Medical marijuana initiative qualifies for Long Beach ballot
(PressTelegram) Long Beach voters can look forward to seeing at least two marijuana-related initiatives on their November ballots.
City Clerk Maria de la Luz Garcia announced Tuesday that supporters of a city initiative seeking to allow medical cannabis dispensaries to operate in Long Beach have collected enough verified signatures to place their measure up for a vote on Nov. 8.
“We are ecstatic. We are very happy,” said Long Beach Collective Association board member Adam Hijazi.
The collective association and United Food and Commercial Workers Local 324, the latter of which seeks to unionize future dispensary workers, are major supporters of the Long Beach ballot measure.
Long Beach’s city government has generally banned medical marijuana dispensaries since 2012. The local measure would tie the number of allowable dispensaries to the city’s population, which is some 474,000 people based on last year’s Census estimate. Roughly 30 dispensaries may be allowable at that population level.
If voters pass both the local and statewide marijuana-related measures, it’s possible for them to exist side by side as complementary regulations, Long Beach Assistant City Attorney Mike Mais said.
For example, Mais said the passage of both measures could result in different tax rates for Long Beach marijuana users depending upon whether they have a medical reason for using cannabis. The local measure would set a 6 percent tax rate for medical marijuana, whereas the Proposition 64 would levy a 15 percent tax charge on recreational marijuana.
