It's up to voters to decide whether or not medical marijuana cooperatives will have to follow new regulations.
The Kern County Board of Supervisors voted 4 to 1 Tuesday to put a new ordinance on the June ballot. Neither side walked away from the meeting feeling victorious. Co-op opponents don't want pot shops in their backyards. Supporters of the dispensaries feel the ordinance is too restrictive.
The Board of Supervisors heard two hours of passionate pleas. One was from medicinal marijuana patient, Heather Epps.
"I need to live out of pain. I vomit every day, and I am in debilitating pain. I didn't do this for fun. I did this because I am sick," said Epps.
Epps is the president of Kern Citizens for Patient Rights, the group that helped gather more than 17,000 signatures to overturn the supervisors' decision last summer to completely ban pot dispensaries. Tuesday, her message was... the co-ops aren't the problem.
"Has there been one person that's been murdered in our collective here in Kern county? None. But, they have in our streets," said Epps.
After hours of testimony, supervisors voted 4 to 1 to rescind the existing ordinance to ban collectives and put a new measure to voters in the June primary. It restricts where medical marijuana cooperatives can be. They must be at least a mile away from schools, day care centers, and churches. And, there can't be two co-ops within a mile of each other.
Those against co-ops think they're a threat to kids.
"So now you are making an illegal drug legal. It's a worry for all of our children," said Nicole Lynch.
Store front supporters think the ordinance will just make it harder for patients with prescriptions to get their medicine.
"You guys have no clue whatsoever what's going on," Marco Flores, a medical marijuana patient told supervisors. "You guys just decide to write ordinances that are more restrictive to patient access."
The only supervisor to vote 'no' was Ray Watson. He wanted to put both the old ordinance banning pot shops and the new measure restricting co-ops on the June ballot. If the new ordinance passes on June 5th, store front owners who are not within proper zones will have ten days to move or close.
