By Dr. David Blair / A Green Alternative
It has been a year since A Green Alternative championed the movement to bring the first licensed medical marijuana dispensary to the City of San Diego. For me, the founder, and my co-founders it has been a life changing experience. A Green Alternative is dedicated to bringing a broad spectrum of fully tested and certified canabis products to meet the medical needs of the community.
The dispensary’s clientele are provided with the highest quality products, such as, consumables, inhalers, ointments, and over thirty different varieties of marijuana, each identified for its unique therapeutic value. The well-crafted array of products and the beautiful display layouts provides an air of elegance to the dispensaries clientele. The entire facility is so clean you can eat off the floor. The waiting room was designed with a soft touch to make the clientele feel right at home. The staff is dedicated to providing each client the specialized care they need by only allowing one client at a time into the display area so the staff can confidently evaluate the client’s needs and identify which types of products are best suited for their individual needs.
A Green Alternative spearheaded implementing standards set forth by the State and the City by going over the top, setting the gold standard that exceeded the original licensing requirements. We were required to meet “X” standards, but we insisted on raising the bar two times “X.” In fact, the City rewrote licensing requirements to mimic what A Green Alternative has implemented. In addition, many of the dispensaries clientele are serviced by a delivery service anywhere within the City limits without any additional charge. The dispensary’s self-imposed requirement is that before a client can be provided home delivery they must visit the store to be educated on what products best serves their needs.
A Green Alternative, after its first year of operation serving the community, still faces unique challenges in the evolution of the consumer friendly medical marijuana marketplace. The biggest problem legal dispensaries face are the illegal pot shops and delivery services, which pop up like weeds after a rainstorm; each time a licensed dispensary opens, three to four illegal pot shops open up right next to them.
Customer and neighborhood safety is a paramount concern to A Green Alternative. For the safety of the clientele and our delivery personnel, on their first visit they must provide proper identification to ensure only pre-qualified clients are provided this special customer care by home deliveries. The dispensary is gilded to being a model citizen by providing an armed security to greet its clientele at the entrance, which also provides heightened security for the neighbor’s who share a common parking lot. The dispensary’s motto is, “we treat our customers like our mother,” with the highest level of dignity and respect at all times.
A Green Alternative, after its first year of operation serving the community, still faces unique challenges in the evolution of the consumer friendly medical marijuana marketplace. The biggest problem legal dispensaries face are the illegal pot shops and delivery services, which pop up like weeds after a rainstorm; each time a licensed dispensary opens, three to four illegal pot shops open up right next to them.
There are over 200 of these pot shops and delivery services currently masquerading as medical marijuana dispensaries by advertising in the local publications and signage in their windows. These pot shops and delivery services sell contaminated black market products, do not pay taxes, and pay their employees in cash at the end of each day. The City is losing tens of millions in tax revenue and licensing fees because it is common knowledge they can generate illegal profits in excess of $10,000 dollars per day.
The average consumer has no idea these pot shops are not properly licensed and sell untested gained black market products. The legal dispensaries have just recently banded together and formed an association with the goal of educating consumers as to the locations of the legal dispensaries, and the competitively priced, high quality tested products they sell. In the coming weeks the legal dispensaries will have a distinctive logo as part of their advertising campaign to steer consumers into unknowingly purchasing gained untested products that fuel the underground economy.
The City of San Diego and the surrounding communities are working very hard to protect the licensed dispensaries, and eliminate the illegal completion, but the problem is enormous. Currently there are over 200 illegal pot shops and delivery services working in the City alone and new ones sprouting up everyday. City Attorney Jan I. Goldsmith’s office has to date prosecuted and shut down 286 illegal dispensaries with an additional 29 cases pending with nearly a 100% success rate. In addition, the City has benefited by a $1.8 million judgement against one illegal dispensary alone. Neighboring cities like Chula Vista and Oceanside likewise are actively shutting down the illegal dispensaries.
The City is well on its way of providing community with safe well-regulated licensed dispensaries. Everyone expects that next year consumer access to cannabis products will increase by the legalization of recreational use.
But it takes time, about 60 days from filing a lawsuit to securing a court order shuttering the dispensary. In the meantime, the illegal dispensary makes over $10,000 per day or over $600,000 and then moves on to another location where the process begins all over again. In order for the City to maximize the tax revenue and drive the criminals form the marketplace, each citizen should step up to the plate and file a complaint when any pot shot or delivery service moves into their community.
Citizens can help their communities by contacting their local Code Compliance Departments and for those residents in the City of San Diego by filing a complaint on-line at www.sandiego.gov/ced.report/index.shtml.
