[420 Girl]

CA: The city has approved nine business licenses for medical marijuana dispensaries, despite a proposed city ordinance that caps the number at six.

One city official said La Puente's strict code, which goes into effect Friday, will force out dispensaries that can't keep up with the city's numerous building, health and safety rules.

"The filters were set in place that the people have to be ready, professional and legitimate," said Mayor Louie Lujan, who noted the city was expecting a last-minute rush of applicants. "The system will weed out those that shouldn't be operating."

Simply put, a business license isn't enough to operate, he said.

As of Tuesday, La Puente has approved nine licenses and three applications are pending, according to city planner Guillermo Arreola.

That's more than any other city in the San Gabriel Valley.

Ever since the ordinance was crafted in December, future dispensary owners rushed to open up shop.

Last month, La Puente capped the number of dispensaries at six because five applications had been approved and one was pending.

Since then, a second rash of applicants came forward.

Last week, the city had only six approved dispensaries and five applications awaited a sign-off from City Hall.

At least three of the approved dispensaries are open, owners said.

"I'm disappointed in the fact that we attempted to have an ordinance that closed the hatch on this and limited it," Councilman David Argudo said. "However, that ordinance did not kick into effect until Friday, therefore we're stuck with this due to poor planning."

Argudo said that for a city of La Puente's size, 3.2-square miles, six dispensaries is excessive.

It is unclear how the city will handle nearly a dozen dispensaries when the proposed ordinance requires that "no more than six medical marijuana cooperatives or collectives shall be permitted to operate in the City at any one time."

Deputy City Attorney Ellin Davtyan, who handles the medical marijuana regulations, didn't return a call Tuesday for comment.

If all the approved dispensaries meet the necessary building and safety requirements, the city would evaluate them on a case-by-case basis, Lujan said.

Lujan, who said he doesn't believe all the dispensaries would eventually open, noted that it would be "survival of the fittest."

The city has yet to make the the approved and pending applications available for review.

City Clerk Amy Turner said Tuesday it could take days to redact personal information from the applications.

Citing sections of the California Public Records Act and case law, City Attorney Rick Olivarez said the city isn't required to provide the applications right away because they contain "sensitive information."

One legal expert said the city efforts to make the applications public should last only a "couple days."

"There may be some confidential financial information, bank accounts and social security numbers, but that shouldn't take long," said Peter Scheer, the executive director executive director of the First Amendment Coalition, a San Rafael-based nonprofit public interest group. "Those applications are standard and they should be pretty straight forward."

Scott Noelte, one of the four people who runs the Green Comfort Collective on Fairgrove Avenue, said he didn't understand what the city was doing by allowing nine dispensaries.

"I thought that having a limit was good," Noelte said. "But stick to that limit. These things are not by definition bad, but having one on every block is."

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