PLANNED MEDICAL POT DISPENSARY DERAILED BY COUNCIL MEMBERS

Huachuca City Council Was Opposed to Clinic's Location

HUACHUCA CITY - The hopes of a local business owner to open a medical
clinic coupled with a marijuana dispensary were stifled Thursday after
the Board of Adjustments unanimously voted to deny a variance that
would have allowed him to build the facility near a children's center.

The 5-0 vote means that Dusk Till Dawn Cabaret owner Steve Bagdonas,
along with his business partners, will not have the necessary
permission to continue forward with an application to the state health
department for a dispensary.

All council members were present for the vote, however Council member
Donna Johnson abstained from voting and Mayor Byron Robertson may only
vote to break a tie at Board of Adjustment meetings.

Johnson would not say why she did not cast a vote.

Other council members took issue with the proximity of the proposed
facility - south of the cabaret - to the nearby Cochise County
Children's Center.

"I just don't think that's an appropriate location," said council
member Laura Wallace. "I'm open minded. I can look at the pros and the
cons (of medical marijuana), but at that location, no."

Councilman Gene McCullough said Bagdonas' reasoning that a clinic and
dispensary would bring in tax dollars to the city was
unconvincing.

"You haven't got that many people that would be coming in there. We're
talking about a very small clientele," McCullough said. "I don't want
it here."

Town code requires any dispensary to be no closer than 1,000 feet from
any church, public park, school or child care center.

A dispensary so close to a children's center would send the wrong
message, said Councilman Ken Taylor.

"Most of those kids are coming out of broken homes where their parents
have had drug problems, and I think that having a dispensary that
close would just be a constant reminder," Taylor said.

After the vote, Bagdonas said the decision could hurt the town's
ability to attract new businesses to the area.

"They just don't want any new commerce here. It just seems like
Huachuca City wants to stay exactly the way it is and not change with
the times," he said. "In this hard economy, you would think that they
would look for anything that might prosper."

The vote followed a public hearing on the issue in which no one spoke
out in favor of or against the variance, except for longtime Huachuca
City resident Elmer Urda.

As long as the signage of the proposed medical plaza and dispensary
did not depict marijuana, and the facility would not smell of the
plant, Urda said he was in favor of it coming to Huachuca City.

"If it helps people, I'm all for it," he said.

Bagdonas said he had no plans to attempt to establish a dispensary
elsewhere in the area or state.