Medical Weed's Stay of Execution in L.A.

Eagle Rock Neighborhood Council president Michael Larsen predicts that the City Council will hold fast for a complete ban while trying to persuade voters to its side.

Larsen says Koretz's idea of slashing the dispensaries to 182 is "not what [the weed dispensary industry] is interested in."

PHOTO BY JENNIE WARREN

Matt Cohen, owner of Natural Way of L.A.

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More About

• Paul Koretz
• Matt Cohen
• Los Angeles Police Department
• Psychoactive Drugs
• Politics

When the City Council tried to cut back to the original 182 once before, Larsen notes, the broader dispensary industry's "reaction was 70 lawsuits."

But the immediate concern of many medical marijuana customers is that LAPD has targeted some dispensaries for shuttering — and may choose to continue or expand that effort, referendum or not.

The City Council could ask the Drug Enforcement Agency to help LAPD enforce federal law, which defines marijuana as a Schedule I controlled substance illegal for any use.

Councilman José Huizar, probably City Hall's toughest talker against pot shops, told the Daily News' Rick Orlov that if the Sept. 6 ban is rendered moot until March by the signatures turned in last week, "We will enforce state and federal laws on marijuana."

City leaders may be already moving into position to do just that.

On Aug. 22, the City Council approved Councilman Bernard Parks' motion to instruct LAPD to work with the DEA to "create a citywide enforcement strategy to deal with medical marijuana collectives."

Such a strategy could go wider than this year's object lesson in the San Fernando Valley's sprawling Devonshire Division. In that huge suburban corner of L.A., LAPD narcotics officers showed their muscle by apparently closing down every medical marijuana dispensary in the division.

LAPD's position is that it is illegal for medical marijuana collectives to take money.

Huizar is clearly staking out that ground, leading up to the probable March vote on the weed ban by L.A. residents. He says: "Dispensaries do not have a right to exist."