UNCERTAIN SHUTDOWN SCENARIO LOOMS FOR MEDICAL MARIJUANA SHOPS

The decision by Fort Collins voters to ban medical marijuana
businesses from the city could result in a strained three months for
existing businesses and their customers.

The Larimer County Clerk's Office is expected to certify Tuesday's
election results by Nov. 18. Once that occurs, the city's 20 medical
marijuana businesses would have to shut down within 90 days.

The dispensaries are likely to stay open as long as they can, said
Steve Acker-man, president of the Fort Collins Medical Cannabis
Association and owner of the dispensary Organic Alternatives.

"We will keep operating and we will keep serving our patients," he
said. "Our patients are coming in and they are all concerned about
what's going to happen." How the shutdown will be conducted by the
businesses and state and local officials is not yet known, he said.

Organic Alternatives, 346 E. Mountain Ave., is the designated
caregiver for about 300 state-registered medical marijuana patients,
Ackerman said. "Every one of them that has come in the last few days
has said they really rely on us for their medicine," he said.

After the Fort Collins shops close, patients may travel to Boulder or
Denver to visit dispensaries to get their marijuana. Two
dis-pensaries that sit just outside city limits in unincor-porated
Larimer County will continue to operate.

Another option for pa-tients is to designate care-givers to grow
marijuana for them. Caregivers may grow in their homes. Ackerman said
he is considering becoming a caregiver, as are other dispensary
owners and employees.

Ackerman said he is not concerned about moving all of the products
his store has by the time it is required to close. Dispensaries may
sell limited amounts of mari-juana to each other.

Fort Collins officials have been meeting to discuss how to dismantle
the city's dis-pensary model, said Capt. Jerry Schiager, interim police chief.

The city plans to contact other municipalities that have gone through
the process of shutting down marijuana businesses and learn from
their experiences, he said. City officials also plan to work with the
state health department, which operates the registry of medical
marijuana patients and caregivers, as well as the department of
revenue and its Medical Marijuana En-forcement Division, or MMED, to
ensure state regulations are met during the closure of local
dispen-saries, Schiager said. "We are trying to figure out what the
possibilities are for following this new model," he said.

State regulations allow patients or their designated caregivers to
grow up to six medical marijuana plants.

City regulations allow up to 12 marijuana plants in a residence, six
of which may be mature, regardless of how many patients live in the home.

Once a local authority issues a cease-and-desist order to a marijuana
business, the dispensary may withdraw its state license application
and move to another location where it would be allowed, said Julie
Postlethwait, public information officer for MMED. A business may
also let its license application lapse.

"After the 90 days are up, we will partner with local law enforcement
to ensure that proper procedures are being followed," she said.