SAN MATEO COUNTY SOON MAY START REGULATING MEDICAL MARIJUANA CLUBS

A long-awaited San Mateo County ordinance that requires medical
marijuana clubs to obtain operating licenses and follow certain
conditions got the nod of a subcommittee Tuesday despite some
concerns raised by local cannabis distributors.

The ordinance, drafted by the county counsel's office, adds new
requirements for medical marijuana cooperatives or collectives -- two
of which recently opened up in the unincorporated North Fair Oaks
area near Redwood City.

"I'm very much in favor of having marijuana available to people who
need it for their health, and I think having an ordinance like this
makes us make sure that it's done in a safe practice," said San Mateo
County Supervisor Carole Groom, who along with Supervisor Rose Jacobs
Gibson sits on a board of supervisors subcommittee that deals with
health issues. The full board could review the proposed ordinance April 28.

Medicinal marijuana was legalized in California in 1996 through
Proposition 215, but federal law still prohibits cannabis possession.

The county's ordinance comes more than 18 months after federal agents
raided three medical marijuana dispensaries in San Mateo and shut
them down after the district attorney's office alerted the U.S. Drug
Enforcement Administration that they were operating illegally.

After those raids, supervisors called for a model ordinance
regulating marijuana businesses that cities could adopt. The San
Mateo City Council on Monday adopted an ordinance almost identical to
the county's proposed one.

"We care about all the businesses in our community and we want to
make sure they're all safe and that we actually have some oversight,"
Jacobs Gibson said.

Under the ordinance, each cooperative would have to get a license
from the county that comes with several conditions, among them that
the cooperative must operate at least 1,000 feet away from a school,
recreation center or youth center; install an alarm system and window
bars; and refrain from selling cultivated marijuana or exchanging
anything of value for marijuana.

Some of those requirements concern Jhonrico Carrnshimba, the
president and CEO of Universal Healthcare Cooperative Corporation, a
North Fair Oaks cooperative that began distributing marijuana to
patients in February.

Carrnshimba, who helped run one of the San Mateo clubs that was shut
down, said he has made a concerted effort to make his club a true
cooperative, establishing a five-member board of directors and a
membership sign-up process and offering other services such as yoga
classes and counseling.

He said he hopes to discuss changing parts of the ordinance,
including its prohibition of edible products laced with marijuana,
which he said could affect cancer patients who need cannabis but
cannot smoke it.

"We'd like for (the county) to work with us to do an ordinance,"
Carrnshimba said. "They're not really looking out for the patients."

Robert Simmons, a Belmont resident who says he runs a "mobile
dispensary" that distributes marijuana to patients, told the two
supervisors that the prohibition against selling cultivated marijuana
would have the effect of "ostracizing patients and forcing them to
buy marijuana outside of the county."

But Chief Deputy County Counsel Penny Bennett said selling marijuana
is already a violation of state law.

She said the county's ordinance is not about abolishing medical
marijuana facilities in the county but about "regulating them and
making it safe."