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Berkeley marijuana dispensary forced out of business after 13 years
Contra Costa Times ^ | April 30, 2012 | Doug Oakley

Posted on 04/30/2012 7:50:01 PM PDT by Free ThinkerNY

After nearly 13 years in business, a San Pablo Avenue medical marijuana dispensary in Berkeley was set to close Monday evening under pressure from the federal government for being too close to two schools.

The 9,000 member Berkeley Patients Group has not yet found a suitable new location in Berkeley and plans to open a delivery service, dispensary management said Monday. Sixty nine employees of the dispensary will be out of work come Tuesday, but they will be paid through the end of the month.

"There's a lot to take into account in trying to follow state and local laws in finding a place," said Sean Luse, chief operating officer, as customers streamed in to the dispensary on its last day. "There's a lot of fear out there in the community and that's part of the challenge. We're keeping our fingers crossed."

The dispensary at 2747 San Pablo Ave. is across the street from a school called the Center for Early Intervention on Deafness and three blocks from a second school called Ecole Billingue de Berkeley. City and state laws require dispensaries to be at least 600 feet from any school. The dispensary was established before city guidelines on proximity to schools were put into law.

Luse said Berkeley Patients Group signed an agreement with building owner David Mayeri to vacate the current location May 1. That agreement was overseen by an Alameda County judge with the U.S. Attorney's Office in San Francisco looking on, Luse said.

Goldsberry, who helped found Berkeley Patients Group but is no longer involved, and who now is a consultant to dispensaries, said the current federal pressure under President Barack Obama is the worst it's been since former California Attorney General Dan Lungren went after dispensaries in the late 1990s.

(Excerpt) Read more at mercurynews.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: drugs; drugwar; marijuana; pot; warondrugs; wod; wodlist; wosd

1 posted on 04/30/2012 7:50:07 PM PDT by Free ThinkerNY
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To: Free ThinkerNY

they made a fortune


2 posted on 04/30/2012 8:11:10 PM PDT by stephenjohnbanker (God, family, country, mom, apple pie, the girl next door and a Ford F250 to pull my boat.)
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To: Free ThinkerNY

No hope, no soap and no dope, hippies!


3 posted on 04/30/2012 8:50:20 PM PDT by TigersEye (Life is about choices. Your choices. Make good ones.)
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To: Free ThinkerNY

13 years in business? When did CA legalize medical marijuana? I thought it was more recent than that.


4 posted on 04/30/2012 8:53:15 PM PDT by Yardstick
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To: stephenjohnbanker

Good. They were within their rights to do so under CA law and the 10th Amendment, right?


5 posted on 04/30/2012 9:14:24 PM PDT by Ken H (Austerity is the irresistible force. Entitlements are the immovable object.)
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To: Yardstick

Prop 215....1996


6 posted on 04/30/2012 9:19:20 PM PDT by Vendome (Don't take life so seriously, you won't live through it anyway)
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To: Vendome

Thanks for the info. Wow, so these guys weren’t even one of the earliest ones.


7 posted on 04/30/2012 9:26:22 PM PDT by Yardstick
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To: Yardstick

I think the oldest one is Bayside in Oakland and now San Jose.


8 posted on 04/30/2012 10:29:24 PM PDT by Vendome (Don't take life so seriously, you won't live through it anyway)
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To: Free ThinkerNY

The Feds should have closed them down 13 years ago!!!


9 posted on 04/30/2012 10:33:23 PM PDT by dalereed
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To: Free ThinkerNY

More jobs killed by government regulations.


10 posted on 04/30/2012 11:10:32 PM PDT by AZLiberty (No tag today)
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To: dalereed

You just peed on the Tenth Amendment in full view of everyone!


11 posted on 04/30/2012 11:49:41 PM PDT by Ken H (Austerity is the irresistible force. Entitlements are the immovable object.)
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To: Free ThinkerNY

Legalize it.


12 posted on 05/01/2012 4:01:00 AM PDT by Tainan (Cogito, ergo conservatus sum)
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To: Ken H
You just peed on the Tenth Amendment in full view of everyone!

The Constitution is passe - big-government "conservatism" is where it's at!

13 posted on 05/01/2012 12:10:59 PM PDT by JustSayNoToNannies (A free society's default policy: it's none of government's business.)
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To: dalereed
The Feds should have closed them down 13 years ago!!!

Can you cite for the the Article and Section of the US Constitution that gives the Federal Government the power to regulate what adults put willingly into their own bodies?

Thanks in advance.

14 posted on 05/01/2012 12:23:22 PM PDT by Lurker (The avalanche has begun. The pebbles no longer have a vote.)
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To: Lurker

as far as i’m concerned anyone using thAt crap should be executed on the spot!!!


15 posted on 05/01/2012 3:38:09 PM PDT by dalereed
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To: dalereed

Charming. So tell me, what exactly are you doing on a forum that is dedicated to restoring Constitutional governance to the United States? Have you ever even read the Document?

I seriously doubt that you have. And if you did at some point you certainly didn’t understand it.


16 posted on 05/01/2012 3:47:04 PM PDT by Lurker (The avalanche has begun. The pebbles no longer have a vote.)
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To: Lurker
Or he understood that it would get in the way of his pushing people around, so he decided to ignore it.
17 posted on 05/03/2012 2:48:38 PM PDT by JustSayNoToNannies (A free society's default policy: it's none of government's business.)
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