to be published on August 26, 2026.
Following the first reading, the effective date of the attached ordinance was revised to October 1, 2026, ensuring City staff have adequate time to notify affected retailers.
FISCAL IMPACT:
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