by Kevin Cody
Last year, Hermosa Beach Mayor Mike Detoy, City Manager Suja Lowenthal, and Police Chief Paul LeBaron met with Adam Spiker, and Manhattan Beach Councilman Richard Montgomery.
Spiker represented the Economic Development Reform Coalition of Southern California (EDRCSC). The group’s goal was to convince South Bay city officials to lift their bans on cannabis retail sales and home delivery. Spiker had hired Montgomery to arrange introductions to his fellow South Bay city officials.
In the meeting with Hermosa Beach officials, Spiker pointed out cannabis’s tax potential. (Hermosa City Attorney Mike Jensen, in his “Impartial Analysis of Measure T,” the cannabis tax measure on the upcoming November 8 ballot, estimates Hermosa’s tax revenue from two cannabis retailers at $700,000 to $1.5 million annually.)
Spiker also pointed out that over 70 percent of Hermosa residents voted for State Proposition 64, in 2016. Proposition 64 legalized cannabis sales in California, except in cities that banned the sales. The Hermosa Beach city council passed an ordinance banning retail cannabis sales just months before Proposition 64’s passage.
Hermosa officials were not receptive to Spiker’s arguments.
“No resident has ever asked me to allow cannabis sales in the city,” Mayor Detoy recalled telling Spiker.
Spiker responded to the Hermosa officials’ indifference by saying his group would ask voters to lift the ban.
Last October, EDRCSC began gathering…
