Marijuana dispensaries could sprout at up to three Palo Alto locations, if the City Council or voters were to approve an ordinance legalizing medical marijuana within city limits. A citizens group has gathered more than enough signatures to put the issue on the city ballot, City Clerk Donna Grider said. The success of the signature drive means the council must either adopt the proposed ordinance or bring it to the voters some time next year, Gennady Sheyner reports in the Palo Alto Weekly. Initiative supporters argue in the petition that legalizing and taxing marijuana dispensaries [...]
A San Jose law firm representing the city of Gilroy in its efforts to keep medical marijuana dispensary MediLeaf out of town has released more than 60 pages of attorney bills that offer a glimpse into the city’s $200,000-plus legal tab. Berliner Cohen released copies of the bills – 62 pages worth totaling $202,500 – following a public records request by the Gilroy Dispatch. The copies are heavily redacted, the Dispatch’s Mark Powell reports, with many details regarding meetings between city officials and attorneys blacked out. “I had originally forecast it would be more than [...]
Some owners of medical marijuana shops operating in San Jose are concerned that paying the city’s new marijuana business tax would be an admission to breaking state and federal laws and could land them behind bars. About 100 people attended a workshop Monday morning at City Hall to learn exactly how San Jose’s new marijuana business tax will work, Mark Gomez reports in the San Jose Mercury News. Starting Tuesday, San Jose will enforce a 7 percent tax on marijuana dispensaries under a measure voters overwhelmingly approved in November. But some of San Jose’s pot [...]
San Jose still considers all of the city’s 100 or so medical marijuana shops to be unlawful nuisances, but officials will welcome the pot providers to City Hall Monday to talk about a new program of great interest to the broke city: a marijuana tax. Starting Tuesday, San Jose will slap a 7 percent tax on marijuana dispensaries under a measure voters overwhelmingly approved in November, John Woolfolk reports in the San Jose Mercury News. The city — which has emerged as a key battleground in the state’s “green wars” over medical marijuana regulation — [...]
Mountain View may become the only city in the county to specifically allow medical marijuana dispensaries, and city officials say they need more time to finish an ordinance, which would delay a City Council vote scheduled for Tuesday. “Staff feels we need some more time to make sure we’ve covered everything in the ordinance,” said City Attorney Jannie Quinn, who will recommend the council delay its vote on a draft ordinance. “We would be the only city in the county and we want to get it right.” A reason for delay, Quinn said, is that [...]
Bud’s note: Today’s must-read story is by Marcus Wohlsen of the Associated Press, as picked up by the Sacramento Bee. Think of the AP as a news collective, with members “donating” their local news in exchange for some dank nugs off the AP newsfeed. ============ SAN JOSE — As marijuana goes mainstream in communities across California, the state’s third-largest city has become the next big battleground over the drug’s future. Medical marijuana retailers this fall have faced raids and stings by narcotics agents who accuse them of old-fashioned drug trafficking, even as the San Jose [...]
San Jose’s medical marijuana clubs are deeply concerned about being raided by narcotics officers. But in recent days, a number of them have been raided by criminals. Four dispensaries and one marijuana grower were hit by vandals, burglars or armed robbers in the past week, one just hours after a City Council meeting in which the fate of the city’s cannabis clubs was debated. In the case Wednesday night, a dispensary owner was knocked out of his wheelchair by a masked intruder and robbed. Police are investigating the possibility that some or all of the [...]
Nov 102010
Medical marijuana activists pleaded Tuesday for San Jose leaders to stop drug raids they say have sent a jolt of fear through cannabis providers and patients alike. Drug agents in recent weeks have raided three local medical marijuana providers, John Woolfolk reports in the San Jose Mercury News. Several other collectives, including Harborside Health Center, one of the area’s largest and best-established, have simply closed, fearing an imminent bust. “How can you sit up there and take my rights away?” asked a tearful Aisha Alexander, 36, who told the City Council she uses marijuana to [...]
In the latest example of selective enforcement by the Santa Clara County Special Enforcement Team (SET), the San Jose Patients Group co-op in San Jose was raided at 4 p.m. Thursday. A spokesman for MC3, a coalition of local dispensaries, said the seizure and destruction of property was dramatic and forceful, yet no arrests were made. Bearing search warrants, and claiming authority from the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s office, narcotics officers entered the premises and immediately disconnected all security cameras that could have recorded their activities. The same tactic has been used in dispensary [...]
In the year since U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder announced federal drug agents would stop targeting medicinal marijuana use where state law sanctioned it, Santa Clara County — like other parts of California — has become the Wild West. But suddenly, the sheriff has ridden into town, John Woolfolk and Sean Webby report in the San Jose Mercury News. California, the first of 14 states that now allow medical marijuana, has one of the loosest laws of its kind. It doesn’t limit conditions that qualify patients, nor does it require them to register with the [...]
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