The Future of MMJ in Los Angeles: Q&A With L.A. Cannabis Task Force Chair Ariel Clark

By John Schroyer

The city of Los Angeles is a regulatory mess when it comes to medical marijuana.

Since the passage of the statewide Medical Marijuana Regulation and Safety Act (MMRSA) last September, hundreds of MMJ businesses in the states most populous city have been wondering how the upcoming rules will affect them.

Because California went two decades without having any state oversight or regulations, localities including L.A. have had to deal with the situation themselves.

Now, L.A. officials are trying to figure out the best way forward, which may include eventually granting formal business permits to many dispensaries and other MMJ businesses still operating in the black or gray markets. That could depend on a proposed local ordinance voters may consider next year.

Whats the current situation with Los Angeles particularly in terms of how its regulations mesh with the new statewide rules?

In the city of Los Angeles, theres a ban on all marijuana businesses. Theres no local permitting at all. Why this is a problem, obviously, is because under the new MMRSA, one needs to have a local permit in order to have a state license. So this is a problem that everybody across the board, from operators to the city, know must be solved in some fashion.

What the city has in place right now is called Measure D. Itwas voted in back in 2013, at a time when we did not have robust state regulations.

What Measure D does is provide limited immunity for a certain number of dispensary operators-round 130 at best, but probably closer to 50 that meet certain criteria, such as having been open since 2007. It provides a limited immunity so that these dispensaries can operate, but they dont have any permits.

Whats being done about it?

The city of Los Angeles is the biggest marijuana-consuming population in the world, certainly in the U.S., and we have the most cannabis businesses. The thing is that dispensaries are, at best, 5% of all cannabis businesses operating in the city. You have growers and manufacturers and all these other folks.

So all of these businesses are not operating legally. But for the purposes of the successful implementation of the MMRSA, the city coming in line with that is absolutely critical. Its a big problem.

So (L.A. City Council President) Herb Wessons office and a couple of other council members have directed some city staff to look at this issueacknowledging the MMRSA and the marijuana businesses in the city to evaluate how the city should regulate these businesses. Theyll likely put an ordinance forward to the voters next March.

Whats the ideal outcome for the industry, whats the worst-case scenario, and what do you think will actually happen?

The ideal outcome is that we would have a well-regulated local ordinance that fully reflects the MMRSA, that takes into account the particularities of the city, and that caters to local zoning issues and issues that are specific to our city. The ideal would be an equal-opportunity process to apply for and receive licensure on the local level.

The worst thing that could happen is we have no local permitting in place at all, and Measure D stands as is, meaning no one has a local permit.

The second-to-the-worst case scenario is that only a small number of business operators hold these licenses. Theres a big effort in the city to shore up a monopoly, frankly, and thats a problem.

What do you think is actually going to happen, though?

Ultimately, I thinkall of us groups ...