Yesterday, SFWeekly reported that the Hemp Center, located at 4811 Geary between 12th Avenue and Funston, is the latest target of federal crackdowns on medical marijuana dispensaries in California.
The building’s landlord received a letter from U.S. Attorney Melinda Haag, warning of “property seizures and prison sentences if the dispensary was not shut down”.
The Hemp Center has been in operation since 1999, and in its current Geary location for the past 11 years. It is licensed by the city’s Department of Public Health, however the medical cannabis industry is still federally illegal. Letters like the one Haag sent to the Hemp Center have closed down eight other San Francisco dispensaries since October 2011.
“The letter cites a park, 900 feet away, as the reason why the dispensary is targeted for closure,” dispensary operator Kathleen Capetti told SFWeekly.
According to state law, cannabis dispensaries cannot be within 600 feet of schools or recreation centers which serve youth. San Francisco law requires a 1,000-foot barrier between those uses, but does not specifically address city parks.
The only city park within 1,000 feet of the The Hemp Center is the Park Presidio greenbelt, which is technically a city park but not a highly recreational one. Most residents would be hard-pressed to find children playing among the greenery. The next closest park is the one behind the Richmond District Branch Library on 10th Avenue.
On its website, the Hemp Center writes, “Our experienced budtenders and state-of-the-art vaporizing equipment are only a few of the things that make The Hemp Center so unique. Our spacious club, incomparable amenities, and comfortable Caribbean atmosphere makes getting well a truly inspiring adventure.”
And that’s another unique feature of the Geary Street dispensary – they allow on-site smoking (or vaporizing at it’s also called). The Hemp Center is also the only dispensary in the Richmond or Sunset Districts (grow houses aside, ahem).
Dispensary owner Kathleen Capetti is vowing to fight the threatened closure, telling SFWeekly, “Obama promised they wouldn’t go after the clubs that are in compliance… Now they’re just going after people willy-nilly.”
What do you think? Should the dispensary be allowed to remain in business? Leave a comment to let us know.
Sarah B.
What a shame. This unmarked building and its furtive customers brought a unique kind of festive sketchiness to the Richmond.
My favorite line – “Our spacious club, incomparable amenities, and comfortable Caribbean atmosphere makes getting well a truly inspiring adventure.” Definitely looks like an adventure from the Google Street view image…
My issues with this club have nothing to do with children… I know I don’t like waiting for the bus or walking past here when ‘clients’ are around… I am totally fine with medical marijuana for those who need it for health reasons, but I’d be surprised if the clientele here actually have legitimate needs.
These places really need to be licensed on a state or federal level.
Rant over!
The Hemp Center is a pillar of the community for over a decade. It’s a truly compassionate organization with deep local support from neighbors who are both rich and powerful and poor and needy. Kathleen, the owner, is a figurehead of the medical marijuana movement since it began. The sociopathic, rogue US NorCal AG is operating in defiance of her mandate from the President and against the wishes of CA state politicians from Gov Brown on down. What the Feds are doing here is the kind of bully fascism that Americans need to stand against. The SF Weekly ran a front page article last week about UCSF/etc oncologists who have 96% stage 4 cancer remission rates with medical marijuana treatment. It’s The New Great Depression but the DEA has money to jackboot legitimate Prop 215 patient clubs? Why does the pharmaceutical industry not want anyone to get together and commiserate and cure their cancer with some weed you can grow in the backyard? The DEA lady here is a hate crimer of the worst stripe.
I was really hoping with the First Lady’s health food campaign, the President/Feds were going to take aim at the JITB’s cuisine a few blocks east.
Really? Come on now. If we are gonna keep this government thing, shouldn’t it go back to being a government for the people, by the people? Seriously though folks, can we stand to lose another business on Geary? With the target coming in autumn, Geary will be a wasteland.
I know the place is a good neighbor because I didn’t even know it was there!
What BS. The government should chase after people that commit actual crimes. Station a bunch of federal agents out at hunters point; but don’t go hole in the wall where people are doing nothing wrong.
California needs to take a stand. Support Lt. Gov. Newsome and legalize. C’mon California, we’re counting on you. Prohibition has got to end.
Ridiculous. That “green belt” is as much a park as North Beach is a beach. The Feds are wasting time and taxpayer money. I lived directly across the street from the dispensary for 10 years and never had any problem with it or its clientele.
Yeah, that fully security bar encrusted frontage really says welcome to the neighborhood to me. Very inviting.
Obama is clearly renigging on the promises that got him elected, as a registered voter that helped him obtain office, my disappointment is growing exponentially in a wave of multiplying factors. It would be extreamly refreshing to have a president reach office and stand ground, refusing to become a special intrest puppet, perhaps a woman is needed. Money holds way to much influence in todays society. Cannabis is illegal because it is such a versitile, renewable resource, able to be grown in the harshest of conditions it holds solutions for problems in the biggest money making industies from medical, fossil fuel suplimentation, industrial fabrics of the highest quality, tobacco, liquor, even chemistry (as hemp oil can be used in plastics for instance). Any one of these industries has enough at stake to want Cannabis too stay a schedual one drug. Combined, they have been unable to exterminate the speices in the almost 100 yrs of false propaganda. A new age of the people is rising to regain peace and Cannabis users have a strong will, our voice will NOT be ignored, nor will it receade, be stiffled or concealed. Those of us who remain imprisoned are not forgotten, they are martyrs whos sacrifice is in my mind the very least most are prepared to make for a Natural Herb obviously here as NATURES solution to most synthetics. We should be ashamed as a spieces to have allowed a herd mentality on most subjects. I encourage EVERYONE TO QUESTION ATHORITIES MOTIVES! WHO GAINES THE MOST FROM THE WAR ON DRUGS? Government! Newsflash! Government has never held a more precarious position in all history. Anyone honestly believe government makes life easier? If every politician disappeared in a poof of smoke, along with every member of law enforcement, the ensueing harsh conditions while uncooperative thugs are exterminated would be a brief cleansing and trim world population back to a sustainable level. Greed and slothfulness have gotten us here, standing for what is right will deliver us results we CAN LIVE WITH, EVEN THRIVE IN! STOP THINKING INDIVIDUALLY, IMMEDIATE ACTION IS REQUIRED IF WE ARE TO EVER SEE THE PARADISE we were given to start with. This is clearly an issue rooted in each of us, I am not the first, but for certain, I am willing to go to great lengths or live unimagineable horrors and/or pain to get my fellow humans to wake up ralley together and make this world BETTER THAN IT WAS PASSED TO YOU! Nowhere in known exsistance is there a living creature more capable of beauty. I demand we begin to let the light shine! Without the beauty in our lives, there will cease to be a will to live, this I promise all mankind. We are the most destructive, violent animals on the most beautiful of planets. We have become our own exterminators. What gives us the right to piss away all that is good in selfish acts of ?????, because we can? Pitiful at best, what a weak ass display for the”most intelligent life” known by General Population. Wonder why the stars and heavens have intrigued us always. More individuals than ever are reaquiring skills and abilities each are born with but. trained to forget. The end result is unavoidable, the big question is how painful are we gonna make the transition? Nameste to all my brethern beings!