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Lafayette sees cannabis club ban in ruling

Brooke Bryant Contra Costa Times

Lafayette, CA June 25, 2005 -- The Lafayette City Council opted not to pass an urgency ordinance banning medical marijuana dispensaries earlier this month because the U.S. Supreme Court beat them to the punch.

The city says that the June 6 federal ruling -- handed down the same day the council was scheduled to vote on a temporarily ban -- effectively prohibits the medical marijuana clubs that Californians voted to legalize in 1996.

The Supreme Court said that federal authorities can prosecute marijuana users even in states that allow some use of the drug.

"Federal law trumps state law, and federal law prohibits the use of marijuana," said City Manager Steve Falk. Any applications to start a medical marijuana dispensary would be denied on those grounds, he said.

Lafayette first considered the ordinance after city staff pointed out that the city has no zoning or city codes addressing medical marijuana dispensaries. According to the staff report, the city has received an inquiry about opening a dispensary in Lafayette.

Lafayette is just one of a swarm of cities to debate a moratorium on medical marijuana dispensaries, prompted by a range of concerns, from the difficulty of regulating the clubs to the disconnect between federal and state law.

Albany, Pinole and San Pablo all passed moratoriums in May, joining cities that include San Francisco and Emeryville who already had bans on new clubs in effect. But Alameda County supervisors approved a plan to start licensing the county's cannabis clubs even after the federal decision.

The City Council in neighboring Pleasant Hill also discussed a moratorium on the same day that the Supreme Court decision was announced. Unlike Lafayette, the council there decided to pass the initiative, giving city staff more time to figure out the ramifications of the federal decision. Pleasant Hill council members cited the quiet opening this year of a cannabis club in Concord, which had no ordinances prohibiting the clubs, as one reason for the moratorium.

But Lafayette City Attorney Malathy Subramanian said she advised the Lafayette council that the Supreme Court's decision makes it clear that medical marijuana dispensaries, and the state law that allows them, are illegal.

"To me, there's no room for the two laws to coexist," Subramanian said.

Some cities are still enacting the ordinances as a precaution, a buffer against state law that still allows the use of marijuana for medical purposes, she said.

The Lafayette staff report included information from various police departments that have dealt with marijuana dispensaries, including Oakland, where police reported problems ranging from dealers who buy marijuana at the club and sell it on the streets to medical patients who are robbed of their drugs as they leave the clinic.