Prospects for a medical marijuana dispensary in Northwest Philadelphia seemed to dim Tuesday as a crowd of about 250 neighborhood residents, many from eight East Mount Airy churches, packed a city hearing room intent on having the business’ zoning permit revoked.
No plant material will be grown or sold at any Pennsylvania dispensary. The Stenton Avenue site is only one of four slated to open in Philadelphia early next year.
Residents, many dressed in red in symbolic protest, punctuated the three-hour hearing with groans and shouts and intermittently waved placards and posters. “Good Stuff, Bad Location,” read one.
Many were emboldened when former Councilman Frank DiCicco, now chairman of the Zoning Board of Adjustment, quipped about the stronger-than-expected opposition.
In an interview, TerraVida president Chris Visco said she had already spent $23,000 in application fees and other building costs, much of that withdrawn from her 401(k), and would have to pay the state an additional $30,000 if the permit is revoked.
“We didn’t realize we’d be received with such opposition,” Visco said.
S. David Fineman, the attorney for a coalition of groups opposing the site, said the location is plagued by several problems.
“Maybe the city made a mistake,” Fineman said.
The city should have blocked the dispensary because Kingdom Seeds operates a child-care center fewer than 500 feet away, he said. Though the state medical marijuana law requires dispensaries to be at least 1,000 feet from schools and day-care centers, the city was granted a waiver to reduce the distance.
In late July, Fineman sued the state Department of Health, demanding that it reveal how an anonymous group made its decisions on awarding permits.
On Tuesday, local residents not only objected to the proposed dispensary’s proximity to the child-care provider, many also complained that TerraVida’s owners had not given them adequate notice. Parker said she learned about the dispensary in a newspaper story. Several others echoed that, saying they, too, had felt disrespected.
“They had no regard for the neighborhood,” said Joan Blakney, who lives three blocks from the proposed site. “They didn’t ask the people.”
Blakney said that traffic along that stretch of Stenton already is too congested, and that there is not enough parking to accommodate a steady stream of medical marijuana patients.
“This should be at a place like the Cheltenham Mall or near Germantown Hospital,” she said. “There are so many other places.”
The zoning board could order the City to revoke its permit.
credit:philly.com
