Pubdate: Sat, 14 Sep 2013
Source: Seattle Times (WA)
Copyright: 2013 The Seattle Times Company
Contact:  http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/409
Author: Bob Young

POT-STORE LOCATIONS CHANGE TO EASE FED CONCERNS

Youth Buffer Will Be 1,000-Foot Straight Line

State Gauged Likely Path From Schools, Day Care

There is at least one part of Washington state's rules for legal 
marijuana that federal prosecutors can't abide.

The state is changing its plans for where pot businesses can be 
located, after Department of Justice officials told Gov. Jay Inslee 
that enforcing federal drug laws near schools and playgrounds remains 
a priority.

The state Liquor Control Board announced Friday it will file an 
emergency rule to revise the way it measures a 1,000-foot buffer 
between pot businesses and schools, playgrounds, childcare centers 
and other venues frequented by youth.

The revision will not change the state's timeline for licensing legal 
pot merchants, said Rick Garza, director of the Liquor Control Board. 
Garza said he still expects pot stores to open next June or July, 
after stores have been licensed, their owners have undergone 
background checks, and producers have grown crops to supply them.

But the adjustment will impact where those stores can be located.

Under draft rules, the 1,000foot buffer was to be measured in a 
straight line, or as the crow flies. But that restricted businesses 
to the point that it appeared no pot stores could be located in dense 
neighborhoods such as Seattle's Capitol Hill.

In revised rules issued last week, the board changed the way the 
1,000 feet is calculated, opting to use the most common path between 
a pot facility and a youth venue, rather than a straight-line measurement.

Relaxing the buffer measurement would've created more possible pot 
business locations in Seattle, according to a map produced by city planners.

But Garza said that in a meeting with Inslee on Tuesday, Jenny Durkan 
and Mike Ormsby, the top federal prosecutors in Washington state, 
made it clear they would enforce federal law based on the 
straight-line measurement.

"We want to make it clear we're going to mirror federal law," Garza said.

He said the clarity and ease of measuring 1,000 feet in a straight 
line as opposed to the more complicated "most common path" may make 
some cities more welcoming to pot businesses.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom