Pot Co-op Vows to Fight City

A judge earlier this month ordered Temecula’s only medical marijuana co-op to stop distributing marijuana, but that doesn’t mean the facility’s doors are closed.

In fact, Cooperative Patients’ Services, Inc., remains very much open and had a few patients stop by on Friday afternoon.

The cooperative is also planning to secure a second location in French Valley – outside the Temecula city limits - where patients can actually receive their medical marijuana while the cooperative battles the city in court for its right to exist.

“We have acquired a satellite location outside the borders of the city boundaries,” said the co-op’s legal affairs director, Douglas Lanphere, on Friday.

He said the temporary restraining order a Superior Court commissioner handed down earlier this month means only that Cooperative Patients' Services cannot distribute or make the medical marijuana available to people in Temecula. Patients can get deliveries or will be able to pick it up at the French Valley satellite location, he said.

Temecula is taking the same legal tact that other cities such as Riverside and Wildomar have pursued in an effort to close medical marijuana establishments in their cities.

Cooperative Patients’ Services is set to return to court on March 30 in an effort to fight the temporary restraining order, Lanphere said. If it loses, Lanphere will seek a stay allowing his establishment to remain open while the case is appealed to the California Court of Appeal for the Fourth District.

Meanwhile, patients can come to the Old Town location for classes on topics such as cultivation, have a consultation there, or see the medical marijuana selection and the displays of skin creams, drinks and brownies that are infused with the drug.

The satellite location where they can actually get their marijuana will be near French Valley Airport in unincorporated Riverside County, Lanphere said. He added that there are five other medical marijuana establishments in that area of French Valley, plus many more around Southwest Riverside County in unincorporated areas near Hemet and Lake Elsinore.

Cooperative Patients’ Services opened in Old Town in January and has more than 550 members, he said. About 75 to 80 percent are Temecula residents, Lanphere said, adding, “That shows the immediate need in this area.”

Most patients are 40 or older and suffer from illnesses including lupus, multiple sclerosis, intestinal disorders, migraines and glaucoma, he said.

“We are serving the true ill people. We love seeing the gray hairs here," Lanphere said.

He said his establishment is not a dispensary but administers a cooperative that helps patients who grow medical marijuana by helping cover their costs of production, such as providing soil or paying for electricity. Patients make their crops available to other patients.

Temecula’s lawyers claim the establishment profits from marijuana sales and violates Temecula’s laws against dispensaries. The city considers it a public nuisance and wants the court to ban the establishment from selling or providing marijuana.

The city also said in its court papers that the city was misled when it granted Cooperative Patients’ Services a business license as it claimed to be a “therapeutic cannabis resource center” in its application but said nothing about making marijuana available to people there.

California voters legalized marijuana use for medicinal uses in 1996 but the city of Temecula has banned dispensaries since 2004.

Lanphere, who has been a medical marijuana activist for a decade and helped to develop a voluntary identification card system for patients so they can avoid arrest, said he doubts Temecula will ever welcome any sort of medical marijuana establishment.

“It’s going to require a court order,” he said.