Pubdate: Tue, 10 Mar 2015 Source: San Diego Union Tribune (CA) Copyright: 2015 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 POT SHOP APPROVAL PROCESS CRITICIZED San Diego - A group trying to open one of San Diego's first legal marijuana dispensaries is attacking the city's approval process, saying it allows speed to trump quality and does not ban applicants who previously operated illegal pot shops. The criticisms come days before the Planning Commission is scheduled to give final approval to a Midway District dispensary that many have criticized as too small and that would be run by a man who once operated an illegal dispensary. Competition to open first is fierce, because San Diego's ordinance allows a maximum of four dispensaries in each of the city's nine council districts, and it prohibits dispensaries from being approved within 1,000 feet of one another. If Point Loma Patients Cooperative gets Planning Commission approval on Thursday, it will kill the chances of at least four other proposed dispensaries located within 1,000 feet - including the applicant criticizing the system, D&D Cooperative. Donna Jones, an attorney for D&D, said the Planning Commission should delay Thursday's decision until four other dispensaries a few weeks behind in the approval pipeline can be considered simultaneously at one hearing. She said it's bad policy that the city must approve the first proposed dispensary to make its way through the approval process, regardless of whether other proposed dispensaries would be superior in terms of location, size or other factors. "The neighborhood, the community and the city as a whole would be best-served by ensuring that all of the competing applications receive a full and fair hearing and that the city be in a position to select the application that best meets the city's and the neighborhood's needs," she said. Jones contends Point Loma Patients Cooperative would be an inferior dispensary because it would be significantly smaller than the others proposed and it lacks sidewalks needed to provide pedestrians and mass transit users convenient access. Lawyers for Point Loma Patients Cooperative didn't address the size concerns, but noted that having sidewalks is not required. City officials, who are recommending the Planning Commission approve the application, agree that the city's process is about speed, not quality. "Applications are processed on a first-come, first-served basis," Development Services Department officials say in a recent memo. "The applications that resolve issues and resubmit revised plans expeditiously will be scheduled for a hearing faster than other applications." Jones also said Point Loma Patients Cooperative should be rejected because the man proposing the dispensary, Adam Knopf, previously operated an illegal pot shop less than 2 miles to the west called Point Loma Patients Association. "The city should not reward a habitual violator who continues to waste city resources and abuse the administrative process," she said. Knopf's lawyers say he resigned from that illegal dispensary a few weeks before the city ordinance was approved. They also say operating it wasn't clearly illegal before the ordinance, calling the city's pre-ordinance rules on dispensaries "vague and ambiguous." The city's ordinance doesn't include previous operation of a dispensary among the approval criteria, with only those convicted of a violent felony or crime of moral turpitude deemed ineligible. The City Attorney's Office said Monday that the Planning Commission has the discretion to delay Thursday's vote, but that the applicant could seek automatic approval by contending the city was not complying with the Permit Streamlining Act. - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom