Cannabis Poses New Question for Palisadian Values

By JOHN HARLOW | Editor-in-Chief

Palisadians who have fiercely opposed the proliferation of alcohol-licensed premises have lost what might be their final battle.

On Wednesday, Sept. 6, city planners meeting in west Los Angeles overruled a plea by Palisadian residents once grouped together as “Save Our Village” to block Vintage Grocers’ plans to sell wines and spirits at its forthcoming Palisades Village store.

Among other factors, the Alphabet Streets-based lobby group—probably the last organized resistance to the Caruso project—cited that there were already three existing stores within 1,000 feet that sell alcohol (Ralphs, CVS and Gelson’s) thus making the license application unnecessary.

Other residents opposed the opposition: “The community council voted 17 to one to permit the Village project including liquor licenses and the grocery store. I always expected that the grocery would be open from at least 7 a.m. to 10 p.m., and I am confident the vast majority of the community had the same expectation,” long-term resident Richard Cohen said.

Another resident, Chris Spitz, said that public approval for the plan was overwhelming and the community council support unprecedented in its 44-year history.

The recently reorganized Vintage Grocers management walked away with everything they needed to open next summer.

The message was clear: Alcohol is no longer taboo in the Palisades.

There could be as many as seven new enterprises selling wine by the bottle or glass in the Palisades Village project when it opens next August.

This change has already prompted established restaurants, from Taste to Kay n’ Dave’s, to rethink their drinking models. Many are seeking expanded alcohol licenses or longer hours.

Critics who warned that Rick Caruso’s ambitions would uproot the older Methodist culture of the town’s founders may have been proven right, observers said.

Skeptics who question why every social occasion has to be accompanied by alcohol have been countered by the emergence of new voices who want a glass of Prosecco in town after work.

But there is a fresh threat to sobriety on the horizon, which will be discussed by a planning commission at Los Angeles City Hall after 11 a.m. on Thursday, Sept. 14: how to regulate the “pot shops” that become legal next January.

Proposed rules say that a pot shop cannot open within 800 feet of protected sites such as schools and public parks, and forbid sales to minors.

An earlier list also included churches, youth centers and the library.

The city conversation will be discussed after 7 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 14 at the Pacific Palisades Community Council.

The community council appears to be stepping away from listening to restaurant alcohol applications and instead looking at how marijuana might be sold in the town.

There does not appear to be much space for pot shops in the Palisades.

Planners say there is a tiny handful of contender locations in Marquez Knolls, The Highlands or The Riviera—all depending on a legal interpretation of parks and hiking trails.

A map on the city planning website showed one possible location, on Sunset Boulevard, surprisingly close to the Westside Waldorf School and the Chabad. But this appears to be a mapping error.

There is a more slippery concept of “delivery” locations where orders can be taken, but no marijuana can be held on the premises. They could be more widespread, but their purpose, in an era when everything is ordered online, seems a little more vague.

There are medical issues with marijuana, including addiction, that have been brushed aside by growers and fans.

There are questions of enforcement. There have been reports of teens smoking marijuana in plain sight in The Village, but few arrests compared to the numbers of homeless apprehended for similar habits on the beaches.

But, as with alcohol, past habits of condemning cannabis wholesale, resulting in prohibition and mass incarceration, has generated its own moral backlash—resulting in messy deregulation.

Now, as the city and PPCC consider the issue, Palisadians have the opportunity to influence the shape of pot to come—perhaps optimistically, without repeating the mistakes of the past.