OCEANSIDE SUES TO CLOSE TWO POT DISPENSARIES

City Attorney Also Reveals That City Took Steps a Year Ago to Ban
Facilities Even After Two-Year Moratorium Expires

OCEANSIDE -- The city of Oceanside is not only moving to shut down two
medical marijuana dispensaries that opened in recent months, but has
taken steps to permanently ban all dispensaries in the city even after
a two-year moratorium expires in May.

According to documents filed with the San Diego County Superior Court
in March, City Attorney John Mullen is seeking a permanent injunction
against Green Ocean Collective on South El Camino Real, and Abaca
Medical Collective on South Coast Highway.

Green Ocean operates out of a nondescript two-story office complex
near El Camino Real and Fire Mountain Road, while Abaca is in a
storefront near Coast Highway and West Vista Way.

The City Council will discuss the lawsuits in closed session at
Wednesday's meeting.

In discussing the issue of the city's two-year emergency moratorium on
dispensaries, which expires May 13, Mullen revealed that the city in
January 2010 effectively banned dispensaries -- and other businesses
not spelled out in the city's code -- with a subtle change to a
section of its zoning ordinance.

The City Council adopted the change when it approved an ordinance
regulating minidorms. The change was made to Article 4, Section 420,
which previously said that a new land use could be added to the city
ordinance with an amendment. It now states that those uses are
prohibited, but may be incorporated into the ordinance with an amendment.

"It's subtle, but what it basically means is that if it's not spelled
out as a permitted use, then it is prohibited," Mullen said. "That
includes medical marijuana dispensaries."

Dispensary owners would have to apply for the amendment to add the use
to the city's code, at which point it would be subject to a
conditional-use permit, which gives the city Planning Commission --
and in the case of an appeal, the City Council -- control over the
regulations dispensaries would have to abide by.

Councilman Jerry Kern said that medical marijuana advocates would have
to clear a high threshold to convince him, and possibly his
colleagues, that dispensaries should be allowed in Oceanside.

"I don't feel the citizens are fully on board with these things," Kern
said. "Right now, we aren't going to create any regulations, but once
we get down the road and have a couple of applications, we are going
to have to make a decision."

The debate over medical marijuana dispensaries in the state dates back
to 1996, when Californians voted to legalize marijuana for medicinal
purposes. A number of cities have banned them on the basis that the
use of medical marijuana still violates federal regulations, but few
cities took steps to regulate them.

In Oceanside, the council in 2009 adopted its moratorium at a time
when several cities, concerned with the potential that dispensaries
could proliferate throughout the region, also adopted similar bans.

Mullen would not comment on the lawsuit, but according to court
records, the city has been grappling with at least one of the
dispensaries since April 2010, when city code enforcement officers
learned that Abaca was operating in the South Coast Highway storefront.

According to court documents, the owners of Abaca told code
enforcement officers that the collective has 2,000 members.

Following a citizen's complaint filed in June 2010, the city cited the
property owner, John Charles Chancellor Madison and ordered him to
shut down and apply for a business license. When the city denied the
license due to the moratorium, Madison continued operating the
dispensary, but closed it in July after the city filed a misdemeanor
complaint, later reduced to an infraction.

City officials, however, learned it had reopened in
December.

Meanwhile, the city also learned about Green Ocean in February after
receiving a complaint. The owner, Tom Huynh, told code enforcement
officers Feb. 11 that the dispensary had opened two months earlier.

In both suits, the city alleges that the businesses, because they are
operating without licenses and against city regulations, are
considered a public nuisance. In addition to the injunction, the city
is seeking to recoup inspection, investigative, enforcement, abatement
and legal fees, which could be thousands of dollars.

Representatives with both dispensaries declined to comment, but
medical marijuana activists said the lawsuits were a signal that the
city "is on a clear path to ban collectives."

"It was the path they were on when they enacted the moratorium," said
Eugene Davidovich, a coordinator for the San Diego chapter of
Americans for Safe Access, which promotes safe and legal access to
medical marijuana. "Since then, we have tried to talk to them about
setting up regulations and sent them samples of regulations that have
been adopted in other places, and they did not want to listen to that."

Davidovich said he and other activists are quickly organizing a "Stop
the Oceanside Ban" effort akin to movements in San Diego and Imperial
Beach, cities that recently dealt with regulating dispensaries.

Oceanside's actions, Davidovich said, run counter to Proposition 215,
the 1996 measure.

"This is just another attempt to subvert the will of voters and
overturn state law," said Davidovich, a Gulf War veteran and
self-described "cannabis patient." "They have taken the position of
'not in my city,' which is a very irresponsible position to take. It
goes against the most vulnerable in their community. This law is for
the sick and dying."