SF Supervisor backs off plan for 8 pot clubs

http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/08/20/BAGJCEASIE1.DTL&hw=medical+marijuana&sn=004&sc=800
SAN FRANCISCO
Supervisor backs off plan for 8 pot clubs
Charlie Goodyear
Saturday, August 20, 2005

Facing what he calls a political reality, Supervisor Sean Elsbernd is
backing off from his suggestion that San Francisco should have no
more than eight medical marijuana clubs.

In legislation submitted this week, Elsbernd is now proposing a
one-year moratorium on any new clubs once the city's Planning
Commission has issued permits for existing clubs to operate under
regulations proposed earlier this summer by Supervisors Ross
Mirkarimi and Gerardo Sandoval.

There are more than 40 pot clubs that have cropped up in San
Francisco since passage of a 1996 state measure permitting marijuana
use for medical purposes -- with 7,000 registered medical marijuana
patients in the city. Police say the system is widely abused, with
drug dealers and gang members buying at the clubs along with patients
who have a legitimate need for weed.

Elsbernd believes his legislation will help keep the number of pot
clubs around 35, a level that should have broader political support
at the Board of Supervisors.

"I did not sense that a majority of my colleagues were interested in
knocking it down to single digits," Elsbernd said Friday.

The Planning Commission is expected to take up pot club regulation in
the coming months.

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