POT DISPENSARY ADVOCATES URGE DELAY

LONG BEACH - The Avalon Wellness Center sits in an industrial
neighborhood on Long Beach's Westside.

Surrounded by welding and industrial supply businesses, the gray block
building almost disappears in the bleak backdrop, but for the green
medical cross painted on the wall.

Avalon may have to close its doors if the City Council on Tuesday
follows a recommendation to repeal existing ordinances allowing
medical marijuana dispensaries, and ban the sale and distribution of
cannabis.

The recommendation from City Attorney Bob Shannon comes in the wake of
an Oct. 4, 2010, state Court of Appeal decision that struck down the
local law allowing the sale and distribution of marijuana.

The three-judge panel said the Long Beach law requires applicants to
violate federal laws that prohibit the sale and distribution of marijuana.

California has allowed limited use of the drug since
1996.

The California Supreme Court has been asked to review the
precedent-setting decision - which cities across the state are
watching - and is expected to decide by Feb. 8 whether to hear the
case.

Carl Kemp, a lobbyist representing Long Beach collectives, says at the
very least the City Council should wait until the Supreme Court says
whether it will hear the case.

He says the Supreme Court may render a decision that would support the
Long Beach ordinance and "bring it back to life."

Shannon, however, said even if the Supreme Court reviews the appeal,
it will take a year to make a final decision and until then "the ban
is clearly required."

Kemp disagrees, saying that in deciding whether it will review the
appeal, the high court has several options for the interim that could
leave doors open for the ordinance while it considers the case.

"To repeal and ban (collectives) before the court says anything is
foolish," Kemp said.

While other cities can sit on the sidelines and await the high court
ruling, Shannon said Long Beach is not among them because it is the
named defendant in the appellate court's ruling.

"We are required to comply and be more directly involved," he said.
"We don't have the ability to ignore the (appellate) ruling."

After Long Beach decided to approve medical marijuana in the city, it
set up a lottery for collectives and issued a limited number of
permits to cultivate and distribute marijuana to patients.

Hundreds or thousands of dollars in fees were charged. At the time,
many advocates of the ordinance claimed it was restrictive to the
point of making it virtually impossible to operate.

"No other city has such onerous requirements," said Paul Violas, an
attorney who represents medical marijuana advocates.

One of the collectives that went through the process was Avalon.
Valerie Crist, Avalon's director, said her collective spent tens of
thousands of dollars to renovate the property, submit architectural
and building plans and comply with and even exceed a laundry list of
city requirements.

Chris Cantella, the cultivation manager, said he had to "part the Red
Sea" to fulfill a city requirement and install a carbon dioxide
detection system. In addition to its bunker-like exterior, Avalon
customers are met by a security guard and 24-hour surveillance cameras.

"I wish the city would come and see us," Crist says. "If they came to
see what we are about they'd change their minds."

Crist says her nonprofit collective's "compassion program" has given
away large amounts of medical marijuana to gravely ill and poor
patients in dire need.

One of those is Mimi Weil, 61, who says she's in a terminal stage of
hepatitis C that went undiagnosed for nearly 40 years after a blood
transfusion. She was prescribed other drugs, but they affected her
motor skills, caused her to fall repeatedly and left her disoriented,
she said.

Two weeks ago, she began taking Phoenix Tears, a cannabis oil that
proponents say can cure a multitude of maladies and help the body regenerate.

Weil doesn't know if the treatment will save her, but she says doctors
"have already killed me enough with their conventional medicine."

She says she looks and feels like a different person since she began
taking Phoenix Tears and plans to add cannabis milk to her regimen.

To produce a gram a day of the distilled Phoenix Tears, Weil uses two
to three pounds (between about 906 and 1360 grams) of medical
marijuana a month, according to Cantella.

"(Doctors) have done everything but turn me inside out," Weil
said.

She adds that if she is going to die, she doesn't want to do it while
zonked out on morphine.

"I want to go out enlightened," she says.

Gregory Lefian, president of the Long Beach Collectives Association,
says his group is in a tough position - deciding between the law and
what he sees as legitimate medical needs of patients.

"We're between a rock and a hard place," he said. "I promised my mom I
wouldn't do anything illegal. But what's the moral thing to do?"

Opponents of medical marijuana say patients like Mimi Weils are far
outweighed by those who use the drug simply for a high. They argue
medical marijuana dispensaries aren't medical at all, and that they
attract crime and are thinly veiled fronts for drug dealing.

"What you have is a bumper crop of 18- to 30-year-old males with
medical issues they never had in the past," Shannon said.

This perception has resulted in a backlash against the pot
dispensaries.

While California has the nation's most permissive medical marijuana
laws, 185 cities and counties have banned pot dispensaries entirely.
Long Beach may join the list Tuesday.

The City Council in December deadlocked 4-4 on approving the ban, but
continued the recommendation so that Councilman Robert Garcia, who was
not at the meeting, could vote. In the past, Garcia has expressed
support for medical marijuana patients.

In December, council members Gary DeLong, Patrick O'Donnell, Gerrie
Schipske and James Johnson voted in favor of the ban; council members
Suja Lowenthal, Dee Andrews, Rae Gabelich and Steve Neal voted against
the ban.

If the council approves the ban, it is certain to wind up in
court.

"We don't want to fight," Kemp said.

Violas, the lawyer, sounded less hopeful.

"From the beginning the city attorney and the police have only been
interested in shutting (dispensaries) down," he said.