Medipot shops in Santa Cruz Mountains fall outside zoning regs

BOULDER CREEK — Last month, Marc Whitehill opened a small shop just off the main drag of this quiet Santa Cruz Mountains town to sell medicinal marijuana, the Santa Cruz Sentinel reports here.

The budding entrepreneur, who offers a selection of marijuana topical creams, pot cookies and green, leafy plants, envisions a thriving collaborative where local growers can make a living serving the medical needs of the community.

“I’m a small-town person,” Whitehill told the Sentinel’s Kurtis Alexander. “I’m trying to do something good here.”

But Whitehill’s venture, a spinoff from his 20-year career as a registered nurse, is running up against a community split over whether the town needs a pot shop and county regulations, which don’t permit marijuana distributors.

Complicating his problems is the fact that his Boulder Creek Collective sits across the street from a popular playground and recreation center.

“I know that people need medical pot, but I just don’t think it’s a good spot,” said Christina Horvat, manager of the Boulder Creek Recreation and Park District, which manages the nearby park. “It’s too close to the kids.”

Several moms have come to the district since the shop opened to express concerns about their children’s safety in an area where drugs are being sold, Horvat says.

Medical marijuana is legal under California law. The voter-approved Compassionate Use Act authorized it in 1996, but the details of how and where it can be exchanged haven’t been settled. A patchwork of regulations now govern its distribution, and Santa Cruz County officials say local law hasn’t been changed to accommodate marijuana shops.

“They’re not allowed,” said county Planning Director Tom Burns. “We’re not saying you can’t do it. We’re saying current zoning ordinance doesn’t allow for it.”

Despite the law, a handful of retailers operate in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Another marijuana collaborative has a storefront in Felton, and a few businesses warehouse the plant and make home deliveries, all of which are prohibited in the unincorporated county, planning officials say.

In the city of Santa Cruz, however, two medical marijuana dispensaries are permitted. City officials, have enacted a temporary moratorium, though, to prevent any additional shops from opening.

Burns says the county, which typically enforces zoning rules only when complaints come in, would not seek to shut down any of the marijuana distributors “unless there’s a health or safety issue.”

“We don’t go out looking for these things,” he said.

County Supervisor Neal Coonerty, whose board has the authority to change local zoning, said the county would have much to consider before making any changes to accommodate marijuana shops.

“First, we have the basic question of do we want to have them at all. Then there’s how do we regulate them,” he said.