Hey Jeff, thanks, hope you're safe. I personally know of a few ICMaggers that worked at a club or two. BEST OF LUCK TO OUR IC FAMILY! Hope you're safe guys!
Hey Jeff, thanks, hope you're safe. I personally know of a few ICMaggers that worked at a club or two. BEST OF LUCK TO OUR IC FAMILY! Hope you're safe guys!
Sigh. Hi Pythaglio, bearer of bad news, lol. What loophole is exploited to make this sort of BS legal?
I meant it's legal for one patient to provide cannabis to another. If a cop goes to a doctor and gets a script for oxy then goes to the pharmacist and buys some with it, the phamacist is performing a legal transaction regardless of whether the doctor was running a 'pill mill'.
Reread the text I quoted, replace the word 'entrapment' with the word 'legal' as you misunderstood what I was saying.
http://lastblogonearth.com/2009/09/09/dispensaries-raided-because-theyre-making-too-much-profit/
If only the dispensaries had not been greedy and followed Jerry's guidelines then the sick still would have had access.
I wonder why you believe the powers that be that make this claim, especially in light of your posting how you feel about SD county authorities. Wow, I'm sure that they're totally into the truth, the whole truth, and nothin' but the truth so help them gawd.
Oh, BTW, have you ever come up with a plausible reason why enough people would play in order to supply patients needs while wearing a hair shirt and existing under a vow of poverty? WTF is your problem with people making a buck?
Blue Dot must be having an awesome day today, he/she always talks shit about clubs and how they deserve this treatment, and of course his hero Jerry Brown..Not surprising at all. I think BD is either a cop, SD politician or commercial grower who wants MJ illegal to maintain the high prices...I don't get it. If a club is acting illegally, well then that's one thing, but San Diego always swoops in on all clubs all at once, it's clearly a scare tactic..
i think someone should start a thread medical vs recreational.....there are ideas from both sides that need to be explored and acknowleded....but lets try to keep this thread on track as just info on what is going down for the most part...im not starting shit w anyone, it is a discussion i am eager to listen to and take part in...but there will be updates throughout the day and i think it is a good idea to have one thread stick to just whats going on...what you all think of that?
I'm sure Mr. Chipman is Bonnie's good friend ergh..time to flood savePB.org with some inspiration emails LOL. Maybe after hearing from some terminal patients he'll at least sleep a little less at night, scumbag!
Remember these names and DON'T vote them back next time around:
Bonnie M. Dumanis
District Attorney
Elected November 2002. Took office January 2003.
Meet the DA 2008 Annual Report
Jesse Rodriguez
Assistant District Attorney
Second in command, responsible for the day-to-day operations of the District Attorney's Office, oversees the Chief Deputy District Attorneys, Special Operations Division and Restitution Enforcement/Victim Services Division. Rodriguez joined the DA's Office in January 2003 after serving 16 years as a Superior Court Judge, 10 of those years as Supervising Judge at San Diego County's South Bay Courthouse.
Mark Pettine
Chief Deputy District Attorney -- Central Operations
Oversees the Case Issuing/Extraditions, Pretrial/Disposition and Superior Court Divisions. Pettine joined the DA's Office in 1976 as a Deputy District Attorney after graduating from the University of the Pacific - McGeorge School of Law.
Julie Korsmeyer
Chief Deputy District Attorney -- Special Units
Oversees the Family Protection, Special Operations, Sex Crimes/Stalking, Insurance Fraud, Economic Crimes Divisions and the office's travel budget. Korsmeyer joined the DA's Office in 1988 after serving as a police officer in Colorado. She was previously the Chief of the Special Operations Division. She graduated from The University of Denver School of Law.
Jeff B Dusek
Chief Deputy District Attorney -- Special Units
Oversees the Cold Homicide, Gangs, Narcotics and Appellate Divisions. Dusek joined the office in 1977 after graduating from Washington and Lee University School of Law in Lexington, VA. He used to play professional minor league baseball.
Dan Lamborn
Chief Deputy District Attorney - Branches
Oversees the North County, East County, South Bay Branches and the Juvenile Division. Lamborn joined the DA's Office in 1983. He was previously the Chief of the Superior Court Division and East County Branch. He graduated from the University of San Diego School of Law.
Cheryl Ruffier
Chief, Employee Relations
Oversees Personnel, Training and Payroll. Ruffier joined the DA's Office in January 2003 after 26 years as a civil attorney specializing in employment law in San Diego. She is a past president of Lawyers Club and formerly Vice President of the San Diego County Bar Association.
Michelle Bush
Chief, Administrative Services
Oversees Financial Services and participates in coordination of Employee Relations. Bush joined the DA's Office in September 2006. She graduated from San Diego State with a degree in Accounting and she is also a CPA. Previously Bush was employed by San Diego County for nine years with three different departments, including the office of the Auditor and Controller and the County’s Technology Office.
Arlene Smith
Assistant Chief, Administrative Services
Manages budget development, accounting functions and trust funds, travel, equipment inventory, facilities, procurement, grants and revenue sources, and all financial reporting. Smith joined the DA's Office in November 2004 after nine years at the San Diego County Office of the Public Defender. She has been with San Diego County since 1979 in various departments.
Gail Stewart
Special Assistant, Legislation
Policy advisor on governmental affairs. She is also responsible for special projects. Gail joined the DA's Office in January 2003, leaving her Media and Public Relations Consulting business. Gail served as a journalist in the San Diego market for 17 years working as a radio anchor/reporter and as a TV investigative reporter for a local network affiliate. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from UCSD.
Paul Levikow
Communications Director
Oversees all internal and external communication for the District Attorney's Office. Editor of Law Enforcement Quarterly, manages media relations, including reporter inquiries, news releases and organizing news conferences, oversees content for the DA's public web site and internal intranet site, responds to public inquiries, special events planning including the annual Citizens of Courage Awards Luncheon. Levikow joined the DA's Office in 2003 after 20 years in print, TV and radio news in San Diego.
Steve Walker
Deputy Communications Director
Provides information to the media on individual cases and overall office policy in Communications Director's absence. Editor of the Annual Report and contributor to Law Enforcement Quarterly. Writes and publishes news releases, organizes news conferences, and manages content for the DA’s public website and internal intranet site. Writes speeches. Responds to public inquiries, provides media training, and oversees special event planning. Walker joined the DA’s office in 2006. He has more than 20 years television news experience including work at NBC News and as an embedded journalist during the Iraq war.
Jesse Navarro
Community Relations Officer
Oversees the DA's Community Advisory Board, represents the DA at various community and civic events, liaison to community, governmental agencies and business organizations, organizes the DA's town hall meetings, special projects, and provides interviews for Spanish speaking news media. Navarro joined the DA's Office in January 2003 after 12 years as a small business owner, participating on numerous local and state boards and commissions and 15 years in law enforcement in San Diego.
Jeffery Anderson
Community Relations Officer
Oversees the DA's Literacy Intervention, Mentor and Reentry Programs and Community Advisory Board, Represents the DA at city council and community council meetings, participates in community collaborations. Anderson joined the DA's Office in 2003 after serving as a Substance Abuse Assessor for the San Diego County Court System.
Midge Costanza
Community Relations Officer
Elder Abuse advocate helping to educate seniors throughout the county how to protect themselves; works with financial institutions on identity theft deterrence; represents the DA at public and community events with an emphasis in crime prevention. Costanza joined the DA's Office in 2005 after making history when she was the first woman named Assistant to the President by Jimmy Carter in 1976. California Governor Gray Davis appointed Costanza as Special Assistant to the Governor in 2000. Costanza was the first woman elected to the Rochester, NY city council. She was also an adjunct professor at San Diego State University.
Ron Moskowitz
Chief Information Officer
Oversees the Information Technology Department and Trial Support Services which provide support for servers, networks, desktop computers, laptops, handheld devices, application development, animation, web and graphic design. He establishes and directs the strategic long term objectives, policies, and procedures by aligning technology with business goals. Moskowitz joined the DA's Office in April 2008. He graduated from California State University Fullerton with a degree in Philosophy and he also has an MBA in Technology Management. Previously, Moskowitz was employed by Orange County as the Chief Information Security Officer.
