Los Angeles Pot Dispensaries to Be Shut Down

Bad news for basically everybody I know, via the AP:

Los Angeles passed an ordinance two years ago that was supposed to shutter hundreds of pot dispensaries while capping the number in operation at 70. But a set of legal challenges against the city by collectives and last month’s expiration of the ordinance thanks to a sundowner clause led to another surge of pot shops. City officials said 762 collectives have registered with the city and as many as 200 more could exist.

“We need to start with a clean slate,” Councilman Mitchell Englander said before the vote. “Los Angeles has experimented with marijuana and has failed.”

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Los Angeles passed an ordinance two years ago that was supposed to shutter hundreds of pot dispensaries while capping the number in operation at 70. But a set of legal challenges against the city by collectives and last month’s expiration of the ordinance thanks to a sundowner clause led to another surge of pot shops. City officials said 762 collectives have registered with the city and as many as 200 more could exist.

“We need to start with a clean slate,” Councilman Mitchell Englander said before the vote. “Los Angeles has experimented with marijuana and has failed.”

I can tell you with authority, as a resident of Los Angeles, that it is easier to get a prescription for marijuana than it is to find quality affordable health insurance in this damn city, and I don’t even smoke pot (prone to paranoia). So I think we’ll have to wait and see if closing the storefront pot shops will truly change availability or if it will simply make our city streets less embarrassing for Mayor Villaraigosa when other mayors come visit.

Regardless of availability, and despite the fact that my own personal opinion is that pot should be 100% legal (though controlled as cigarettes and alcohol are), I have to agree that having storefront pot shops where you need a doctor’s prescription to buy the drug is sort of a strange thing. I mean, imagine if when I got my Flonase nasal spray prescription filled I went to a different place than where I pick up my asthma inhalers (sexy, I know). If it’s a prescription, you should head to your friendly neighborhood pharmacy, right?

Instead, it’s this half-assed attempt at making pot legal. If you ask me, they should go full-out with this legalizing-marijuana thing or truly treat the drug like a medication.

What do you think of the store-front pot dispensaries in cities like LA and Oakland? How do you think closing them will change availability? Will closing storefront pot shops increase crime rates or otherwise harm society?

How about the idea of marijuana only being available via normal pharmacies?

Lead image courtesy of cletch