On Thursday, April 28, at 10 a.m., the Lake County Planning Commission will be considering a draconian medical marijuana dispensary ordinance proposed by the Community Development Department.

The meeting will be on the first floor of the courthouse in Lakeport. I urge interested people to attend this meeting and show support for the dispensaries and medical marijuana patients.

The Lake County Chamber of Commerce recently tried unsuccessfully to get the Board of Supervisors to totally ban medical marijuana dispensaries, which serve thousands of county residents.

Now, the chamber and its allies are back with a regulatory ordinance so restrictive that it would close most of the dispensaries anyway.

Following the 1996 passage of Proposition 215, the legislature passed SB 420 to clarify the legality of medical marijuana collectives and cooperatives, and two court cases have clearly established that storefront dispensaries are legal.

Yet, the proposed ordinance reeks with an unspoken attitude that these dispensaries are quasi-criminal enterprises.

Medical marijuana dispensaries are legal, they are here to stay and we need to deal with them in a rational and practical manner.

One of the worst provisions in the proposed ordinance has already been deleted, the requirement that all dispensary members be county residents. But, there are many other awful provisions in this ordinance that need to be eliminated or changed.

The ordinance forces all the dispensaries to move from their safe, convenient, well-established locations in C-2 and CH shopping areas, to C-3, M-1 and M-2, heavy commercial and industrial areas. This alone may drive most of them out of business. Nine of the 11 dispensaries are in C-2, one is in CH, and one is in C-3.

It defines a dispensary in an incorrect and overbroad way that includes small growing collectives without storefronts. It would not allow for distribution to members of such legal growing collectives on the property where the marijuana is grown, nor by home delivery to the members, so they would essentially be banned.

Compliance would be through the sheriff’s office, rather than through the health department or the planning department. This treats dispensaries as quasi-criminal enterprises rather than as legal businesses offering a legitimate form of alternative medical treatment.

Dispensaries would have to disclose to the sheriff who their growers are and where the cannabis is grown. The growers are required by state law to be patients and members of the dispensing collectives. Requiring disclosure of their names and growing locations is a violation of patient privacy and also violates the grower’s privilege against (federal) self-incrimination and has a very chilling effect on those supplying marijuana to the dispensaries.

And, with federal laws still in conflict with California’s laws, there is nothing to prevent the sheriff or his deputies from sharing this information with the Drug Enforcement Administration, voluntarily or by subpoena.

The proposed ordinance requires a message that it “may cause cancer when smoked.” This is inaccurate and inappropriate. In fact, studies have shown that marijuana does not cause lung cancer and may actually fight cancer.

The proposed ordinance would not allow for the sale of small clones (cuttings), which most dispensaries do. However, it would allow for the sale of flowering marijuana plants, which means it would allow the sale of larger, more advanced plants, but not little clones, which makes no sense and shows that those drafting this have no clue. Indeed, neither dispensary owners nor medical marijuana advocates were directly involved in the drafting process.

There are now 11 dispensaries operating under the county moratorium. This ordinance sets a limit of nine. This would mean that at least two would have to close (probably most if required to relocate out of C-2 zoning), and does not allow for population increase and growth in the industry. It treats dispensaries differently from any other free enterprise business.

 

The ordinance does not clarify whether sales of edibles are permitted. Edibles are an established part of dispensaries, since many people are unable to smoke cannabis and need to eat it.

 

There are many other problems with this proposed ordinance, these are merely the most serious.

I urge interested people to attend the meeting on Thursday, April 28, at 10 a.m. at the Lake County Courthouse, 255 N. Forbes St., Lakeport.

Ron Green is an attorney. He lives in Lower Lake, Calif.