Julie Wartell
Crime Analysis Administrator
Coordinates crime analysis and research for the office by working with staff, other criminal justice organizations and the public to provide statistics, mapping and crime trends. Wartell joined the DA's Office in 2003 after 11 years as a police crime analyst and criminal justice researcher. She has also done extensive training and writing about crime analysis and problem oriented policing.
Paula Robinson
Chief, Bureau of Investigation
Oversees the law enforcement component of the District Attorney's Office, including eight divisions and four branch offices. Robinson joined the DA’s Office in September 2006 from the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department where she served as Assistant Sheriff of Court Services. Her 29 previous years in law enforcement in San Diego County also included serving as a SDPD Officer and Deputy County Marshal where she earned the rank of Captain. She served as the Chief of Police for Del Mar, Solana Beach and Encinitas (in 2002-2003) as the Encinitas Station Captain.
Carlos 'Chico' Gonzalez
Assistant Chief, Bureau of Investigation
Directs the daily operations of the Bureau of Investigation and assists the Bureau Chief in overseeing the administrative matters of the Bureau. Gonzalez joined the DA's office as an investigator in 1990 after 15 years with the National City Police Department and 5 years as a Criminal Investigator in the U.S. Army.
Robert "Butch" Etheridge
Deputy Chief, Bureau of Investigation
Oversees the Range, Training, DA's Office Fleet, the California Witness Protection/Relocation Program, the Public Assistance Office, special projects and administrative matters for the Bureau of Investigation. Etheridge joined the DA's office in 2002 after 30 years with the FBI.
Fafafooey
Member
I dunno about anyone else, but I think stronger action is called for. How do recall elections work? Do they work at this level? I would gladly help collect signatures. Let's fire them all.
What you really need to do to be effective is to target the DEA funding of these agencies. That is where the impetus and resources come from to bust MJ dispensaries.
The DEA seems to have INCREASED its activities regarding MJ since Obama's election.
So Obama is the next person to be targeted. He swore the DEA wouldn't go after Medical Marijuana, yet here they are doing it with Proxies.
Pull out the DEA money and harrassment of MJ growers, sellers and users will come to a quick halt!
San Diego: Just Say NO! to the DEA!
The DEA seems to have INCREASED its activities regarding MJ since Obama's election.
So Obama is the next person to be targeted. He swore the DEA wouldn't go after Medical Marijuana, yet here they are doing it with Proxies.
Pull out the DEA money and harrassment of MJ growers, sellers and users will come to a quick halt!
San Diego: Just Say NO! to the DEA!
MobbDeep
Member
When will the U.S citizens finally come to the conclusion that the police,and any fedral agencies..can and DO whatever they please..even its its against the law,or so called "unconstitutional"..and unless you wealthy and have money for a very good lawyer..theres nothing you can do about it..
FrankRizzo
Listen to me jerky
Sure is a shame......
If anyone here is involved I wish you luck with this mess.
On another note. It seems kind of unwise to me to allow people without their reqs to be inside your dispensary, period. Now if said dispensary is around SD I would think, due to the nature of the politics in that area you really wouldn't want to do that. Could be bs made up by the police/media, but if it's true than that's asking for trouble in my book. Not pointing fingers, no one deserves to be treated like this.
Sure it's another million down the drain to organize this mess.
(FRizzo hangs head low)
If anyone here is involved I wish you luck with this mess.
On another note. It seems kind of unwise to me to allow people without their reqs to be inside your dispensary, period. Now if said dispensary is around SD I would think, due to the nature of the politics in that area you really wouldn't want to do that. Could be bs made up by the police/media, but if it's true than that's asking for trouble in my book. Not pointing fingers, no one deserves to be treated like this.
Sure it's another million down the drain to organize this mess.
(FRizzo hangs head low)
Wow ain't this some shit? One question I do have, Is this the City Of San Diego or San Diego County? Just asking because there are a few in North Country that are not on that list. I love living here in San Diego but we do have the worst officials in this state when it comes to just and unjust laws. I will say it is a million times better than where I used to live, a no tolerance state where you got locked up for a roach.
I'm not sure I fully understand why SD and a few other counties continues to circumvent California state law ? It may be time for the state to begin imposing SANCTIONS against any state funded counties and cities that fail to uphold the law. It's just that simple. Take away their road funding, tax funding or anything else the state provides to these agencys until they comply. The governer of California should already have ordered the sanctions. If there's no law that supports sanctions, then we should have one. It's unacceptable that these cities and countys are circumventing the implementation of laws that became active over ten years ago. Force THEM to comply....see how that changes things.
See I was right about the DEA being the driving force behind this:
From email:
In stark contrast to the San Diego City Council, who seem to want to figure out how to implement California's state Medical Marijuana laws, San Diego County DA and Jihadi Bonnie Dumanis is still going full speed ahead with her local front of The Drug War, aided and abetted by Jihadist elements in local law enforcement agencies as well as the DEA.
Of course, all this costs the county a lot of money and these days voters aren't positively impressed by profligate use of public funds. Are SD activists demanding a financial accounting for these activities? Stay tuned.
With 20 or so raids in one day, an inescapable picture of abusive pattern & practice emerges - just the sort of stage setting which is needed for a class action suit to be developed. Do any of us doubt that the financial resources to ante up for that game could be brought into play?
--------------------------------------------------
from: http://lastblogonearth.com/
Dispensary volunteer was at store: ‘They tore up our house’
September 9, 2009 - 3:47 pm — Eric Wolff
Randy Wall is a 52-year-old AIDS patient and volunteer at Hillcrest Compassionate Care, one of the medical marijuana dispensaries raided today by the San Diego Police Department. Wall said he has been a member and a greeter for the store for a year, about as long as the place has been in business. Wall said they were preparing to shoot a TV commercial at about 11:30 a.m. when police arrived. Wall had been cleaning a back office.
“When I walked out, we heard the cops were coming, but we said, ‘Be cool, be cool,’” he said. “We thought they were going to check our permits. But there was like 20 cops with guns drawn and battering rams. We told them we would unlock the door if they gave us a second.”
“We said, ‘Hold on! Hold on! We’ll let you in,’ but they busted the door open,” he said. “Then they busted down another door that was locked. There was nothing in there, it’s a bedroom where someone sleeps. We have one person stay there, we have to have a security guard in there 24-hours a day.”
“They made us go up against the wall, and they frisked everybody. Then they sat us down right where we were standing, and they proceeded to ask each person questions. I didn’t hear what they were asking for, but I think it was name, address, basic information.”
Wall said police didn’t tell them why they were being taken in. He said they only spoke to the owner of the shop, Rev. Paul Cody, who was arrested.
“It seems to me that everybody that worked there got arrested today. They handcuffed everyone, everybody that worked there was in handcuffs that I saw,” Wall said.
Wall said police were not at all rough with the employees, but they were less gentle with the store itself.
“They acted like complete animals, they tore our house up for no reason,” he said. “I’m so upset about this. I thought the way that they did it was very unprofessional. They came in like we were a bunch of common criminals, which we weren’t. They just made you feel like you were nothing, just a common criminal.”
Drug Enforcement Agency “in a support role” in medical marijuana dispensary closures
September 9, 2009 - 3:02 pm — Eric Wolff
A spokesperson for the Drug Enforcement Agency, Amy Roderick, says that the DEA is involved in the raids currently being conductedby the San Diego Police Department and the San Diego Sheriff’s Department on medical marijuana dispensaries. She said DEA is involved “in a support role” but she said she didn’t know if DEA agents were actually making arrests.
This comes as a bit of a surprise, given that in February, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder respondedto a question at a press conference about whether raids on dispensaries would continue in the negative. From the Huffington Post:
“No,” [Holder] said. “What the president said during the campaign, you’ll be surprised to know, will be consistent with what we’ll be doing in law enforcement. He was my boss during the campaign. He is formally and technically and by law my boss now. What he said during the campaign is now American policy.”
CityBeat has calls out to other law enforcement agencies to see who else is involved. So far, the City of Chula Vista and the City of National City police departments say they were not a part of the operation.
San Diego police raid and close medical marijuana dispensaries
September 9, 2009 - 2:29 pm — Eric Wolff
The San Diego Police Department and other county law-enforcement agencies are conducting a sweeping raid on marijuana dispensaries this afternoon. As of this writing, CityBeat has heard that Green Kross Collective, Total Care Collective, San Diego Discount Caregivers, Hillcrest Compassionate Care, Downtown Kush lounge, Top Quality Collective, Medical Cannabis Providers, and Nature’s Rx Collective have been shut down (We will updates this list as we learn more) by the San Diego Police Department and their owners arrested if they were present. Sources tell CityBeat that the owners have been given 48 hours to provide proper paperwork for their shops, but everything is very tentative at the moment.
Det. Gary Hassen, a spokesperson for the San Diego Police Department, told CityBeat there is an ongoing investigation and that District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis will hold a press conference tomorrow morning at 10 a.m.
Paul Levikow, a spokesperson for Dumanis, said he would not comment until after the press conference.
A spokesperson for the San Diego County Sheriff, Jan Caldwell, confirmed that sheriff’s deputies are also involved in this operation. CityBeat takes this to mean the operation is countywide. We’ll be making more calls as the afternoon goes on.
There has been a boom of dispensary openings in recent months since U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said raiding medical marijuana dispensaries would not be a priority for the Drug Enforcement Agency. Also, the U.S. Supreme Court recent declined to hear the medical marijuana lawsuit brought by San Diego County and others challenging California’s voter-passed initiative that legalized the sale and use of medical marijuana.
City’s permitted more medical marijuana businesses than it thinks it has
September 8, 2009 - 5:21 pm — Kelly Davis
Today, the San Diego City Council decided to re-start its Medical Marijuana Task Force. Originally formed in 2001, the task force developed guidelines on what amount of pot a medical marijuana user could have on hand, and was then disbanded—despite a huge jump in dispensariesin San Diego in 2005 and calls for the city to hammer out guidelines for dispensary operations.
With the Supreme Court deciding not to hear San Diego County’s challenge to Prop. 215 (the voter-approved initiative that allows people with a doctor’s recommendation to use marijuana for medical purposes) and Obama saying that raiding medical marijuana dispensaries wasn’t going to be a priority for the DEA, medical-marijuana-related businesses are back.
The city seems to think that only eight of these businesses are legit. According to a July 21 memo from Development Services Director Kelly Broughton, only eight medical marijuana businesses have applied for a city-issued business-tax certificate.
The reality is that dozens have applied for, and been issued, a license—just not under the proper category. Why? Because the city doesn’t have the proper category. Sure, it has a category called “medical marijuana dispensaries,” but labeling yourself as such is asking for trouble—dispensaries are illegal according to guidelinesput out by the state Attorney General. Medical marijuana can be distributed through nonproft co-ops and collectives, the A.G. said, and, so, that’s what medical-marijuana-distribution businesses have been calling themselves. They’ve also been applying for a business-tax license under the same categories that dispensaries, collectives and co-ops have historically used. I looked through a year’s worth of business-tax records and here are some of those categories:
* Other misc. store/retailers
* All other health and personal care
* Other direct selling establishment
* Holistic health practitioners
* Food and health supplement store
* Other individual family services
According to Broughton’s memo, it’s up to Development Services to “determine the appropriate use category” for each business that applies for a tax license. This determination is “based on information provided by the applicant.” If that’s true, then it’s surprising that “San Diego Medical Cannabis Collective” (which applied, and received, a tax license under “Other misc. stores/retailers”) didn’t get recategorized. Others are less clear, but not by much: The Green Door Collective (where you can get a contact high simply by standing across the street), the Medicine Man Herbal House of Healing, Island Herbal Collective and Green Kross Collective. Did any of these names raise a red flag for Broughton’s staff? Who knows. As the U-T’s Helen Gao points out, nobody from Development Services was at today’s City Council meeting to answer questions.
If you look through the city’s business-tax records, using the words “collective,” “cannabis” or “caregivers” as search terms, there are no less than 20 medical-marijuana businesses that have been issues a business-tax license in the last year. CalNORML listsat least another dozen—and notice how they’re no longer using the term “dispensary,” either.
Since it’s illegal for any business that sells or distributes medical marijuana to make a profit, the next step is to check these businesses against the California Secretary of State’s business records. Perhaps that’ll be one of the task-force’s recommendations, unless a reporter with time on his/her hands gets around to it first.
From email:
In stark contrast to the San Diego City Council, who seem to want to figure out how to implement California's state Medical Marijuana laws, San Diego County DA and Jihadi Bonnie Dumanis is still going full speed ahead with her local front of The Drug War, aided and abetted by Jihadist elements in local law enforcement agencies as well as the DEA.
Of course, all this costs the county a lot of money and these days voters aren't positively impressed by profligate use of public funds. Are SD activists demanding a financial accounting for these activities? Stay tuned.
With 20 or so raids in one day, an inescapable picture of abusive pattern & practice emerges - just the sort of stage setting which is needed for a class action suit to be developed. Do any of us doubt that the financial resources to ante up for that game could be brought into play?
--------------------------------------------------
from: http://lastblogonearth.com/
Dispensary volunteer was at store: ‘They tore up our house’
September 9, 2009 - 3:47 pm — Eric Wolff
Randy Wall is a 52-year-old AIDS patient and volunteer at Hillcrest Compassionate Care, one of the medical marijuana dispensaries raided today by the San Diego Police Department. Wall said he has been a member and a greeter for the store for a year, about as long as the place has been in business. Wall said they were preparing to shoot a TV commercial at about 11:30 a.m. when police arrived. Wall had been cleaning a back office.
“When I walked out, we heard the cops were coming, but we said, ‘Be cool, be cool,’” he said. “We thought they were going to check our permits. But there was like 20 cops with guns drawn and battering rams. We told them we would unlock the door if they gave us a second.”
“We said, ‘Hold on! Hold on! We’ll let you in,’ but they busted the door open,” he said. “Then they busted down another door that was locked. There was nothing in there, it’s a bedroom where someone sleeps. We have one person stay there, we have to have a security guard in there 24-hours a day.”
“They made us go up against the wall, and they frisked everybody. Then they sat us down right where we were standing, and they proceeded to ask each person questions. I didn’t hear what they were asking for, but I think it was name, address, basic information.”
Wall said police didn’t tell them why they were being taken in. He said they only spoke to the owner of the shop, Rev. Paul Cody, who was arrested.
“It seems to me that everybody that worked there got arrested today. They handcuffed everyone, everybody that worked there was in handcuffs that I saw,” Wall said.
Wall said police were not at all rough with the employees, but they were less gentle with the store itself.
“They acted like complete animals, they tore our house up for no reason,” he said. “I’m so upset about this. I thought the way that they did it was very unprofessional. They came in like we were a bunch of common criminals, which we weren’t. They just made you feel like you were nothing, just a common criminal.”
Drug Enforcement Agency “in a support role” in medical marijuana dispensary closures
September 9, 2009 - 3:02 pm — Eric Wolff
A spokesperson for the Drug Enforcement Agency, Amy Roderick, says that the DEA is involved in the raids currently being conductedby the San Diego Police Department and the San Diego Sheriff’s Department on medical marijuana dispensaries. She said DEA is involved “in a support role” but she said she didn’t know if DEA agents were actually making arrests.
This comes as a bit of a surprise, given that in February, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder respondedto a question at a press conference about whether raids on dispensaries would continue in the negative. From the Huffington Post:
“No,” [Holder] said. “What the president said during the campaign, you’ll be surprised to know, will be consistent with what we’ll be doing in law enforcement. He was my boss during the campaign. He is formally and technically and by law my boss now. What he said during the campaign is now American policy.”
CityBeat has calls out to other law enforcement agencies to see who else is involved. So far, the City of Chula Vista and the City of National City police departments say they were not a part of the operation.
