Bay Area cities are scrambling to pass emergency laws around the cultivation and distribution of medical marijuana in anticipation of statewide changes aimed at regulating California's cannabis industry for the first time.

Earlier this fall, Gov. Jerry Brown signed three bills into law, collectively known as the Medical Marijuana Regulation and Safety Act. The law goes into effect Jan. 1 and is an attempt to create guidelines for the industry nearly two decades after California voters legalized medical marijuana.

But there has been confusion at the local level about the potential impact ahead of the act's implementation, including whether cities will lose local control if they don't act by March 1.

The legislation will create a new state agency that will issue, suspend and remove licenses to dispensaries starting in 2018 and require the Medical Board of California to investigate doctors who recommend the drug excessively. It will also make it a misdemeanor for doctors to prescribe the drug when they have a financial interest in a licensed medical marijuana facility and crack down on marijuana farmers who pollute streams and rivers.

Now cities are rushing to meet the March 1 deadline out of fear they will lose local control when it comes to whether to allow dispensaries to grow medical marijuana within their city limits.


"If we don't pass this type of ordinance, we will lose our right to regulate it," said Richmond Assistant City Attorney Patricia Aljoe during a recent City Council meeting to discuss how to modify the city's existing laws around cultivation and the mobile distribution of marijuana. The city has three cannabis dispensaries.

Many East Bay cities are responding to the upcoming changes by tightening or reaffirming existing ordinances that ban the cultivation and mobile delivery of cannabis. Others are taking an even more conservative approach with bans on the sale of medical marijuana, prompting concerns from advocates that hasty policies will restrict access for patients.

"There has been a big push by the League of California Cities to ban dispensaries, ban cultivation, ban delivery services, pretty much ban everything," said Dale Gieringer, director of the California chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, or NORML.

"We're especially upset about places that aren't distinguishing between personal use and dispensaries."

Gieringer said the March 1 deadline cities are rushing to meet was the result of a drafting error, accidentally added during the end-of-the-year legislative scramble.

"The whole stampede is a mistake," Gieringer said.

Last week, Assemblyman Jim Wood, D-Healdsburg, and author of the Medical Marijuana Regulation and Safety Act, sent a letter to all California cities explaining the error and said that emergency legislation would be presented in early January to correct the problem. He added that cities will not be penalized for not having ordinances in place by March 1.

"Even if my urgency measure is not signed until after March 1, the Bureau of Medical Marijuana Regulation, the entity responsible for developing the state's regulations, currently exists on paper only," Wood wrote. "It will be many months before the bureau has the capacity to develop and enforce statewide regulations."

Wood's district stretches from Santa Rosa to the Oregon border and includes the Emerald Triangle, the largest marijuana-producing region in the world.

But it appears that many cities haven't gotten the memo, with Oakley, Brentwood, Antioch, Fremont, Richmond, San Pablo, Walnut Creek, Lafayette, Orinda, Dublin and Livermore among those recently engaged in discussions about amending existing ordinances. Currently, only Richmond, Vallejo, Oakland, Berkeley, San Leandro, unincorporated Alameda County and San Jose allow dispensaries.

Pleasant Hill bans dispensaries but allows patients to grow up to three plants outdoors for personal use so long as they are not visible from a public right of way. Most cities opposed to dispensaries cite concerns over smell, increased crime and that marijuana use may lead to the use of other drugs. Others don't want to violate federal law, which treats marijuana not as medicine but as an illegal drug.

"Dispensaries are prohibited by federal law, and our city has a long-standing ordinance that we don't allow things prohibited by federal law," said Walnut Creek Mayor Bob Simmons.

But whatever their stance on marijuana, all are concerned with retaining local control as the statewide regulations near.

"Generally, a city likes to retain its control over what happens within its borders and not turn that control over to Sacramento," said Brentwood Planning Commission Chairman Lance Crannell during a recent meeting.

Despite many cities' tough stance on marijuana, a growing number of voters support legalization. A 2015 poll by the Public Policy Institute of California found that 55 percent of California residents believe all marijuana should be legalized.

They will have a chance to show their support next year when the Adult Use of Marijuana Act is expected to appear on the ballot. If approved, it would decriminalize all forms of marijuana, following in the footsteps of Colorado, Oregon, Washington and Alaska.

Staff writer Nate Gartrell contributed to this report. Contact Karina Ioffee at 510-262-2726 or kioffee@bayareanewsgroup.com. Follow her at Twitter.com/kioffee.