Recommendation to receive and file a report on the Medicinal and Adult-Use Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act to update the City Council on new State buffer requirements, including youth center and daycare center buffers, for marijuana facilities; and Request City Attorney to draft an ordinance amending Chapter 5.90, Medical Marijuana Businesses, of the Long Beach Municipal Code, to eliminate the 600-foot radius buffer for youth centers, add a 600-foot radius buffer for daycare centers, and establish an exemption from the daycare center buffer requirement for businesses that submit medical marijuana business license applications prior to January 1, 2018. (Citywide)
Report from city manager and city attorney. Recommendation Receive and file a report on the Medicinal and Adult Use Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act to update the City Council on new state buffer requirements, including youth center and daycare center, buffers for marijuana facilities and request the city attorney to draft. An ordinance amending Chapter 5.90. Medical marijuana businesses of the Long Beach Municipal Code Citywide. Okay. Now there's going to be a report, I believe, from the city, from staff. So let's go to go into the report. Thank you. The report, a brief report from AJ Corey. AJ Thanks, Pat. Thank you, Mayor, and members of the City Council. I'm going to go over recent changes to state law governing medical marijuana businesses and the impact those changes will have on where medical marijuana businesses may locate in Long Beach. So until recently, medical marijuana businesses in Long Beach were regulated by two sets of laws. At the state level, the Medical, Cannabis Regulatory and Safety Act, or Mersa at the local level. Long Beach Municipal Code Chapter 5.90, which is approved through Voter Initiative Measure Aims to date. City staff have been relying exclusively on these two sets of laws to guide our medical marijuana business licensing process. In November of last year, California voters approved a second set of laws specifically for recreational marijuana market called the Adult Use of Marijuana Act, or Yuma for short. Because Yuma regulated recreational marijuana businesses, Long Beach staff continue to refer to Mirza and Chapter 5.90 of the Long Beach Municipal Code to implement the local medical marijuana program. However, on June 27th of this year, the state legislature merged regulations for medical and recreational marijuana into a single regulatory framework called the Medical and Adult Use Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act, or MSU CRC. Under this new law, the rules for where medical marijuana businesses may locate changed. Prior to the passage of the MSU CRC medical marijuana businesses in Long Beach were prohibited from operating within 1000 feet from K through 12 schools, 1000 feet from beaches, 600 feet from parks or 600 feet from libraries. We call these buffer requirements under the MSU CRC. The state established two new buffers for medical marijuana businesses a 600 foot buffer for youth centers and a 600 foot buffer for daycare centers. A youth center means any public or private facility that is primarily used to host recreational or social activities for minors. A daycare center means any public or private child daycare facility other than a family daycare home. And includes infant centers, preschools, extended daycare facilities and school aged child care centers. The map on this slide shows where marijuana businesses could locate before youth centers and daycare center buffers were added by the state. To simplify things, we like to say that businesses may locate in any of the areas shaded in Pepto-Bismol pink in the packet in front of you. This map has been broken down by council districts. These maps have also been made available online for viewing by the general public. The map on this slide shows where marijuana businesses can locate after youth and youth center and daycare center buffers are added. The youth and daycare center buffers are shown in red and black colors. Bottom line, including youth daycare center buffers, reduces the total allowable area the medical marijuana businesses may locate by approximately 10% citywide. The States granted local jurisdictions the option to change or eliminate the new buffer requirements for youth center and daycare centers. Using this authority, staff is presenting City Council with the following options. The first option is to do nothing, in which case staff will apply the youth and daycare center buffers retroactively. All the medical marijuana business applications that have been received to date will be reassessed based on these new buffer requirements, and any new applications that violate these buffers will be rejected. The second option is to eliminate the daycare center and youth center buffers. This can be described as the status quo option because it holds medical marijuana businesses to the same buffer requirements originally set forth in measure. Mm. The third option is to affirm the youth and daycare center buffers as defined by the state, but to make them effective January 1st, 2018. This provides a window for businesses who have already applied or taken steps to apply to continue through the licensing process under the same set of buffers buffer requirements as before. This option will also provide fair warning to property owners and future applicants well in advance of the new buffers taking effect. The fourth option is to eliminate youth center buffers, affirm daycare center buffers, and have the daycare center buffers become effective. January 1st, 2018. Staff is recommending option number four, so I'm going to go over this option in more detail on the next slide. The recommended option would eliminate youth center buffers for a number of reasons. First, the state left the definition of youth center extremely open ended. It's not at all clear what qualifies a facility as primarily serving minors. Youth center facilities might include karate studios, swimming classes, music classes, dance studios, painting classes, gymnastics programs, birthday party rooms, and so on. Second, there's no reliable database on youth center locations in Long Beach. They're not required to register with the state, and the city does not track businesses at this level. Third, youth center locations frequently change, and the marijuana buffer map would need to change with them. And finally, each designation of a youth center could be open to legal challenges that would tie up our licensing process and require significant staff resources to resolve the recommended option would. However, a firm daycare center buffers day care centers are clearly defined by state law. They're licensed by the state and easily tracked on the state's Department of Social Services website. Recognizing daycare centers will also correct for a deficiency of our local initiative measure MM which recognized kindergartens as buffers but not preschools. With this recommendation, new medical marijuana businesses will no longer be able to open close to a preschool or other types of child care facilities. Finally, by setting an effective date of January 1st, 2018, the recommended option will provide businesses with sufficient time to adjust before the new buffers take effect. This will ensure a fair treatment of applicants who have acted in good faith prior to the passage of the new CRC, but who would otherwise be rejected due to the new buffer requirements. And that concludes my presentation, and I'm available to answer any questions. Thank you. Mr.. Mr.. City Attorney Giovanni. Some additional comments to this. Note at this time. We're available to answer your question. Okay, great. Thank you. So I'm going to take this back to the city council. I have a two speaker so far. If you want to speak, please let me know. Councilwoman Mungo's first. City staff have been using a GIS model to determine these 600 feet margins instead of survey reports. Why is that? And what can we do to change that practice to be more accurate for the residents? So fairly early on in the application process, we settled on using the gas system to measure distances between buffers. We were anticipating hundreds of applications and we would have to measure those applications against hundreds of more buffers throughout the city. And so we also were facing an aggressive timeline set forth in that ordinance to complete our application review process. And so, given all of those competing priorities, we settled on a measurement tool that is accurate. It's accurate, we're told, by tech services down to a foot or two, depending on the distances that you're measuring. And that method, once we settled on it, had to be consistently applied across all applicants in order to be fair and consistent in our our measuring tool. Well, I'd like to add a friendly. Well, I'd like to make the motion that within option one, that all priority one and priority two applicants should be surveyed that are within 50 feet of the required buffer and on non-priority properties that should be surveyed that are within the 50 feet of the required additional 500 foot buffer, that's required to score maximum points on the non-priority application. Vice Mayor if I can that that's not on the agenda this evening. To add that in addition, we'd have to come back and have a discussion with that. We can't add that to what the council item is this evening. The council item tonight is talking about buffers. Can we include in the friendly amendment the way in which those buffers are measured? The I think the answer is no at this time. You have to. We could certainly bring something back to direct staff to change how they calculate the buffers. However, I think what AJ is saying, and I think he's doing a good job saying it, is that staff had to make a selection and there isn't, as far as I know, any issue that calls into question the accuracy of the GIS system. It's accurate to 1 to 2 feet. So I would assume that you have some reason to believe that the survey is more accurate. I don't have that information. So residents in the community, when this item posted on the agenda, stated that they're concerned about some of the buffers, that the GIS includes an area of availability that is within five feet and they would like it surveyed. And so if we're going to be looking at these the intent of the voters and in this case the state legislature is very clear that they'd like it to be accurate. And so my only thought would be when we apply any buffers. I understand the staff's perspective that they want to do the most efficient opportunity. But those locations that are within and I started with 50 feet, but the front of a home in the fifth District is 50 feet. If we want to go to a more citywide standard of ten feet or whatever, we'd like it to be. But within one home length, those should be done accurately. And so in discussing buffers, I'm open to asking the staff to bring that back at a future date. But in discussing buffers, how they're measured seems to be appropriate, whether it's through the original or the new buffers. So that would be my comment at this time. Right? So we can come back to council with that. We might ask to play with the distances a little bit. I think 50 feet. We can be very confident in our system to those distances, but if it's a smaller amount, say five or ten feet even, it might be doable within the timeline set forth in the ordinance . And it would be very, very few locations. I think even telling us it would be three locations or it would be 40 locations, I think that's a big difference. But if it is three or four locations, it'd be a minimal amount of effort to ensure that taxpayers are protected. Our immediate concern tonight was their intent. Thank you. Great. Thank you very much. Next up is Vice Mayor Richardson. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So I want to I want to make a motion here, but and I want to add some comments. But I wanted to start off. Councilwoman Mongo. Was that was that motion to that motion to have a second? Is that the main motion on the floor? I don't think she made a motion. Okay. I'll try to integrate what you have. Wonderful. Into the motion here. Thank you, sir. Okay, so the first question is, I see a number of maps in it, and it's one map that has as what it is today with no action. And the other map has both the buffers. I would love to have seen the map and I looked at and deduced it, but the map that actually represents the recommendation today would have been really helpful. And I don't know if that if other people would have that would be helpful to others, too, but I would have liked to have seen that my motion here for a couple of reasons. I'm going I want to support the staff recommendation here. Option four. And firstly, I think, you know, I believe I introduced the, the concept when we were thinking about passing our own council driven motion, the concept of, of child care centers, daycare centers originally. And we, we went through this whole conversation about how do you define them? And it's interesting to see that across the state, other people are starting to have that same conversation and that you and our city attorney and other cities across the state have finally come to a really trackable definition of child care centers or daycare centers . So the fact that staff has that recommendation really shows is along the spirit of how this conversation has gone across the city. And and, you know, and as it relates to the other option, the ambiguity, I really given this was a vote, given the fact this is a voter driven initiative, I would be feel very hesitant to include the other element if we're not concrete on how we enforce it. Because I don't want to steer away from what the voters, the voter intent, the voters, you know, took action on this. And I want to make sure if we're going to go in and further prescribe things, we should be rock solid on that. So a motion is staff's recommendation of number four. Now, I want to add to that. That's the that's my emotions that are second. Okay, so move. Second. To second. Councilman Mongo. Okay. Now, in terms of, you know, it goes into effect January one and I know that the rules begin to change around recreational and I know that, you know, city attorney we've. I brought this to you about, you know, there are issues related to how those work. And if you could just sort of elaborate on those conversations and where you think we should go from here in terms of how we address what happens in January and some of the hot topics we discussed and what steps we might need to take to make sure that we have some clarity. Thank you, Mayor. Members of council. Vice mayor. Yes. The as you mentioned, the state is working on regulations for commercial cannabis regulations. It's estimated that they will. Hope it's hopeful that they'll be January 1st of 18. It may be somewhat a little bit after that before those regulations are issued. And so at some point between today and the end of the year, staff will need to come back to council to get direction from the city council to see if the city council is has a desire to allow cannabis, commercial cannabis in the city of Long Beach. And under what conditions you would like to see that that activity regulated, which would include what zones you may want it in or located, and any and all buffers that you would want applied to the commercial cannabis. So the item before you this evening is limited to the medical marijuana businesses and MGM. As you mentioned, as being a citizens driven initiative, we are unable to craft a buffer other than what the state has drafted without going back to an amendment for the people. So and there is no way or availability of the as someone who is interested in commercial cannabis to apply at this time to Long Beach. So we envision or our office envisions that that a staff item will be coming back to the council to get further direction from you. And at that time you can give us direction on buffers and and or zoning. Thank you. And in terms of timing, you mentioned between now and the end of the year, so we can make sure that we're prepared before it goes into effect. Do you imagine you anticipate that this would this conversation would begin around the time this would this item before, so need to come back for first a second reading , right? That is correct. If the item passes this evening as your motion, we would prepare the ordinance and it would come back to as an amendment to 5.90, and it would come back to you as first and second reading. Okay. So when would we anticipate so if that's a first and a second, we probably take about how long to bring that back for the first and say it would probably take two. Maybe 30 days at the most. Okay. Then it would be first and second reading and then it would not go into effect until January 1st of 2018 as far as anybody who is in the system or has applied by that day. Understood. And at that point, after the second reading is when we pick up the conversation on recreational, is that the way you would anticipate. That final commercial? Yes. On commercial, yes, sir. Yeah. Okay. So that I'm satisfied there. And if we could somewhere in that timeline, answer those questions that Councilwoman Mongeau had, you know, given that this motion is very you know, we have to, you know, given Brown act limited to what we're discussing here. When we come back to talk have a larger conversation about buffers, I would like to learn more about what Councilwoman Mongeau raised. So thank you so much. Thank you. I have a couple more speakers. Can I have a clarification question, Mr. City Attorney, off of the motion on the floor. I want to make sure that I understand that well, how I know that the the voter approved ordinance, which was which was approved by the voters, set out a variety of things, including buffers, as well as the process of the application, including the application process as well for dispensaries and so forth. How what is the impact to the dispensaries that are already in the application process and how does for affect or not affect that process? Mayor, members of the Council, thank you. And Jake, jump in here, too. But my my interpretation is that those people who are in the system and this would be similar to the council adopting a moratorium and you have people who are in the process or have submitted applications would be exempt or would remain in the in the process and not be locked out, if you will. So the anyone who has already applied or applies between today's date and the end of 2017 would not have the 600 foot buffer applied to their location. And so anyone who applies after January 1st of 2018, this 600 foot buffer would go into effect. So essentially there's a grandfathering that happens. That's correct. So we believe that that's fair to treat the folks that have been working with the city and applied in good faith and have been part of the system and in the system not to change the rules in the middle of the application process. Okay. Thank you for that clarification. Moving on to Councilwoman Janine Pearce. Thank you. Sure. You guys can hear me. You can hear me. Okay. I want to commend staff for. The work that you guys have done. I also want to say how much I appreciate you coming out to the neighborhood association meetings and working with folks in the industry to make sure that we're the ones that are going online, are working closely with the neighborhoods. So just overall, I think staff on this has gone above and beyond what happened last time. And so I really just want to say thank you for that, too, is I wanted to ask I know that whenever the discussion around the medical initiative was coming up and there was looking at day care centers, do has staff run a number to see if we went with option number four how many new shops would be able to locate, like how many how much buffer space in between? Because I know it limits how many we would be able to have open in the in the city. Right. Well, the the number of dispensaries that will open in the city is capped at 32. We will be a. Medical or recreational just medical. Okay. So when recreational comes online. When recreational comes online, that city council has the ability to make that decision. It could be fewer as many as city council wanted. Right. So I guess I'll I'll ask the question offline around the buffer zones because I believe that because we would be adding in the daycare centers that it would limit the number that we would could have in the city. So just don't want community members to feel like because recreational is coming online that and that we're looking at the zones again that there be an opportunity for more shops to open. So again, maintaining the number of 32 for medical and not increasing recreational add couple of comments on that. So look. I'm good, I'm good with that. And then I just want to say I support the motion on the floor. And you know, when we're talking about measuring, just making sure that is a small number, that it's around ten because we don't want to be able to have to go back and have a tough conversation with those that already have their licenses. So support the motion on the floor. Thank you. Thank you. Next up, we have Councilwoman Susie Price, remote location. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So I do support the motion. I just have a couple of comments on it, obviously. I mean, I think that our city has worked really hard to operate in good faith as we work with the business owners who have rightfully submitted applications as a result of a voter initiative. And I think that the practical realities that arise as a result of our Voter Pass initiative make any integration of state recommended buffers for state mandated buffers a challenge for us, both from an ethical standpoint, as we have been partners with these businesses with certain expectations, but also in my opinion from a legal standpoint as well, the state has obviously come out with buffer distances around daycares, which I wholeheartedly agree with and youth centers. And we're trying our best to implement the state law in a way that's most practical based on the restrictions that we have. So when evaluating the to assess and looking at the options, I think option one, in my opinion, it's unfair to the businesses that have acted in good faith with the city and followed the rules as they were set out by the voters and measure em. And I believe that they would be penalized through no fault for any action of their own. We had a meeting of the minds when they submitted their applications, and by changing the standards at this point, the amount of money that they paid for, for rent or purchase of property and the investments and tenant improvements that they have made would all be lost as a result of no negligence or deficiency on their part. So option number one is an option for me. Option number two, in my opinion, is not ideal because it doesn't accept any recommendation from the state which seeks to address the impacts that occur on communities near businesses. So I'm not in favor of option two. Option three, although the timeline for implementation of this option is appropriate, the inclusion of youth centers is not workable due to the vagueness of the definition, as AJ has stated. And even if this is this the state's definition was broadened, it would require the tracking of business type, which we do not currently have based on an unclear definition of youth matters. And it implies, based on everything I just mentioned in his staff report, that we would need voter approval for this, which would really frustrate and complicate what has already taken place in regards to our medical imaging option for is the best option, as it in my