RE: COMPLAINT # 6515 — Objection to Green Cross permit

Dear Mr. Badiner:

As a practicing physician (Internal & Nuclear Medicine), I am deeply concerned that patients enduring pain from medically diagnosed conditions should receive appropriate palliative care. Therefore, I voted in favor of permitting the dispensation of medical marijuana to such patients, with the understanding that they would be screened and supervised, and that the "cannabis clubs" would be licensed and controlled by city agencies.

As a 33-year resident of Fair Oaks Street, I never imagined that my vote would endorse the city’s establishment of a de facto drug dealership in the heart of our close-knit residential community. This, in my observation, is what the Green Cross has become.

I request that you either revoke its license and close the clinic, or relocate it under strict supervision.

Over the past several months, automobile and foot traffic by Green Cross patrons has increased to the point of major congestion in the block outside the clinic on 22nd Street west of Guerrero. Double parking, along with blocked driveways, alleys, and fire hydrants, became so hazardous that Green Cross recently hired a "security guard" to discourage such behavior by its customers. However, the hazard has simply migrated around the corners onto Fair Oaks Street, where it remains a danger to nearby schoolchildren and residents alike.

Worse, Green Cross customers obviously include scores of non-patients, whose "need" arises exclusively on Friday and Saturday afternoons and evenings, and whose interest in cannabis is apparently commercial rather than medical. Hasty exchanges between clinic patrons and waiting drivers are frequent and furtive. While observing such transactions in broad daylight, I have several times been met with openly hostile glares and the gunning of motors, which is intimidating, if not explicitly threatening.

In the past few months, neighboring businesses have been forced to close or limit their operation due to this trafficking. Reports of residential burglaries, hot prowls, and neighborhood break-ins — when residents are at home — have increased. A local man was recently beaten near his restaurant. Fistfights and gunfire have erupted in our formerly peaceful streets.

When will a bystander be caught in the crossfire? When will a child be run over and killed?

Clearly, this "clinic" is in the wrong place, but please don’t dismiss my objections as mere NIMBY-ism. If you decide to permit Green Cross to remain in operation, please relocate it where it can be properly supervised, and where genuine patients can conveniently obtain the relief they need.

Three wheelchair-accessible locations near public transportation include: