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San Francisco To Crack Down On Pot Clubs

KPIX

San Francisco, CA June 29, 2005 -- Six days after federal agents raided a trio of San Francisco's medical marijuana clubs, the city's supervisors have introduced legislation to regulate the businesses.

The dispensaries are facing pressures in court as well; Tuesday a San Francisco Superior Court judge ordered a medical pot club in San Francisco shut down, according to Jeffery Woo, a lawyer who pushed for the closure on behalf of his client who lives near the club.

Health & Wellness Alternatives, a medical cannabis dispensary located at 935 Howard St., has been illegally operating without a permit to do business in the area, Superior Court Judge Ronald Quidachay ruled Tuesday.

Quidachay issued a temporary restraining order against the pot club's operators that prevents Charles Pappas, Aundre Speciale and Health & Wellness Alternatives from possessing, using or otherwise handling marijuana at or within 1,500 feet of 935 Howard St.

Laura Weil, who lives on Tehama Street adjacent to the pot club, filed the petition Friday through Woo, her attorney.

Weil says she's been asking the city and county to enforce its conditional use permit requirements for months, and even tried unsuccessfully to convince the pot club's owners to apply for the permit.

"I really didn't want to go to court to get them to stop," Weil said. "I support the legal and proper use of medicinal marijuana because I believe it helps certain patients, but the city needs to enforce the permit process, which helps prevent the kind of abuse we're seeing from Health & Wellness Alternatives."

"The proprietors of Health & Wellness did not adequately research their location, and moved into a residential neighborhood with a high density of children," she said. "This showed poor judgment -- and had they gone
through the conditional use process, they likely would have been denied. They also moved into a neighborhood already saturated with dispensaries, with eight in a six-block radius from 935 Howard St."

Once Weil files a $2,500 fee, Pappas and Speciale would be required to appear in court July 12.

Perhaps reacting to residents' growing unease over San Francisco's medical marijuana clubs, Supervisors Ross Mirkarimi and Gerardo Sandoval introduced separate pieces of legislation on Tuesday to regulate the clubs.

If the San Francisco Board of Supervisors approves either proposal it would end the temporary moratorium on new clubs.

Both versions would prohibit medical pot dispensaries in residential and mixed residential zoning districts.

Mirkarimi's version would require a one-time $7,400 permit fee and an annual fee of $2,000. Clubs would also be prohibited from opening within 1,000 feet of any school or community-gathering place if marijuana is smoked on the premises, and not within 500 feet if smoking is prohibited on site.

Clubs would not be able to operate between 12 a.m. and 7 a.m. under Mirkarimi's proposal. Sandoval's version is less stringent.

Under his proposal, medical pot dispensaries would be prohibited within 1,000 feet of another dispensary and would not be allowed to operate between 2 a.m. and 6 a.m. Also, any clubs in operation before April would have one year to obtain a conditional use permit or close.

California voters legalized marijuana use for medical purposes in 1996 through the passage of Proposition 215.