City Attorney Carmen Trutanich

Los Angeles City Councilmember Dennis Zine told a standing room only crowd at Tuesday’s Planning and Land Use Management (PLUM) Committee hearing that an ordinance that does not recognize sales of medical cannabis would not work for Los Angeles, but he is worried about creating a policy that violates state law. The Councilmember’s ambivalence is part of the confusion that dominated yesterday’s marathon committee meeting. The PLUM committee voted to continue the debate on the regulations, Zine’s motion for more study into relevant case law, and a progress report from the planning department for another week to allow committee members more time to review the material.

Part of what the committee is reviewing is a new draft ordinance from City Attorney Carmen Trutanich, which his office provided to the PLUM committee and the public less than one hour before the meeting was scheduled to begin. Like two previous versions prepared by his predecessor, Rocky Delgadillo, the new version does not recognize legitimate sales of cannabis within the membership of a legally organized and operated medical cannabis collective. Instead, the ordinance seeks to regulate collective patient gardens – a regulatory strategy  rejected by the committee earlier this year.

The City Attorney arranged for a parade of officials to reinforce his position that sales of cannabis are illegal in all circumstances. Representatives from the Long Beach District Attorney and City Attorney’s offices inexplicably joined the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office and Los Angeles Police Department to reinforce Trutanich’s message. Medical cannabis advocates can take a lesson from the discipline with which the City Attorney’s team kept to his talking points. In comments without time limits, every official speaker insisted that “over the counter sales” are illegal.

Dozens of advocates responded to a call by Americans for Safe Access (ASA) to speak to the committee about the new regulations. Strictly limited to one minute each, patients and advocates asked the PLUM Committee to protect the privacy of patient cultivators and make a myriad of other improvements to what advocates call “the Reyes version,” an alternative ordinance prepared by city staff in advance of today’s meeting at the request of PLUM Committee Chairman Ed Reyes. Speakers also took issue with the City Attorney’s intransigence on sales of medicine and timing in releasing his version of the ordinance.

In written comments to PLUM Committee members in advance of the meeting, I explained that state law allows for sales of cannabis inside a member-supplied collective association, and that state courts have consistently upheld these associations and transactions as legal.  This is a message ASA and allies have repeated in a private meeting with senior staff at Trutanich’s office and in a White Paper published last month.

Delay at the PLUM Committee is another impediment progress on permanent regulations for the city. That is unfortunate, because sensible regulations are exactly what the city needs to quell community concern over the unchecked proliferation of storefront collectives and recent violence associated with medical cannabis. It’s also too bad for patients. The longer these issues go unresolved, the more likely the City Council is to react to public pressure with onerous regulations.

The ordinance requires that “The names of all registered members of the Cooperative/Collective who will be contributing Medical Marijuana to the Cooperative/Collective must be disclosed in writing and in advance to the Los Angeles Police Department.” That provision would give patient-cultivators pause in the most tolerant jurisdictions, but it is a poison pill in a city where local law enforcement considers all medical cannabis activity suspect and routinely cooperates with the Drug Enforcement Administration to close collectives under federal law.

In three pages (updated 9/18/09) of suggested improvements to be delivered tomorrow, I caution PLUM Committee members that, “Requiring the patients’ association to disclose the names and addresses of members who supply medicine is unnecessary and places the patient-cultivator at undue legal risk from inappropriate law enforcement activity, rogue police officers, and federal interference. This provision is unacceptable and should be deleted in its entirety.”

Tuesday’s committee meeting will also be the first chance for Angelenos to hear what newly-elected City Attorney Carmen Trutanich has to say about the propose regulations. I was discouraged to hear his Senior Adviser, Jane Usher, tell a neighborhood group in August that her boss could not find any rationale for sales of cannabis under state law – even within the membership a legally organized and operated patients’ association. That may be a bad sign that Trutanich intends to follow in his predecessor’s anti-collective footsteps. That would make it harder to persuade the PLUM Committee and full City Council to adopt regulations that respect the legal status of patients’ associations that maintain storefronts and provide medicine in exchange for financial remuneration in accordance with state law.

The PLUM Committee meets at 2:00 PM on Tuesday, September 22, in Room 350 at City Hall. Come early to complete a speaker’s card if you want to talk to committee members about the draft ordinance.

(Download the relevant documents from the LA City Clerk’s website.)

Advocates are skeptical, however, of an amendment to the initial motion extending the term of the moratorium for another six months (until march 2010). Councilmembers Reyes, Rosendahl, and Zine proposed that friendly amendment to give city staff more time to write a permanent ordinance regulating collectives. Advocates worry that the extension violates California Government Code 65858, which prohibits cities from using an Urgency Ordinance to establish a moratorium for more than two years. This may generate litigation when the initial two-year moratorium expires on September 14, 2009, and new collectives try to open.

City staff argues that work on the permanent regulations is underway, and therefore, the extension is defensible. This may be true, but delays caused by litigation will certainly complicate the already chaotic path towards regulations. The situation is even more complex because, as a Charter City, Los Angeles has the constitutional right to make its own law. Whether or not state law preempts Los Angeles from adopting longer moratoria under Section 253 of the City Charter is unclear. That section can be read as allowing longer Urgency Ordinances, although it is reasonable to assume a court would disallow an open ended ban on any activity temporarily prohibited under Section 253. This may have to be settled in court if the City Council extends the moratorium beyond two years.

What the city needs now is clarity and concrete progress. The City Council would be wise to leave the original deadline in place and prod city staff into action on the final ordinance before the original two-year ICO expires.

The City Council will consider the amendments at 10:00 AM on Friday, June 19, in Council Chambers (Room 340) at City Hall – 312 N. Spring Street at Temple Street in downtown Los Angeles.

Council Members Zine and Reyes with ASA and GLACA representatives

City Councilmembers Dennis Zine and Ed Reyes visited Purelife Alternative, a medical cannabis dispensing collective in Los Angeles, on April 20 as part of the city’s ongoing effort to adopt an ordinance regulating facilities in that city. Medical cannabis advocates hope the visit will help the Councilmembers and city staff craft sensible regulations for collectives in the city before a moratorium on new facilities expires on September 14.

The visit is a strategic victory for medical cannabis advocates in Los Angeles. The Councilmembers’ first hand look at the operations of a legal collective served to dispel many preconceptions and clearly demonstrate how access to medicine can be safe and orderly. Representatives from Americans for Safe Access (ASA) and the Greater Los Angeles Caregivers Alliance (GLACA) talked with the Councilmembers and city staff about preventing diversion, verifying members, security, and quality control.

Councilmember Reyes is the Chairman of the Planning and Land Use Management Committee (PLUM), which heard testimony critical of a draft ordinance prepared by the City Attorney’s office in February. The City Attorney’s draft ordinance treats all sales of medical cannabis as illegal and would require storefront collectives in Los Angeles to close. Advocates have joined Councilmember Zine in rejecting the City Attorney’s ordinance and calling on the PLUM committee to request a new version incorporating input from the city’s defunct medical cannabis working group.

Progress on adopting a permanent ordinance has been slow in Los Angeles, but there is growing pressure from neighborhood groups to stop the proliferation of new facilities in the city. More than 200 new collectives have opened in Los Angeles since the city adopted an Interim Control Ordinance establishing a moratorium on new locations in 2007. Advocates hope the City Council visit will serve to expedite the permanent ordinance, because research shows that regulating collectives reduces crime and complaints in neighborhoods.