opinion, seeks to follow the state law around daycare centers. So that can be reasonably seen as the goal of voters to keep buffer zones and in effect for young children, typically as young as kindergarten, it seems reasonable to apply the similar. But for children younger than kindergarten as well as the Jay already stated, realistically, if someone would vote to protect a five year old, then they would also vote to protect a four year old from the same impacts, whatever those may be options for the need to. The vaguely defined youth centers set up a definition for youth centers, an option for also treating businesses that have begun this process fairly by not implementing this until January of 2018. In my opinion, this option represents the choice that strikes the middle ground that we must find in order to address the point of state law while being realistic about what works best here. Given that we have our own voter initiative that is already in the process to implement now I did hear comments from my colleagues regarding when recognition comes online. I have my own note about whether or not Long Beach should be opening up to the commercial marijuana market. And as you can imagine, my approach would probably be for us to allow the medical market need for a while. If we were to adopt the commercial market. Having said that, I think this stuff should apply to any medical establishment that seeks to convert to recreational should the city vote to allow recreational or commercial use in the future. I know that's not on the table right now, but should any of the current medical marijuana dispensaries choose to convert to recreation? If Beach allowed recreation and I believe the expanded buffers of youth centers and daycare centers should apply to that those existing medical marijuana dispensaries so that the state's intent is in effect for commercial sale . Those are my thoughts. I want to start I want to recap the recommendations and for talking with my team frequently on this issue in the past few days. I appreciate it. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Councilman Austin. Thank you and aloha. Councilmember Price. This has been an evolving issue for the last several years. I've been on the council for five years and I think a ban went into place about two weeks or so before I took office. And I've seen many machinations of the medical marijuana policy. It has been a moving target and I'm glad that the state has given us some guidelines to work with because it has been very difficult to create a local policy and to come to a consensus. This item I will be supporting because it just makes good sense. I think it's morally correct. This is a an issue that was debated and argued before this city council, I want to say a year and a half ago, two years ago, and we couldn't come to consensus on it. And so I'm glad that that the state has given us an antidote to to work with, and that there seems to be a consensus here among the council that this is the right thing to do. At least restricting daycare centers is, I think, like I said, morally correct for us and respecting also the will of the voters . And so I will support this. This continues. You know, one of the arguments that has been made for many years on this issue is local control over our land use. This provides that for us as well. And so it checks the boxes that that concern me. But also I think of honors the will of the voters here in the city of Long Beach. And I look forward to having the extended conversation about recreational. Very so. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Next up is Councilman Andrews. Yes, thank you, Vice Mayor. I am definitely going to support this item. And I would I really would like you know, since I've been here, along with anyone, you know, dealing with this marijuana issue is that we're finally getting to the point that we should have been a long time ago, because I think we've been really seriously just kind of where can I tell? I'd like to thank all the applicants who started off when I started out with it, who went above and beyond and gone along with everything in which the city's asked them to do. And I want to thank every one of you guys. So I think we're close to being where we should be. And thank the vice mayor again for bringing this forward. I think that with. Excuse me and Mrs. Price, please hurry home. We miss you. Vice Mayor Quigley, just the just the question. Do you think we can get those maps? So, yeah. Okay. And how about, you know, as people progress through the process, I'd love to hear I'd love to get that map start to identify the folks who are continuing through the process on a more regular basis. So maybe it's time for that time to start doing more regular check ups now that we're at this point in the process, at least for my district. So I hope we can pick up this conversation next week, I'm sure. Thanks. We have a list online that we'll turn them in the maps. I'm sorry, we have a list online for the businesses in the process, but we'll make them. On the map. Yeah, I would love to plug. I saw the list. It's kind of hard to. Yeah, right. I mean, it was a lot of applications, so I'd love to see the ones that are advancing so we can start wrapping our minds around this conversation with some of our community members. Thanks. Thank you, Councilwoman Mongo. When staff made the decision on the cut off date, was January selected because that's on the state date and it goes into effect? Or is there a reason why September 1st or October 1st wasn't selected? It was just a date that aligned with the day that the state would begin issuing licenses. With the state. Wonderful. Thank you. Thank you. Will take public comment. There's a motion on the floor. Please come forward. Very good. You echoing the comments that were made last week? I think the city. Did not in good faith, went forward, but they really didn't do their due diligence in providing buffer zones. That I referenced before and it should be in every district should have these. I.e. you certainly don't put it next to a school. Other places as you have listed. But I think it's it's naive to think and shows that it wasn't given the thought that he should have been given that where those kids go, the routes they take to and from school, and particularly the locations they go to after school . And I'm using in the example the in Belmont Shore, the Rite Aid drugstore, where they go for ice cream or a block or the other way. The Jack in the Box. Every district has that type of thing, and that's up to the district, to, you know, your neighborhoods. And you've got to isolate and find out where those kids go. And I as I said yesterday, the Port of Long Beach and last week, I think we can get the Port of Long Beach to fund whatever legal challenges need to be, undertake and take in and take it, if need be, to the United States Supreme Court . So we don't have the kids sandwiched in between cavalcade of perverts. To smoke marijuana. I don't care if it's medical or recreational, as far as I'm concerned. If they want if they want to set up a place on the ninth floor, the 10th floor of the city hall next to the jail, fine, but certainly not in your neighborhoods. And nobody would, when they think about it, it has any sense of decency would allow that to be placed in neighborhoods where kids. Are going. So give that some thought and get the port on board. And I think they'll do that just to spend whatever is necessary, to spend whatever necessary to take that challenge, to take it up to the United States Supreme Court if necessary. Thank you. Hi. My name is DeLuca. I am. Well, I have a business in the third district. I have a preschool. So I come here as a citizen, as a mother, as a preschool owner who has 60 children every year. And I'm really happy to hear the morality behind all of your your views here in support of having the buffer zone for preschools and daycare centers. So that's why I was here, to protect my preschool in my business. And, you know, not everyone has the same view with medical marijuana. And I wouldn't want parents having a judgment on my school and then not providing a brilliant service to these children in my district. Now that we've established that preschools are already included. Now, my concern is obviously youth centers as a mother as well. And my suggestion or maybe even query is how can we defined youth centers? Do karate places, do swimming academies have to apply for licenses under the license of a youth center? I don't know. That seems to be a lot of ambiguity with buffers as well as definitions. And I think those all need to be established and ascertained before any decisions are made. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Diane Alekhine's advocates for disability rights. The very first question I have is why don't we have these same buffers around all of the alcohol distributors? I don't get it. Alcohol kills. Alcohol is a very bad drug and I just don't get it. It seems like to me that every opportunity this council has thrown something into the into the works. I mean, these this initiative that the they put forward was voted on by the voters. It has been voted on in statewide. It's been voted countywide. It's been voted here in the city. Mm. And then you keep talking about M-A, which is the taxes that you will get from these sick and dying people and how you're going to spend it. And yet it seems like every time you just demonize it is not a bad thing. It is a medical we're talking medical use. Okay. And and to keep demonizing, I mean, do you actually picture parents are going to be letting their little kids go to daycares alone? I mean, they're going to be with them just like any. Just like if they took them into a restaurant, they saw people drinking. Well, are we going to ban them now from going in, taking their children into those? I mean, how do they deal with that? They explain it. But to to demonize it and to put so many restrictions on after these people jump through hoops have asked, I mean, who are you representing? Are you representing the people? Because the people have voted already and they did not have those two buffers, but they voted. So if you actually I my favor would be to go to number two. But anything other than that, you were going against what the voters have said they want. So who are you representing? Are you really representing the voters? That's what you need to do. And we need to stop demonizing. It's not a bad thing. Medical marijuana is there for good reason. Thank you very much. Thank you. Next week, a police. Mr. Mayor and. City council members, thank you for the opportunity to speak this evening. My name is Bill Loucks. I'm a Long Beach resident, and I also own a cannabis manufacturing business that I look forward to moving back, moving to Long Beach, to be closer to my home. My company is actively involved with the BCA and we donated money and the use of my employees to help the initiative get passed. Regarding the issue at hand, it's my understanding that this is an optional thing that the city can choose to do or not do. And regarding adopting this state buffer, my contention is that any major changes to the voter initiative that are not mandated by the. State should be put back to the voters to decide if their. Initiative is to be modified. I'm uncertain if the city has a legal right to go in. And just change it. However, from a. Moral standpoint, I think it's only fair the voters spoke. They asked for this to be passed. It passed. If it's to be modified this way, I think it should go back to the voters on the next election. In the meantime. I would encourage. You to stop putting up roadblocks that will prevent business owners from finally getting open and generating revenue and also generating tax revenue for the city. I'm old enough to remember when when cities used to. Welcome and help new businesses come to their