Pubdate: Wed, 30 Jul 2014 Source: San Diego Union Tribune (CA) Copyright: 2014 Union-Tribune Publishing Co. Contact: http://www.utsandiego.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/386 Note: Seldom prints LTEs from outside it's circulation area. Author: David Garrick Page: B-1 HURDLES FOR POT DISPENSARIES' BIDS Local Planning Groups Showing Resistance With First Applications in San Diego SAN DIEGO - Resistance from neighborhood leaders across San Diego is adding turbulence this summer to the already complex approval process facing applicants trying to open the city's first legal pot dispensaries. Feedback from community planning groups on proposed dispensaries has included refusals to schedule hearings in a timely fashion, outright rejections and tentative approvals with long lists of contingencies. Other planning groups have invented criteria for approval that go beyond the ordinance the city approved in March, such as whether more than two dispensaries would be in the same business district. One group is against a proposed pot shop partly out of frustration that several illegal dispensaries continue to operate nearby because the city has struggled to shut them down. And many of the planning group hearings have devolved into political debates, with residents advocating for or against legalization of marijuana instead of focusing on the particular dispensary being proposed. "Community planning groups aren't supposed to be about that," said Lance Rogers, an attorney representing six of the 36 dispensary applicants citywide. "These groups are taking very different approaches and there could be problems with some of them legally." While approval from planning groups isn't essential because they play only an advisory role in the process, their opinions could sway final decisions on dispensaries this year by city planning officials or the San Diego Planning Commission. Rogers said the groups have added another element of uncertainty and risk to the process, which was already complex, expensive and time-consuming. San Diego's ordinance makes it difficult to open medical marijuana dispensaries in most parts of the city because it requires them to open in a limited number of commercial and industrial zones. In addition, they must be at least 100 feet away from residential property and at least 1,000 feet from schools, playgrounds, libraries, parks, churches and facilities focused on youth activities. Twenty-seven of the 36 proposed dispensaries are in three central San Diego neighborhoods: Kearny Mesa, Mira Mesa and the Midway District near the Sports Arena. Of the other nine, five are in southeast San Diego, two are near Qualcomm Stadium, one is in Mission Valley and one is in the Torrey Pines area. Because the city's ordinance prohibits more than four dispensaries from opening in any council district, there will be fierce competition in District 2, where 18 dispensaries have been proposed, and District 6, where the city has received nine applications. The glut in District 6 prompted the Mira Mesa Planning Group to consider an unconventional approach, said John Horst, the group's chairman. Horst said he'd like to see his group approve two of the five proposed in that community and have the neighboring Kearny Mesa Planning Group approve two of the four proposed there. "That way, the Miramar industrial area won't shoulder the entire burden of the four allowed in District 6," he said. But the Kearny Mesa group has taken a different approach, declining to schedule any hearings until a proposed dispensary clears all city zoning hurdles. The Midway Planning Group has taken yet a different approach. They've approved each of 12 dispensaries for which they've held hearings, but with several conditions that have most frequently focused on adding more parking. In Pacific Beach, the only proposed dispensary was rejected by a subcommittee of the community planning group and probably faces the same fate when the full group votes Aug. 27, said chairman Brian Curry. "There's considerable opposition when we still have so many illegal dispensaries operating in the area," said Curry. [sidebar] 100 Number of feet marijuana dispensaries must be from residences in San Diego - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom