Who will Survive the Medical Marijuana Dispensary Crackdown?

January 28, 2010 - The Los Angeles City Clerk amended the Ordinance which is the only law mandating the opening, re-opening and operation of medical marijuana dispensaries in the city. The city addressed the concern of the 1000's of applications they have received for approval of new marijuana dispensaries.

Opposers are worried that the amount of dispensaries creates an "threat to public welfare" environment and allows for "drug dealers and recreational users to hijack California's medical marijuana legislation for their own benefit"

Changes being made in Los Angeles for Marijuana dispensaries:

The amendment to the Ordinance No. 181530 enacts a very important Grandfather Clause. (I personally am not a fan because I remember another time when the Grandfather Clause was used.) Only dispensaries that we registered with the clerk's office on or before 09/14/2007 and has at least one of it's original members from that date, at the same location since then.

Basically, if you own a collective or dispensary and you opened after 9/14/2007, you have to now close.

The city can no longer ask for the Names, Addresses and Telephone numbers of those that are patients of medical marijuana dispensaries.

Basically, patients in need of medical marijuana who fear that their names will be released to the press, their employers or some government list no longer holds any ground. This will not happen with the new ordinance.

So what about the dispensaries that DO meet all the requirements? The City Council devised a lottery that will allow the remaining businesses to apply to remain open.

How many will be chosen?    Only 100

The lottery strategy was based on the advice of the city attorney’s office to decide which dispensaries will be allowed to operate legally and to make it easier for the city’s lawyers and police to shut down hundreds of other dispensaries.

The Los Angeles City Clerk released a list of 228 medical marijuana collectives that applied meeting all the requirements to enter the lottery. Bottom line: In the entire city of Los Angeles, only 100 dispensaries will be allowed, and everyone is fighting for the chance to survive.

Can't Stop The Pot: Patients Fight To Stop Los Angeles From Pot-Blocking

Superior Court Judge James Chalfant denied an attempt to stop a city ordinance from shutting down 400+ medical marijuana dispensaries. He just wants Los Angeles to prove their case to do so.

City Council created an ordinance to close the doors of all the pot shops that have popped up across Los Angeles over the past several years. The law would close down over 400 dispensaries and cause roughly 130 others to have six months to meet stringent guidelines if they wished to remain open. This new Law would have gone effective as of Monday.

Not so fast Los Angeles, Attorneys for patients using medical marijuana had filed a class-action lawsuit last week, contending that the law would unconstitutionally bar patients’ access to their medicine. (Word.) Although the law only calls for dispenseries to be removed from areas that are 1000 miles radius from schools and churches, allegedly it is a violation of the rights of citizens that need access.

“I believe access to medical marijuana … is supposed to be limited,” the judge said. “It is not supposed to be freely available on the street to anyone who wants it; that was the intention of the people.”

The class action suit included over 100,000 Los Angeles residents who suffer from illnesses ranging from anxiety and menopause to lupus or AIDS, according to an article written in Los Angeles Times.

Superior Court Judge James Chalfant on Friday ordered attorneys to file additional papers on whether allowing certain dispensaries to remain open while closing others would be a violation of the equal protection clause of the California Constitution.

Hearings for the patients and the dispensaries were set for early July.