The San Diego community has come a long way with the common sense guidance provided by our local elected officials and the dedication of licensed medical marijuana dispensaries. The City is well on its way of providing community with safe well-regulated licensed dispensaries. Everyone expects that next year consumer access to cannabis products will increase by the legalization of recreational use.
With community involvement and regulations, the anticipated tax revenues will provide relief for cash strapped communities. For instance, legalized recreational use in Colorado generated over $63 million in tax revenue. In the meantime, local governments are quickly learning how to shut down the illegal operations and enacting ordinances to allow licensed dispensaries to operate in their communities. This is truly a spirited effort by all involved to bring the cannabis industry into the mainstream of our economy.
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Dr. David Blair is the founder and owner of A Green Alternative, the first legally licensed medical marijuana consumer cooperative in San Diego County.
Many of these so-called “illegal” dispensaries are in fact legal in the eyes of the state. Many are incorporated, have sellers permits and Federal employee numbers. The problem lies within the cities in California that are restricting business licenses and not changing zoning laws to accommodate collectives.
Instead of attacking fellow medical cannabis industry collectives Dr. Blair should join forces with them to open up access to qualified patients. Cities within the county should allow more collectives to open up. There are hundreds of legal drug stores and liquor stores throughout the county. It’s shameful that local governments are limiting access to medical cannabis.
Thank you Desde la logan. I was trying to formulate this exact response this morning before I got busy. You put into words perfectly what I wanted to say.
Thank you, Butch. As someone with inside knowledge of the local medical cannabis industry I was bothered by this op-ed. There are numerous collectives that are doing everything they can to be legit. But the cities are doing everything they can to prevent them from doing so. If I can go to the 99 and buy bottles of aspirin that can potentially kill me, if there are liquor stores on almost every corner in every marginalized neighborhood of this city, if I can easily legally purchase a firearm why can I not do the same with medical cannabis? The cities are the problem. Yet Dr. Blair blames problems on “illegal” collectives.
Joseph Conrad once wrote, “Exactitude in some small matters is the very soul of discipline.” It is one thing to purport to be caring and it is quite another thing to make false assumptions about a struggling community. First things first, the good doctor should be aware that quoting a part of an article with a misspelled word is enough to discredit anyone as a writer. I quote, “The biggest problem legal dispensaries face are the illegal pot shops and delivery services, which pop up like weeks after a rainstorm;” Please tell me doctor, how do weeks pop up after a rainstorm?? Surely you must mean weeds. Did you not proofread your own article? Look, let’s be honest, not everyone in San Diego is going to drive as far as the Tijuana border to go to a dispensary, it’s just not possible for a lot of patients to go that far. San Diego is a very large city with almost 4 million people, it is the height of folly to assume that other dispensaries in other locations throughout the city are not only wrong for existing but to go so far as to say they are selling black market products is simply not true since your dispensary offers many of the same products, so are you implying that your products are also black market? I quote, “These pot shops and delivery services sell contaminated black market products” To say that your floor is clean enough to eat off of is an unnecessary embellishment, I quote “The entire facility is so clean you can eat off the floor.” Why would anyone want to eat off the floor? As a medical cannabis patient I’m frankly a little put off by this article which claims to be coming from a caring source but in reality comes across sounding angry and bitter. This is not the way we are going to make progress, and we certainly are not going to make progress by scaring readers with possibly false information. Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote, “Knowledge is the antidote for fear.” Scaring patients into thinking your dispensary is the only true dispensary in the city is not the proper way to educate them.
The typo “weeks” is the fault of today’s editor, actually. Sorry. That’s fixed.
I won’t pick on typos because I make mistakes often. I have long supported A Greener Alternative generally, though I am not a patient it an employee. I found this article understandable and upsetting too. I understand what it is like to spend your life savings trying to meet an ever changing list of requirements to establish an operate a “legal” cannabis collective farm and dispensary when so many bad actors exist. But it is really shameful to attack dispensaries the County/City didn’t sign off on in recent months. Patients and their caregivers shouldn’t go bankrupt or face jail because of plant counts, 20+years not permitting any grows or dispensaries.
Frankly I want to grow my own cannabis, and when I need more, use my insurance to get it at CVS. But I cannot grow my own at present and it is difficult to get affordable cannabis. Everyone wants to cash in on cannabis patients. After all this time who is helping patients get cannabis at a fair price? And, who is accepting medical insurance?
Very sad this board director I respect characterizes competition with illegal pot shops as the big problem. I would start with the fact federal law prohibits patients like me from possessing and consuming cannabis. Second, I would point out that if you build a caregiver model that is neither hospital or pharmacy, do not hire nurses or pharmicists to dispense and counsel patients, and justify paying poverty wages to staff because you want to keep prices around $300/ounce, you have a bad model.
Shizzle me snizzle, do what though wilt shall be the law,ya get me drift now?