Midway Area Gets a “Legal” Pot Dispensary

The Point Loma Peninsula has a pot shop! The San Diego Planning Commission on March 19th voted 4 to 2 to approve a medical marijuana dispensary in the Midway area of the Point.

The Point Loma Patients Cooperative is the 4th such dispensary to be allowed under San Diego’s stringent requirements. It’s located at 3452 Hancock Street.

The other dispensaries allowed include an Otay Mesa storefront that just opened last week, and 2 more – one in San Ysidro and the other in Kearny Mesa. Both are are expected to open this spring. Allegedly, the City is supposed to allow a total of 36 dispensaries within city boundaries.

The City Council in January voted 8 to 1 in favor of finalizing the regulations that are required of medical weed storefronts in the City. (District 2 rep Zapf was the lone dissenter.) The City ordinance allows a maximum of four dispensaries in each of the city’s nine council districts. And importantly, the ordinance prohibits dispensaries from locating within 1,000 feet of each other, as well as schools and churches, etc.

The vote for approval of the Midway shop had been delayed as it was originally to obtain its authorization on the 12th of March. But the Planning Commission had issues on parking and patient access to the storefront. Adam Knopf, the applicant, came back on the 19th with design changes that apparently met the okay of the majority.

Even though City staff believed the dispensary met city standards for sidewalks, parking and public access, 2 of the Commissioners, Susan Peerson and so-called “liberal” Theresa Quiroz voted against it out of their hypocritical expressed “concerns” for the patients. They voted against the storefront for the very patients who need it – all in the name of the patients.

The U-T San Diego article about this approval had a negative tone to it, as well, as if there hasn’t been enough bashing of medical marijuana shops. Because the Midway business was approved, it stated:

the approval hurts the chances of more than a dozen other proposed dispensaries seeking the four coveted slots in Council District 2.

As if the U-T actually cared about this issue – as they have been an opposition stalwart for years.

At any rate, patients in OB, Point Loma and area will have access to a “legal” medical store very soon. Congrats!