Council Debates Ban on Medical Marijuana Outlets

A dozen supporters and one foe of Ventura County’s only medical cannabis center packed the City Council chambers Tuesday night to sound off about proposed zoning regulations that would snuff out the dispensary.

The issue was whether to ban marijuana outlets--including the Ventura County Medical Cannabis Center on Thousand Oaks Boulevard. But many residents rose to speak in defense of the dispensary’s embattled owner and operator, Andrea Nagy.

As in past City Council meetings, the 28-year-old legal secretary turned pot crusader was hailed by many of her 60 patients as an angel of mercy. But this time, one of Nagy’s foes turned out, too.

One of Nagy’s patients, a disabled veteran suffering from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, defended the dispensary.

“Ms. Nagy is not just my primary caregiver, she’s my only caregiver,” said Jack Lampson, a 62-year-old Oxnard resident. “She checks in on me all the time.”

But another speaker said she was wary of Nagy’s operation. “Let’s leave the dispensing of drugs to medical-care professionals, not to self-serving business people,” the woman urged the council.

The discussion of the proposed zoning regulations came a day after county prosecutors filed a civil lawsuit attempting to shut Nagy down. A hearing on that matter is scheduled for this morning.

By late Tuesday, the smoke still hadn’t cleared. City Council members were debating the merits of the proposed zoning regulations--which would bar all marijuana dispensaries and only allow doctors, pharmacists and other “primary caregivers” to dispense marijuana with a special use permit.

Much of the council debate centered on whether it was wise to enact new regulations until the Ventura County district attorney’s case against Nagy was resolved.

“The district attorney’s filing hasn’t been heard yet by the courts,” Councilwoman Linda Parks said before the meeting. “Absent some clear direction from the courts, I think any council action would be premature.”

However, the district attorney’s action only affects Nagy’s dispensary, some council members argued. If the city does not enact clear rules now, other medical marijuana centers could open in Thousand Oaks unfettered.

“What the district attorney does and whether they’re successful is a separate issue from what we’re doing,” Mayor Mike Markey said before the meeting. “If you continue this for another week or two weeks--and, say, the district attorney does not succeed--you’re back where you started. We need to get something on the books.”

During the debate, Councilwoman Elois Zeanah quizzed Deputy City Atty. James T. Friedl about whether doctors and pharmacists could legally prescribe medical marijuana.

When he answered, “No,” she replied: “So really we’re saying it’s impossible to obtain medical marijuana.” Her statement was greeted by applause from the audience.

If approved, the new rules would still have a way to go before becoming law. They would have to be reviewed by the Planning Commission and undergo at least two public hearings, a process that can take between two and six months.

In a staff report presented to the City Council before the meeting, Friedl had argued that the state’s medical marijuana initiative--1996’s Proposition 215--was essentially a grow-your-own statute. Therefore, he wrote, the very ill and the people who care for them day-to-day should be allowed to grow marijuana for medicinal purposes so long as the crop is not cultivated in a public area.

Friedl had also requested permission in the report to shut Nagy’s Rainbow Country Ventura County Medical Cannabis Center if the new rules were approved.