No to additional Cannabis Dispensaries in our neighborhood

The undersigned residents oppose the location of additional Cannabis Dispensaries in our neighborhood and respectfully request the Santa Barbara City Council to remove the Downtown area below Cañon Perdido from the area where Cannabis Dispensaries are presently allowed by permit.

We further request that careful police monitoring be done regularly on existing cannabis dispensaries. Rising gang activity, public substance abuse violations involving marijuana usage as well as public alcohol consumption along with other incidents of serious crime activity make our neighborhood an unqualified candidate for more Cannabis Dispensaries.

For example, below are noted two of the City Ordinance Criteria taken from Ordinance # 5449 which our neighborhood cannot meet for the location of a cannabis permit.

“That the proposed location of the Dispensary is not identified by the City Chief of Police as an area of high crime activity (e.g., based upon crime reporting district/statistics as maintained by the Police Department).”

“ That the dispensary would not adversely affect the health, peace, or safety of persons living or working in the surrounding area, overly burden a specific neighborhood, or contribute to a public nuisance; or that the dispensary will generally not result is repeated nuisance activities, including disturbances of the peace, illegal drug activity, cannabis use in public, harassment of passerby, excessive littering, excessive loitering, illegal parking, excessive loud noises especially late at night or early in the morning hours, lewd conduct, or police detentions or arrests.”

So neighborhood citizens may provide public testimony on each and every Cannabis Dispensary application, we request that a Public Notice be sent to the undersigned residents for any application filed to locate a Medical Cannabis Dispensary downtown below Cañon Perdido. Please send these notices until such time as action on this citizen petition is finalized by the Santa Barbara City Council.

To ask residents to constantly appear at public hearings on a case by case application basis when ordinance criteria clearly cannot be met is destabilizing to the well being of our neighborhood and undermines the basic safety measures we are trying to achieve.