RESTAURATEUR FILES BID TO OPERATE FOUNTAIN HILLS MEDICAL-POT OUTLET

A restaurant owner who lives in Chandler has cleared the first hurdle
toward opening Fountain Hills' only medical-marijuana dispensary.

Josh Levine, owner of Loco Patron Mexican Grill, filed a
zoning-verification application with the Planning & Zoning Division of
the Fountain Hills Development Services Department.

Levine's medical-marijuana dispensary would be at 16935 E. Colony
Drive, at Panorama Drive. The site now is a vacant lot.

Senior planner Bob Rodgers has verified the location meets all town
zoning requirements to comply with a state law that legalized growing,
manufacturing and dispensing medical marijuana.

Levine is being represented by Court Rich, a Rose Law Group
attorney.

"What he's looking to do is create a top-of-the-line dispensary and to
associate himself with doctors to make it medically based, the kind of
place the town would welcome," Rich said. "The state rules require
that you have a medical director. . . . The key to the operation will
be his association with top-of-the-line doctors to make sure it's a
medically based facility."

Levine chose Fountain Hills because "geographically, it's somewhat
isolated" so there could be a number of people who could benefit from
having a dispensary there, Rich said. Also, the Mayo Clinic and other
health-care facilities are nearby, he said.

The town received three other zoning-verification applications for
medical-marijuana facilities, and all were denied because the
locations were too close to North Chapel Church, at 16929 E.
Enterprise Drive.

Only one medical-marijuana dispensary is allowed within the town, and
that would be in a commercial-zoning district that includes the area
along Colony Drive off Saguaro Boulevard.

Rodgers said that area of zoning isn't very large.

There are only two or three parcels in the C-3 zoning district that
would qualify for a medical-marijuana facility, Rich said.

No use permit is required from the town for operating a
medical-marijuana dispensary, Rodgers said. An operator ultimately
must be licensed by the state before it can open.

The Arizona Department of Health Services will begin accepting
applications for medical-marijuana licenses on June 1; dispensary
licenses will be issued later this summer.