San Diego police raid and close medical marijuana dispensaries
September 9, 2009 - 2:29 pm — Eric Wolff
The San Diego Police Department and other county law-enforcement agencies are conducting a sweeping raid on marijuana dispensaries this afternoon. As of this writing, CityBeat has heard that Green Kross Collective, Total Care Collective, San Diego Discount Caregivers, Hillcrest Compassionate Care, Downtown Kush lounge, Top Quality Collective, Medical Cannabis Providers, and Nature’s Rx Collective have been shut down (We will updates this list as we learn more) by the San Diego Police Department and their owners arrested if they were present. Sources tell CityBeat that the owners have been given 48 hours to provide proper paperwork for their shops, but everything is very tentative at the moment.
Det. Gary Hassen, a spokesperson for the San Diego Police Department, told CityBeat there is an ongoing investigation and that District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis will hold a press conference tomorrow morning at 10 a.m.
Paul Levikow, a spokesperson for Dumanis, said he would not comment until after the press conference.
A spokesperson for the San Diego County Sheriff, Jan Caldwell, confirmed that sheriff’s deputies are also involved in this operation. CityBeat takes this to mean the operation is countywide. We’ll be making more calls as the afternoon goes on.
There has been a boom of dispensary openings in recent months since U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said raiding medical marijuana dispensaries would not be a priority for the Drug Enforcement Agency. Also, the U.S. Supreme Court recent declined to hear the medical marijuana lawsuit brought by San Diego County and others challenging California’s voter-passed initiative that legalized the sale and use of medical marijuana.
City’s permitted more medical marijuana businesses than it thinks it has
September 8, 2009 - 5:21 pm — Kelly Davis
Today, the San Diego City Council decided to re-start its Medical Marijuana Task Force. Originally formed in 2001, the task force developed guidelines on what amount of pot a medical marijuana user could have on hand, and was then disbanded—despite a huge jump in dispensariesin San Diego in 2005 and calls for the city to hammer out guidelines for dispensary operations.
With the Supreme Court deciding not to hear San Diego County’s challenge to Prop. 215 (the voter-approved initiative that allows people with a doctor’s recommendation to use marijuana for medical purposes) and Obama saying that raiding medical marijuana dispensaries wasn’t going to be a priority for the DEA, medical-marijuana-related businesses are back.
The city seems to think that only eight of these businesses are legit. According to a July 21 memo from Development Services Director Kelly Broughton, only eight medical marijuana businesses have applied for a city-issued business-tax certificate.
The reality is that dozens have applied for, and been issued, a license—just not under the proper category. Why? Because the city doesn’t have the proper category. Sure, it has a category called “medical marijuana dispensaries,” but labeling yourself as such is asking for trouble—dispensaries are illegal according to guidelinesput out by the state Attorney General. Medical marijuana can be distributed through nonproft co-ops and collectives, the A.G. said, and, so, that’s what medical-marijuana-distribution businesses have been calling themselves. They’ve also been applying for a business-tax license under the same categories that dispensaries, collectives and co-ops have historically used. I looked through a year’s worth of business-tax records and here are some of those categories:
* Other misc. store/retailers
* All other health and personal care
* Other direct selling establishment
* Holistic health practitioners
* Food and health supplement store
* Other individual family services
According to Broughton’s memo, it’s up to Development Services to “determine the appropriate use category” for each business that applies for a tax license. This determination is “based on information provided by the applicant.” If that’s true, then it’s surprising that “San Diego Medical Cannabis Collective” (which applied, and received, a tax license under “Other misc. stores/retailers”) didn’t get recategorized. Others are less clear, but not by much: The Green Door Collective (where you can get a contact high simply by standing across the street), the Medicine Man Herbal House of Healing, Island Herbal Collective and Green Kross Collective. Did any of these names raise a red flag for Broughton’s staff? Who knows. As the U-T’s Helen Gao points out, nobody from Development Services was at today’s City Council meeting to answer questions.
If you look through the city’s business-tax records, using the words “collective,” “cannabis” or “caregivers” as search terms, there are no less than 20 medical-marijuana businesses that have been issues a business-tax license in the last year. CalNORML listsat least another dozen—and notice how they’re no longer using the term “dispensary,” either.
Since it’s illegal for any business that sells or distributes medical marijuana to make a profit, the next step is to check these businesses against the California Secretary of State’s business records. Perhaps that’ll be one of the task-force’s recommendations, unless a reporter with time on his/her hands gets around to it first.
