OAKLAND TO REGULATE "OAKSTERDAM" CANNABIS DISPENSARIES

In the past two years, a sort of renaissance has been taking place in
a section of downtown Oakland near the 19th Street BART station. A
string of shops offering medical marijuana to card-holding patients
has emerged along Telegraph Ave. and Broadway. On one sunny Sunday a
few months ago, the dispensaries, with names like the Bulldog Cafe and
the 420 Cafe, drew crowds of people into an otherwise deserted
downtown Oakland. With jazz bands playing and street vendors offering
various alimentary delicacies, the area took on more of the aspect of
a low-key street party than a depressed urban district. Or more like
Amsterdam, land of the cannabis cafe, than other mid-sized American
cities, thus the "Oaksterdam" moniker.

But the number of establishments offering medical marijuana has
continued to increase, and not all of them have been rigorous in
ensuring that only medical marijuana card-holders can buy their
product. Some appear to be fly-by-night operations, with no phone
numbers or business licenses, and one has become known as the "Parking
in Rear" dispensary, so named for the only sign that marks its door.

Now, prodded by anti-drug councilmen and one loudly complaining
neighbor, the Oakland City Council is considering a measure that would
regulate and limit the enterprises. Members of the Bay Area medical
marijuana community told DRCNet they approved of regulation in
principle, but had big problems with some of the measure's
particulars.

While negotiations over the final wording of the proposed Oakland
medical marijuana ordinance are underway, the proposal as currently
written would:

* Require the Oakland Police Department to make permitted clubs a low
priority. * Require that the clubs be nonprofit. * Prohibit clubs from
operating within 1,000 feet of public or private school, library,
youth center, residential zone, another dispensary, park or recreation
facility. * Prohibit the consumption of marijuana on club premises. *
Limit the number of clubs to four. * Set up a system of fees and
permits for the clubs. * Bar people with arrest records from being
employed at the clubs.

"Regulation is a positive step -- if you don't look at the details of
this ordinance," said Jeff Jones, founder of the Oakland Cannabis
Buyers Cooperative (http://www.rxcbc.org), the city's original medical
marijuana dispensary, located at the heart of Oaksterdam. The co-op is
blocked by a federal injunction from providing marijuana to patients,
but it continues to help patients with the process of obtaining
medical marijuana cards. "This ordinance has some draconian
provisions," he told DRCNet. "The language about proximity is very
tough."

If the ordinance as written were to be enacted, the proximity language
would virtually wipe out Oaksterdam. Nestled among the dispensaries on
Telegraph and Broadway is the Sexual Minority Alliance of Alameda
County, which qualifies as a "youth center." The director of the
alliance, Roosevelt Mosby, is the one person who has complained the
loudest about Oaksterdam, telling anyone who would listen -- including
drug czar John Walters -- that activity around the clubs had a
negative impact on his clients.

One solution, said Jones, was to grandfather in existing clubs. "The
city manager is considering grandfathering," he said, "so it could be
worse."

"We will speak against the ordinance," said Hilary McQuie of Americans
for Safe Access (http://www.safeaccessnow.org). "For us, the optimum
solution would be that there is some sort of regulation around the
clubs and that they be subject to health and safety inspections like
any other place serving patients. They should have good ventilation
and be able to control odor leakage. They should be compliant with the
Americans With Disabilities Act. Some aren't, and how can they say
they're serving patients if they're not accessible? Ideally, we'd like
them to be regulated and to have a way of dealing with bad actors that
is fair and transparent," she said.

"But this ordinance as written is too arbitrary," McQuie told DRCNet.
"The current proposal would limit the number of clubs to four, and
some council-members want them not to allow smoking on site. I think
we should have as many clubs as the market will bear, and we should
allow smoking on site because the social space aspect of the clubs is
one of their most important functions, especially for people who are
new to marijuana," she said. "Oakland needs people coming into town,
and if these clubs bring people downtown, that's great."

The current number of clubs is at least 15, Jones said, and he
believes the city should have a higher limit. "I'm pushing for 9 to 12
clubs," he said. "Maybe we can reach an acceptable compromise number."
Neighboring Berkeley, with about one-third the population of Oakland,
has four clubs, he pointed out.

Another issue is that of variety. "The clubs have different formats,"
McQuie explained. "Some are like clinics or doctors' offices or
pharmacies. Some people aren't comfortable with the smoking and the
paraphernalia and all that," she said. "Other places cater to
different folks. We need to have a variety of formats to fit the needs
of the patients," she said.

Now, negotiations are going on before the ordinance is presented to
the city council on Tuesday. "I support regulation, but this ordinance
needs some changes," said Councilmember Nancy Nadel. "It was submitted
hastily, and the amount of cannabis allowed in the facilities is lower
than what the city decided earlier," she told DRCNet. "I am also
working to try to change the proximity limitations, and I think four
dispensaries is not enough." The ban on consumption may be a tougher
nut to crack, she said. "I don't think I can change that, but we may
be able to only ban consumption by smoking."

For Nadel, one of the most irksome provisions of the ordinance is the
ban on hiring people with arrest records. "Many of the people involved
with this have records because they've been dealing with federal
interference with our state law," she said. "Under this provision,
Jeff Jones, one of the most honest and upright medical marijuana
advocates I know, would not be able to work in one of these
facilities."

In an indication of the politics of pot in the Bay Area, even
supporters of the ordinance's harshest measures are careful to couch
their comments within a broader acceptance of medical marijuana. "This
will bring the city into closer conformity with the state medical
marijuana law," Councilmember Jean Quan told DRCNet. "From walking the
streets of the neighborhood, I think this goes beyond medical
cannabis. We need to separate legalization from medical cannabis.
There have to be tighter standards," she said. "If you're going to
defend medical cannabis, we have to make such it stays within that
core function."

Councilmember Quan also defended the ordinance as one that would
protect dispensaries. "It would protect informal collectives, and for
larger, more organized dispensaries, it would provide some standards
and give us the opportunity to do some formal monitoring," she said.
"There is no regulation now, and many places have opened without
permits. I have heard that there are some abuses, that some
dispensaries are selling to people who are reselling, some are selling
to people without cards, some are letting smoke get outside or into
other parts of their buildings. We want to stop that," she said.

The City Council will discuss, possibly amend, and then vote on the
ordinance on Tuesday. If approved then, the measure would have to be
approved a second time.

"We were under the radar for a long time, but with two clubs opening
recently with a different vibe, I think the issue hit critical mass.
Regulation is inevitable; we just have to have reasonable regulation,"
McQuie said.