5.08.1770 Findings.
The city council adopts this article and amends CMC 20.08.010 to add the definitions for “medical marijuana dispensary” and “medical marijuana cultivation” set forth under CMC 20.08.010 based on the testimony, reports and/or other supporting materials presented to the city council during the first and/or second reading of the ordinance adopting those provisions. The city council also makes the following findings in support of its decision to adopt this article and amend CMC 20.08.010 to include the definitions for “medical marijuana dispensary” and “medical marijuana cultivation” set forth under CMC 20.08.010:
(1) The voters of the state of California approved Proposition 215 (codified as Health and Safety Code Section 11362.5 et seq., and entitled “The Compassionate Use Act of 1996”).
(2) The intent of Proposition 215 was to enable persons who are in need of marijuana for medical purposes to be able to obtain and use marijuana without fear of state criminal prosecution under limited, specified circumstances.
(3) The California legislature enacted S.B. 420 in the year 2004 in an effort to clarify the scope of the Compassionate Use Act of 1996 and to assist cities and other governing bodies in the adopting and enforcement of rules and regulations consistent with S.B. 420.
(4) Neither Proposition 215 nor S.B. 420 expressly authorize “medical marijuana dispensaries” or “cultivation facilities” as defined under this chapter.
(5) The Federal Controlled Substances Act, 21 U.S.C. Section 841, makes it unlawful to manufacture, distribute, dispense or possess marijuana.
(6) The United States Supreme Court in Gonzales v. Raich (2005) 125 S.Ct. 2195 ruled that the Controlled Substances Act applies even in states such as California which have medical marijuana laws. In March of 2007, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, in revisiting the Raich matter on remand from the United States Supreme Court’s 2005 decision, found that the use of medical marijuana was not a fundamental right protected under the Fifth and Ninth Amendments of the United States Constitution.
(7) Accordingly, medical marijuana dispensaries and cultivation facilities are illegal under federal law.
(8) The illegality of medical marijuana dispensaries and cultivation facilities under federal law notwithstanding, such operations also generate serious negative secondary impacts which unduly burden the communities in which they are located; threaten public peace; and otherwise undermine efforts to safeguard the health, safety and welfare of the public at large. These negative secondary impacts outweigh whatever medical benefits may reasonably be attributed to the use of marijuana by the limited number of patients who reside in Cudahy: (a) who are legitimately prescribed marijuana under legitimate circumstances by bona fide physicians; and (b) who might actually patronize such an establishment.
(9) The negative secondary impacts referenced above include burglaries, robberies, violence, increased vandalism, illegal sales of marijuana to, and use of marijuana by, minors and other persons without medical need in the areas immediately surrounding such medical marijuana dispensaries and cultivation facilities. (Ord. 621 § 2, 2012).