community. And somewhere along the line, this seems to have changed. And now most cities seem to be in an adversarial position to businesses. This is a major factor, in my opinion, as to why, you know, they started keeping records back in 1960 and for the first time since 1960, we have more small businesses closing than opening in this country. Remember, small businesses employ the most people in this country. And and I think putting up more unnecessary rules will only help to make this. Birth death rate get worse. And we need jobs in this community as we do all over the state and country. I would encourage you to take a bold stand to become partners with new businesses trying to open up and Long Beach and not make it more difficult for us to come here and get it open. I think it would make the city a much better place to work and living. Thank you. Thank you. And I'm going to go ahead and close the speakers list after these two gentlemen. Go ahead, sir. Hello. My name is Elliot Lewis. I have three ownership interest in three dispensaries in Long Beach. Just wanted to touch on a few issues, a lot of which was already said. But just to kind of get an understanding of where some of us are at in the process, you know, we've complied with with all the rules. We worked with staff. Jay and Emily have been great. I've reached out to city officials, to the local business area. I'm already in the, you know, the middle of building my store down on Second Street, spared no expense spent, you know, quite a bit of money on it. You know, I just think at this point to throw you centers and daycares and it doesn't actually personally, you know, affect any of my stores. I just think that, you know, for other people that are in the same place that have complied, done everything that they should to throw you centers and daycare in the mix would be inappropriate. And then, you know, touching on the youth center issue. I have the best, you know, marijuana attorneys and consultants in the business. And they've been unable to tell me because, you know, after this issue came up, we went back to the map. We wanted to make sure that all our properties were clear of these potential new additional buffers. And the best attorneys, the people who are most in touch with Sacramento, who are up there every week, can't tell you what a youth center is. So I think on that issue, the ambiguity is just so ridiculous. It's kind of a a no brainer. Just one other thing to bring up about the daycares is something to think about. And, you know, I'm, you know, I think too would I'd be leaning for I get the fallback position but what's going to happen if you include daycares in this initiative? You know, people are just going to go around and buy up daycares. You know, the marijuana businesses tend to be lucrative. Daycares tend to be less lucrative, not in all cases. So I think you would you would end up have, you know, happening is it you know, marijuana businesses will go around buying up daycares. The the end result would be that there would be less daycares. And, you know, we're really appreciative that the you know, the voters voted for the medical side. I don't want to put the cart before the horse, but I wanted to touch on the recreational issue. Look, of the 32 stores that are going to be opened, those spots were selected with, you know, a set of ground ground rules that we believed that we were selecting those spots out of. So I think once the 32 stores are determined and, you know, however they get determined to then apply a daycare buffer or a use center buffer on a recreational basis, you're just picking winners and losers. It's an arbitrary thing done after the fact. So I think all medical facilities, if they do have an opportunity to become recreational, we don't know what's going to happen. But I think picking winners and losers out of that group would be problematic as well. But I want to say one last thing. I really appreciate the staff, everybody that, you know, we've worked with over at the city. I think the implementation of the program has been. Thank you so much. Your time is really nice. Thank you so much. Next, our final speaker. Go ahead. I agree with Dee Andrews and. Staff has done a good job. I really don't care which option you take. You know, I know that with the I've I've been an athlete and I've been in some very high security areas where you can't. I never had the pleasure of actually enjoying marijuana. But all of my friends that have tried it, I've never seen any major issues with it. I've had some friends that have had some medical issues and it's really helped them settle their stomachs and stuff like that. So I know particularly a guy named Jeff that had Hodgkin's, it really helped him. So I know the benefits of what it can do. Despite what a lot of people say in high school, I think I was the only guy that never smoked it. You know, I was a square, you know. So you're not going to keep it out of some of these institutions where no matter what you do, the kids are going to find it. They're better at finding it than than the police, you know, they just do it. So all I'm saying is, I know you guys are going to make the right decision and whichever way you go and I'm going to keep it short and say thanks for your service and thanks for the presentation, everything looks great. I also agree with all the concerns that Councilman Price iterated on. Thanks. Thank you. With that, we have a motion and a second which is to go with number for anything. Additionally, Vice Mayor. Okay, we're going to go ahead and there's no other public comment. So roll call vote. Councilwoman Gonzalez, Councilmember Pierce, Councilwoman Pryce. Here. Is that a yay. Oh, yay. Sorry. Councilmember Super now. Councilwoman Mongo guy Councilman Andrews. Council member Your Honor. Councilman Austin. Vice Mayor Richardson. Okay. Motion carries. Thank you very much. And thank you all for that. Came for the item. Item number six, please.