Pubdate: Thu, 27 Mar 2014
Source: San Francisco Chronicle (CA)
Copyright: 2014 Hearst Communications Inc.
Contact: http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/submissions/#1
Website: http://www.sfgate.com/chronicle/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/388
Author: John Wildermuth

SMALLER BUFFER ZONE ADVISED FOR POT CLUBS

Medical marijuana dispensaries would be allowed to move closer to San 
Francisco schools, child care facilities, parks and recreational 
areas under a recommendation the City Planning Commission will 
consider Thursday.

The proposal would open a much larger part of the city to cannabis 
clubs, which now are clustered in SoMa, the Castro and the Mission 
District, and virtually barred from residential neighborhoods.

The 1,000-foot buffer the city requires around schools and 
child-serving recreational areas bans dispensaries from much of the 
city, said Aaron Starr, the planner who prepared the report on the 
change. Trimming those buffers to the state required 600 feet and 
making other suggested changes could create a citywide "green zone," 
where dispensaries are allowed, that's "five times the size of what 
we have now."

That's good news for the medical marijuana community, which has found 
it increasingly difficult to find places to do business in the city.

"Finding a location that works, finding a landlord who's willing and 
finding a neighborhood that's willing isn't easy," said Robert Jacob, 
executive director of the SPARC dispensary at 1256 Mission St. and 
the mayor of Sebastopol. "When we opened here more than three years 
ago, this was one of the few places in San Francisco where we could 
comply with all the city's restrictions."

Clusters of dispensaries

Concern about those restrictions, and the clustering of the legal pot 
clubs that has resulted, is why Supervisor John Avalos asked planners 
to look the problem.

In the past year, three dispensaries have opened along Mission Street 
in his Excelsior-area district, to the dismay of neighbors.

"I don't think we need two on the same block," Avalos said. 
Dispensaries "are coming in and residents want hardware stores and 
bookstores and more neighborhood-oriented businesses."

But changing the rules isn't going to be easy, since people in many 
of the city's residential areas, particularly San Francisco's western 
neighborhoods, have battled any effort to open dispensaries there. In 
2010, for example, more than 100 people from the Sunset District 
showed up at a Planning Commission meeting to oppose a plan to open a 
dispensary on Taraval Street. Although the commission approved the 
dispensary on a 5-1 vote, the facility never opened.

Neighborhood opposition has been effective. According to the planning 
report, there are no dispensaries in the Sunset, the Outer Richmond, 
Parkside, West Portal, Haight Ashbury, Laurel Heights, the Marina or 
North Beach areas and only one in the Inner Richmond.

"Patients ... assert that the city's location requirements are having 
a significant effect on their access," according to the report, which 
took five months to prepare. "This unequal distribution requires some 
patients to travel long distances to obtain their medicine and for 
patients who require a large amount of medicine and have to visit 
(dispensaries) several times a week, this can be quite a burden."

But while the report found that police have seen few problems with 
the dispensaries and that most of the cannabis clubs work closely 
with neighbors to resolve any conflicts, the opposition is unlikely 
to go away, especially when it comes to allowing the facilities to 
move closer to schools and playgrounds.

"Reducing the 1,000-foot buffer could be a hard sell to San 
Francisco's schools," the report said.

Schools' concerns

While representatives from the San Francisco Unified School District 
were included in the discussions leading to the report, the issue has 
not come to the school board, said President Sandra Fewer.

"There are things I would like to discuss, since this concerns our 
students," she said. "I'd like to hear about what (planners) are 
proposing and what safeguards there are, as well as any concerns from 
our principals."

While Avalos said he's willing to consider smaller buffer zones 
around schools, he has concerns.

"I don't know how easy it will be politically," he said. "There are a 
lot of people who aren't aware of the medical benefits of cannabis 
and others who want to exploit that and cause hysteria."

Adding to the problem are ongoing questions about the long-standing 
federal ban on all uses of marijuana, whether approved by a state or 
not. While the Department of Justice said in a 2013 memo that it will 
leave most marijuana enforcement decisions to the state, the national 
Drug Free School Zone program requires a 1,000-foot buffer around 
schools, and federal prosecutors have shown a willingness to enforce 
it, the planning report said.

Besides the smaller buffers, planners also want to allow dispensaries 
in more non-residential districts, such as those zoned for 
commercial, industrial and production, distribution and repair uses, 
as well as on the second floors of buildings. If those changes are 
adopted, planners would like to require buffers around new and 
existing dispensaries, which would eliminate the current clustering.

The commission can accept, reject, change or add to the staff 
recommendations, which will then move to the Board of Supervisors for 
possible action.

This new look at location requirements is not only for the medical 
marijuana dispensaries of today, but also for any future stores that 
could come from efforts to legalize recreational use of marijuana, 
such as now exists in Washington and Colorado.

"Whether one partakes in it or not, cannabis is a part of the city, 
its culture and its history," the report reads. "When cannabis 
becomes legal for recreational use in California, San Franciscans 
will likely demand that the city take a progressive approach on how 
and where it can be sold."
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom