A San Diego City Council has passed a new set of regulations that will curb the number of marijuana dispensaries in the Southern California city.
Members of the committee voted 8-1 to limit the amount of pot shops in each council district to four, according to a report by local station City News Service.
Tighter restraints on zoning and procedures were set for the city's weed collectives this week, three years after marijuana advocates challenged rules they called restrictive.
The City Council has come back to the marijuana dispensary issue multiple times since the Compassionate Use Act passed in California almost 18 years ago. Pot activists in 2011 said that the rules governing medical marijuana sale were too limiting, and brought a handful of appeals to the committee. Meanwhile, members of the board insisted that removing the collectives from the books would effectively render all pot shops in San Diego illegal.
Weed advocates managed to garner enough signatures to challenge the legislation, but some are calling the new restrictions even more limiting than their predecessors.
Under the new rules, dispensary owners must obtain a five-year conditional use permit from San Diego officials, in addition to annual public safety permits from the city's police, City News Service reported.
Pot shops will mostly be located in industrial areas, and are barred from opening up within 1,000 feet of churches, parks, day care centers, schools, playgrounds and other dispensaries. Marijuana collectives cannot open up within 100 feet of residential areas, and cannot bring medical officials in to write prescriptions on-site. Only four dispensaries can open per district, with the exception of the area represented by Interim Mayor Todd Gloria covering Hillcrest, North Park and downtown, where none can operate.
Council member Marti Emerald told City News Service that the new rules will put marijuana dispensaries on a more stable and legal ground.
"We can't afford to turn our backs on this, otherwise there will be a continued proliferation of these illegal operations and, chances are, there will be further and greater abuses of the system," Emerald stated. "These drugs are going to wind up in the hands of kids and people who really don't need this for medicine."
