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The San Ramon City Council is poised to consider permanently prohibiting medical marijuana dispensaries later this year after the city’s Policy Committee on Tuesday directed staff to draft a new ordinance establishing the ban.
“The Policy Committee followed the advice of our police department and the wishes of our community,” Vice Mayor Harry Sachs said in an email interview. “San Ramon is a family community; we do not need dispensaries here. Those who need medicinal marijuana can obtain it in other cities.”
Sachs sits on the policy group, a subcommittee of the City Council, with fellow Councilman Dave Hudson and City Manager Greg Rogers.
The committee met Tuesday afternoon to discuss city staff’s request for guidance on whether to develop on ordinance related specifically to pot shops. San Ramon enacted a temporary moratorium on dispensaries in 2010, but the moratorium lapsed without permanent rules being put in place.
“We were one of three cities in the county to not expressly, by ordinance, allow or prohibit dispensaries,” Sachs said. “Our city attorneys felt now was the time to address the issue permanently.”
Fourteen Contra Costa cities, as well as the county government, ban dispensaries in their jurisdictions whereas Martinez and Richmond allow the pot shops with specific regulations, according to deputy city attorney Alicia Poon. Hercules and Walnut Creek are the other cities without express dispensary rules.
Police chief Joe Gorton has recommended San Ramon enact an ordinance prohibiting medical marijuana dispensaries, according to Poon.
The lone citizen speaker at the Policy Committee meeting — Patty Hoyt, alcohol policy coordinator at the Discovery Counseling Center — agreed with dispensary ban, according to Poon.
The committee directed city officials to craft a dispensary-ban ordinance for future consideration by the City Council.
“Although there is no hard deadline, the ordinance is expected to be drafted and introduced to the City Council no earlier than at the May 26 City Council meeting,” Poon said.
Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it. Prohibition worked out real well now didn’t it? This is futility in the face of eventuality as far as the legalization of marijuana goes. Those in favor of prohibition and believe that it is the herb who’s roots grow in hell didn’t see the special by Sanjay Gupta on the little girl with intractable seizures that was helped more by medicinal marijuana then all of the expensive pharmaceuticals that didn’t work. Who doesn’t want to see the change? The pharmaceutical industry that has the money to buy off the politicians.
Good thing some people still have a brain not clouded by illegal drugs. If somebody really needs it for medical purposes they should be able to get it from their doctor or a hospital – in a controlled environment. Sorry, but the “dispensary” image does not sit well in this family oriented neighborhoods.
Dear Member, I think you are absolutely correct. I personally think at least 90% of those that have a MM card are fraud.
Let the real medical center’s sell the drug.
Just a thought, Julia Pardini, from Alamo
Bill,
Do you really think that San Ramon (or other local) officials are being bought off by pharmaceutical companies to keep medical marijuana out of town ? If you really believe that, then you have an obligation to notify the District DA and the FBI Public Crimes unit. I really hate it when people make wild accusations about corruption and have no basis for their belief except the official disagrees with them.
Put up or shut up. Call the DA or FBI or stop making unfounded accusations.
Instead of funneling more money to cartels, how about we start selling and regulating marijuana. I always thought San Ramon was smart when it comes to things like this but I guess not. Marijuana will inevitably become legalized for recreational use regardless. We might as well start taxing it like in Illinois and accumulating tax dollars for our education programs instead of sending more kids to jail. Kids are already smoking pot and drinking alcohol. Continuing prohibition will likely not reduce the use.
If there are people that need marijuana for a real medical need, let their personal physician prescribe it & supply same thru a real pharmacy. Presently, anybody can go to a marijuana doctor & get a “prescription” based on just about any imagined malady.
Wonder if there are any real peer-reviewed double blind studies that indicate that a specific chemical(s) in marijuana has any real benefit for a specific malady(s).
The argument that somehow “regulating” marijuana dispensaries will control this drug is faulty reasoning because the dispensaries are heavily taxed & have high fixed costs all of which drive dispensary costs higher than “weed” that is home grown (or cartel supplied) & sold on the street.
San Ramon does not need marijuana dispensaries.
“Member” Julia and “Resident”: Because of laws inspired by the kind of “Reefer Madness” hysteria you echo, you ***can’t get*** a prescription for marijuana filled in a hospital, medical center or pharmacy, even if your personal physician prescribes it. They are prohibited by federal law from doing so.
And there aren’t “peer reviewed double blind” studies of marijuana because it’s illegal to perform them without jumping through hoops designed to discourage it – including getting your samples from a government operated pot farm, which treats the stuff like it was heroin. And since there’s no big money corporation behind marijuana, (and there are behind pharmaceuticals and alcoholic beverages, which both stand to lose market share if pot is legalized) that’s unlikely to change.
I wonder if any of these folks ever, ever stop to wonder why every opinion they have just happens to correspond with the highest profit prospects for the biggest corporations, and little else.
Welcome to the Neanderthals of San Ramon. If you are so worried that kids are going to get THC through the dispensary, stop your worry. They are getting it from their friends in school. Prohibiting dispensaries will do nothing to quell the tide. They are also getting ample supplies of alcohol right under your noses. If you prohibitionist parents had good open discourse with your kids, you would realize that keeping dispensaries out of town will do nothing to prevent the intrusion of THC into the fabric of high school and middle school kids.
Your best solution is to have frank conversations with your kids about the evils of alcohol, stop drinking booze yourselves to set a good example, tell them about the same evils of tobacco and other addictive drugs, then make sure to lay out your case for the evils of marijuana. I mean, alcohol has been the root cause of so many automobile related deaths in the valley. You must ask, is the same true with Marijuana? Of course not. Alcohol is far more dangerous.
And just what is wrong with enjoying THC for the fun of it.
Family oriented is such a cop-out excuse for just about everything. I can’t wait for legalization, so that reactionaries like those above see truth for what it is and not made up government gobblygook.
Maybe you guys no nothing about Sanjay Gupta, perhaps start educating yourselves and stop listening to the fear mongerers. His documentary Weed 2 showed a super secret big Pharma company lab that was creating a pill that is based on 100% of the extract from marijuana. Oh Great, now that Big Pharma is involved, these same close-minded people will then say “It must be OK.” But get with it, even pharma drugs are totally abused, in fact there are likely quite a number of abusers in San Ramons “family” oriented enclave.
The dope fiends should stick with alcohol and if that doesn’t work then put ’em to the wall.
Marijuana is going to be legal across the country very soon, so all of these arguments are pointless. The city won’t be able to do anything about it then and finally people will be able to use it however they want. I understand that communities don’t want their kids using it, but federal regulation with an age limit will do more to stop this then banning medical businesses in the city. Legalization will improve the economy and take money out of the drug cartels pockets, saving lives in the process. San Ramon needs to relax on this issue and focus on something else.