Should retired police be able to sell marijuana? Alderman says no, blocks dispensary

A north -sided marijuana dispensary, a business group hopes to look at neighbors positively on community -minded plans.

However, some West Ridge residents and the resumes of the district council member looked, they saw the “Chicago Police Officer ve in the past and said“ no ”.

Took it. At the end of last month, Andre Vasquez, 40, was in opposition to the offer by the Kause Group, including 10 former Chicago policemen.

Progressive Alderman said that he supports opening a dispensary in the ward, but that the return of residence decided to stop the proposal after emphasizing a retired police ownership with a retired police ownership.

Vasquez told Tribune, saying, “I still have questions and concerns about people who are paid to arrest people who can be in prison because they still sell marijuana and sell cannabis.” “There is something basically something unfair and unfair.”

Vasquez does not plan to ask Kause from the Municipal Assembly to make a zoning change required to operate the Releaf Dispensary in 2415 W. Peterson Ave. and prevents the opening of the work.

After Vasquez rejected the joint Damone Richardson, the ownership team of the company, which still hopes to launch a dispensary in Chicago, said, biri Like the other entrepreneurs who maintain this. ”

Richardson said, “Our team is made up of people who have spent decimes to become a member of their communities,” Richardson said. “They have served their communities for hundreds of years, so I feel like a citizen to do so.”

John Richardson, the father of Richardson’s father and the front of the Kapehn, ended his 33 -year Chicago Police Department career as Deputy Director.

In July, the group presented the job to the 40th Ward inhabitants during the “Social Guided Reconstruction” meeting. 85% of the property team consists of black people from the neighborhoods determined by the state, especially harshly hit by the marijuana criminalization.

Advisor Paul Gustafson said that the band shared his plans to clean the building he was trying to rent with a new wall painting, avoiding loud signs, preventing Loitering and fulfilling a strong security system.

Imiz Our goal is to really beautify this building, ”he said before the residents are often concerned about zoning changes such as park and noise. “We really want to make up this… We are not looking for this to highlight this.”

Gustafson demonstrated his plans to place 5% of the company in a “community confidence”, which was partially controlled by the residents of the neighborhood, and gave the community to some degree of ownership and even some profits of the store.

And in an additional area connected to the building, primarily St. Participating in the ownership team of Sabina Churchgoers’ belief community, doctors, pain management, postmenopausal health and orthopedics, such as expertise on seminars will host seminars, he said.

Gustafson said, ız Our aim is not only to be there, but also to be an active neighbor and find ways to return to the community. These are the conversations we have made from the moment we walk at the door. ”

When Vasquez shared a question about the “basic inequality ın of the retired police benefiting from cannabis sales, Michael Collins, a group of real estate lawyers, said that the past guilt of marijuana was“ hit for the group.

A owner said his son was currently imprisoned for a marijuana crime.

“They feel this direct impact and I will encourage that they do not do the fact that they do their work (against them), Coll said Collins.

The authority said that the “bad prosecution discretion” plays a more critical role in the damages of marijuana guilt, and that many of the former Richardson’s drug actions were asked by calls made by Chicago people.

“There are certainly people who are directly affected by our own side, so we have a lot of empathy with people who are directly affected by their side, and we take this into consideration as to how we are trying to carry out the job,” he said.

Shortly after Vasquez’s decision, the young Richardson told Tribune that the group would not try to open on the site was “a little early ,, but the movement added that the movement“ returned to the drawing board ”. The group has been trying to open a dispensary for six years.

Richardson said, “Frankly, we don’t like it, but we’ll continue to move.” “I have been working for a long time, nothing will be a straight line, mishaps, but we must be permanent.”

The group in July 2023 gained an appointment to help people who have low -level cannabis crimes or from poor neighborhoods, partly proportionate to people who were proposed to black people who were proposed in proportion to marijuana crimes.

In order to obtain the zoning change required to operate as a dispensary, Kanh needed the support of Vasquez because of the tradition of “Aldermanic privilege” to a great extent, while voting for the zoning problems of the members of the City Assembly, the tradition that he almost always follows the will of a local Alderman.

Alderman said that about half of the community input supports Vasquez’s dispensary offer. One quarter opposed it to prevent the opening of any dispensary, and opposed it because of problems with another quarter police connection. In addition, most of the residents he heard did not support the offer.

Alderman remembered that his two black friends were arrested as a young man when he drank herbs to olmak just being a child ”near Lake Michigan. The cops almost looked at Vasquez, a Latin, to the police, but he almost looked at it, even though he didn’t smoke at that time.

Vasquez added that he was open to more negotiations with Kaneh.

“My job is to represent our community and our community had a problem,” he said.

Deirdre O’Connor, a member of a Police Region Council containing the Dispanser region, said that its opposition to Dispensary has nothing to do with the anti -drug “Reefer Madness .. The secret police saw that the young people had thrown young people against cars and that Arcadia Terrace caught them for grass in her childhood.

O’Connor, who also worked in the ward office in Vasquez’s ward office, said, “A group of former police officers would still make a profit from something that the former police officer was still very locked and still punished,” he said.

He added that Kaneh was not affected by the plans he offers to eliminate equality concerns. They did not do enough to gain the trust of the community and argued that they should make better suggestions for damage to marijuana guilt.

O’Connor said, “It must be different. It must be more fair. There should be no former police officers,” he said.

Another dispensary welcomed to open it on the site.