Special Medical Marijuana Council Meeting Tuesday (Amended)
HERE WE GO AGAIN, MARY JANE
The Costa Mesa City Council will meet in a Special Meeting on Tuesday, December 9, 2014 beginning at an unusual time, 6:45 p.m., to discuss the future of Medical Marijuana ordinances in this city. There is no agenda available yet for this meeting, but the following is the complete text of the press release issued by The City this morning. NOTE: The city issued the official agenda for this meeting later this afternoon. You can read it HERE. Plus, HERE you can read the actual New Business agenda item to be considered. This report includes links to thirty-two (32) separate attachments!!! I'm not going to give you those links.. you can go there and select the ones you want on your own. You've got the weekend to do it.
The Costa Mesa City Council will hold a specially scheduled meeting at
6:45 p.m. on Tuesday, Dec. 9 to review a variety of items related to
two medical marijuana initiatives that have obtained enough signatures
to be placed on the ballot.
The council will first review a staff report that details the potential impacts that the two competing initiatives would have on the city’s various departments, including police, finance and the City Attorney’s Office. The staff report will also include the impacts of a medical marijuana ordinance proposed in August by Council Member Gary Monahan and another medical marijuana ordinance passed by Santa Ana voters in November.
After reviewing the report, the City Council could consider several options, including:
COMPLICATIONS REQUIRED ANALYSIS
You will recall we've written about this recently, HERE. The major problem - aside from Medical Marijuana being sold in the city at all - is the fact that both the initiatives that qualified to be placed before the voters include taxation elements that really complicate the issues. The council, in a previous meeting, decided to have the staff study the issues, and that analysis had to be completed within 30 days, hence this special meeting.
CONFLICTING LAWS
If the city places the items - and perhaps another city-generated similar item - on a special election ballot, that might be violating one law because of the taxation element - which is required to be on the ballot of a General Election, which would be November, 2016. If they fail to place it on a Special Election ballot it violates another law. Rock, meet Hard Place!
IT'S GOING TO BE AN INTERESTING MEETING
I expect this meeting to be heavily-attended, both by proponents and opponents of the issue. I'm especially interested to hear what our public safety folks have to say, since they were not consulted when councilman Gary Monahan cobbled together his ordinance with the City Attorney earlier this year.
MENSINGERS FIRST BIG SHOW
And, I'm going to be very interested to see how rookie Mayor, Steve Mensinger, manages this meeting. Theoretically, this will be the final City Council meeting of this calendar year. The next scheduled meeting is Tuesday, January 6, 2015.
The Costa Mesa City Council will meet in a Special Meeting on Tuesday, December 9, 2014 beginning at an unusual time, 6:45 p.m., to discuss the future of Medical Marijuana ordinances in this city. There is no agenda available yet for this meeting, but the following is the complete text of the press release issued by The City this morning. NOTE: The city issued the official agenda for this meeting later this afternoon. You can read it HERE. Plus, HERE you can read the actual New Business agenda item to be considered. This report includes links to thirty-two (32) separate attachments!!! I'm not going to give you those links.. you can go there and select the ones you want on your own. You've got the weekend to do it.
***
City Council meeting scheduled for Tuesday to discuss medical marijuana initiatives
Posted Date:
12/5/2014
The council will first review a staff report that details the potential impacts that the two competing initiatives would have on the city’s various departments, including police, finance and the City Attorney’s Office. The staff report will also include the impacts of a medical marijuana ordinance proposed in August by Council Member Gary Monahan and another medical marijuana ordinance passed by Santa Ana voters in November.
After reviewing the report, the City Council could consider several options, including:
- Adopting a medical marijuana ordinance (either one of the initiatives or a city-crafted ordinance).
- Placing the two medical marijuana ordinances on the ballot at a special election as mandated by the state election code.
- Placing the two medical marijuana initiatives on the ballot at the next General Election (Nov. 6, 2016) since both measures call for tax increases and the California Constitution mandates any proposed tax increases must be voted on during a General Election.
- Placing a third medical marijuana measure—one crafted by the City Council—on the ballot to compete with the two initiatives (if two or more of the measures pass, the one with the highest number of votes would become law) at either a special or General Election.
***
COMPLICATIONS REQUIRED ANALYSIS
You will recall we've written about this recently, HERE. The major problem - aside from Medical Marijuana being sold in the city at all - is the fact that both the initiatives that qualified to be placed before the voters include taxation elements that really complicate the issues. The council, in a previous meeting, decided to have the staff study the issues, and that analysis had to be completed within 30 days, hence this special meeting. CONFLICTING LAWS
If the city places the items - and perhaps another city-generated similar item - on a special election ballot, that might be violating one law because of the taxation element - which is required to be on the ballot of a General Election, which would be November, 2016. If they fail to place it on a Special Election ballot it violates another law. Rock, meet Hard Place!IT'S GOING TO BE AN INTERESTING MEETING
I expect this meeting to be heavily-attended, both by proponents and opponents of the issue. I'm especially interested to hear what our public safety folks have to say, since they were not consulted when councilman Gary Monahan cobbled together his ordinance with the City Attorney earlier this year. MENSINGERS FIRST BIG SHOW
And, I'm going to be very interested to see how rookie Mayor, Steve Mensinger, manages this meeting. Theoretically, this will be the final City Council meeting of this calendar year. The next scheduled meeting is Tuesday, January 6, 2015.
Labels: Gary Monahan, Medical Marijuana, Steve Mensinger
posted by The Pot Stirrer at 12/05/2014 03:30:00 PM
4 Comments:
Costa Mesa has become the slow zebra.
The MJ folks and the Group Home/Recovery Houses KNOW that CM is weak and they are coming in for the kill.
Costa Mesa is weak now and they ALL know it. Soon, CM will be overrun with MORE recovery houses and the MJ folks will assist in the kill.
BTW, Steve is gonna stammer and stumble at the meeting unless he does a LOT of homework.
I think anyone on a council or a commission who might be alcoholic can probably benefit from medical marijuana.
Steve will also have to cut down on his texting if he's going to attempt to run a meeting.
Just for fun, how many ways will the boys mess this up? I'm guess three lawyers worth.
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