The City Council voted 4-1 to ban the cultivation, processing, distribution and delivery of medical marijuana in the City of Coronado at its December 15 meeting. Only two people took a stand against the proposed ordinance, Councilman Richard Bailey and Charles Crehore. Both supported all provisions of the ordinance except the one that banned home delivery of the drug to the sick and elderly.
“Are we going to put them in an ambulance to get their medicine?” Crehore asked.
Crehore pointed out that a large number of people here already have medical marijuana. He said that many are Persian Gulf and Iraqi War veterans who use it to combat PTSD symptoms, or cancer patients who use it to ward off the side effects of chemotherapy.
His impassioned plea to exclude delivery from the ordinance elicited some sympathy from the council but did not win it over.
Mayor Casey Tanaka said that he had “sympathy for people who have a need,” but felt the greater good would be served by allowing the city “to make its own decisions [and not] leave it to someone’s interpretation over the bridge.”
Under new legislation, the city has until March 1 to craft a medical marijuana ordinance. If it doesn’t, the state will decide. Bailey agreed that the city should chart its own course, but said he could not support an ordinance that banned delivery.
“We have an older demographic and I think it is fair to say some are benefiting from medical marijuana, whose benefits have been well documented.” He also pointed to the discretionary nature of the business.
“Have we ever received one complaint?” he asked.
“As long as they operate in a discrete manner this will continue,” Councilman Bill Sandke said, suggesting that seriously ill people might simply “ignore the ordinance, just as many people ignore the back alley rental ban.”
While discrete, the medical marijuana delivery business, like most of the industry, is unregulated. All one needs to deliver the drug is a business license, a seller’s permit for tax purposes and a promise that they will only sell drugs to people who have a medical marijuana card issued by the State of California Department of Health, according to the California Attorney General’s webpage.
Tanaka did indicate that once the council learns more about the new legislation and the views of voters, they may revisit the issue.
“None of us has campaigned on this issue,” he said, suggesting that until the council heard from voters it would “err on the side of caution.”
Other major actions taken by the city council include:
Naming the new senior activity center to John D. Spreckels Center and Bowling Green. Frances Harpst, whose $5 million gift to the city will cover most of the center’s construction costs will have a main room named in her honor. Councilwoman Carrie Downey, who spearheaded the naming, said that people who knew the philanthropist agreed that she wouldn’t have wanted a building named for her.
The council made three commission appointments: Kari McPherson to Parks and Recreation; Carol Pastor to Historic Resources, and Beate Boyd to Planning.
As this was the last meeting of the year City Manager Blair King presented a list of 63 accomplishments the council has achieved in 2015.
Chief among these was a successful legal challenge that allowed the $39.5 million in loans the city made to school district to be repaid with tax increments, and another that allowed it to reclaim $5.85 million left in the former community development agency’s general fund. Both rulings made an already wealthy city, even wealthier.
The rest was dominated by council votes on capital improvement projects. With the exception of a feasibility study for a multi-use path along Ocean Boulevard, and traffic lights on Third and Forth Streets, most were routine and noncontroversial – removing hazardous trees, a new generator for a pump station, new public restrooms for Spreckels Park and Central Beach, replacing the golf cart barn roof, and resurfacing tennis courts, for example.
Beyond these routine matters, the council also expanded the free summer shuttle program, and maintained the viability of the city parks, golf course and Orange Avenue medians while exceeding water conservation goals. It also funded the first Coronado film festival and a new public gallery in the community center.
Before reading his list, King pointed out that governing is seldom easy. “It is a difficult process where decisions are made collectively and in public [and where] everybody has a better idea of how things should be done.”
In accepting King’s praise, Tanaka pointed out that the staff and public deserve much of the credit.
