Planners mull pot dispensaries

School board member Ketta Brown, speaking only for herself, said she found it hypocritical of the council to mandate a medical marijuana ordinance after telling the board at a joint meeting that the district had a big problem with drugs and alcohol.

“It is a mistake going down this road,” resident Brock Lister told the commission. “You need to tell the City Council, and that is what I am going to do.

“Leave drugs to the drugstores and doctors to dispense. This would legitimize the drug underworld.”

However, William Britt, executive director of the Association Assn. of Patient Advocates, said regulation is important to keep qualified medical marijuana users from being hauled off to jail.

“The hearing went about as I expected, but I think we [advocates] had some impact on the commission,” Britt said.

If the ordinance is adopted, Laguna Beach would be the only city in South County other than Laguna Woods to have a law on the books, and one of the few in Orange County.

At the last count, Larson said, dispensaries are banned by 112 communities, including Newport Beach, Costa Mesa, San Juan Capistrano and Mission Viejo.

Dispensaries are said to be operating in Dana Point, which does not track them because the city does not issue business licenses, and San Clemente.

Laguna Woods has an ordinance, but landlords there are understood to refuse to rent space for a dispensary.

Laguna currently has a moratorium on dispensaries, imposed in February and extended in March until October.

The next hearing on the ordinance is set for June 24.

BARBARA DIAMOND can be reached at (949) 380-4321 or coastlinepilot@latimes.com.