The city's proposed medical marijuana ordinance, under construction for more than two years, will be debated again Nov. 16 at a joint hearing of two City Council committees.
Councilmen Ed Reyes and Greig Smith, chairmen of the planning and the Public Safety committees, respectively, are hoping to resolve some of key issues before the measure goes to the full council.
Some of the issues the council is still trying to decide: how to ensure that medical marijuana is not being sold for profit in violation of state law; whether to require dispensaries to provide names of their patients and growers; and how far the stores should be required to stay from schools and places where children gather.
The council has been under pressure to act quickly since a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge ruled last month that the city's moratorium on dispensaries was illegally extended, leaving L.A. unable to act against the hundreds of dispensaries that opened in violation of that ban.
-- John Hoeffel
