For the first time, the California Supreme Court will enter the medical marijuana debate Tuesday and hear arguments on whether municipal governments can ban retail pot dispensaries within their jurisdiction.

In the years since California voters legalized medical marijuana in 1996, about 200 cities and counties have outlawed pot shops, according to Americans for Safe Access, a pro-dispensary group. But Tuesday’s hearings in the state’s high court will mark an unprecedented test on whether cities can legally restrict them.

The hearing stems from a Southern California case from two years ago when a dispensary sued the city of Riverside, Calif., on its decision to ban pot shops. The dispensary claimed that cities and counties cannot ban or restrict something the voters have already approved.

“What the appellate court decided was that cities have a choice, and, in fact, 14 cities in the county of Santa Clara decided to ban dispensaries, San Jose being really the only one to allow it,” San Jose City Councilman Sam Liccardo told NBCBayArea.com.

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Many of the citywide bans on pot dispensaries were enacted after the U.S. Department of Justice said in 2009 that prosecuting pot sales would be a low priority under the Obama administration, prompting an explosion of retail medical marijuana outlets in Southern California.

"These places are popping up everywhere, and the typical city that had one or two, two became four and four became 16 or 20," Jeffrey Dunn, an Orange County lawyer who will be arguing in favor of the local bans on Tuesday, told The Associated Press. "What has happened as a practical matter is this state law, which authorizes the medical use of marijuana, and federal law that prohibits it, has forced cities and counties to be the ones to regulate this like any other entity that crops up in our business districts." 

But advocates for medical marijuana say that California’s laws allow local governments to set limits on dispensaries, but not to ban them entirely.

"If it's the case localities can ban, you could end up with the entire southern and middle portion of the state banning dispensaries, which clearly does not promote uniformity throughout the state or safe access" to marijuana, Americans for Safe Access legal director Joe Elford told the AP. 

Liccardo said he supports limiting the number of dispensaries but wants the cities to have the final decision.

“It is disconcerting if the state rules that cities don’t really have the ability to control when, how and where dispensaries operate,” Liccardo said. “It’s very important for a lot of communities because we know there are a lot of impacts with dispensaries – not all of them are good.” 

Courts have delivered mixed results on the issue in the state.

In two other cases, an appeals court in Southern California struck down Los Angeles County's two-year-old ban on dispensaries, and another appeals court upheld the ban in Long Beach, Calif., ruling federal law pre-empts municipalities from allowing dispensaries. 

But Alex Kreit, a Thomas Jefferson School of Law professor said the Supreme Court may be reluctant to strip cities of the right to enact the bans, likening the situation to states that permit counties to be "wet" or "dry" in allowing alcohol sales.

"It is really unusual for a locality to try to outright ban something that is legal under state law," Kreit told the San Jose Mercury News. "But I still think it's going to be an uphill battle for the medical marijuana argument in this case."

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Advocates of looser federal restrictions on marijuana suffered a significant legal setback Tuesday, as a panel of three judges found that the federal government acted properly in refusing to loosen restrictions on pot.

Pro-marijuana groups and a disabled veteran who said it improves his medical condition asked the Drug Enforcement Administration to put marijuana on a lower tier of federal restrictions.  They said the agency was ignoring a growing body of scientific evidence that it has some medical benefits. When the DEA refused, they sued.

But by a 2-1 vote, a panel of the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia said Tuesday that the DEA did consider all the available information. "We find nothing in the record that could move us to conclude that the agency failed to prove by substantial evidence that such studies confirming marijuana's medical efficacy do not exist," the majority opinion said.

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The ruling comes as a stark contrast to actions by a growing number of states that allow use of marijuana on the recommendation of a doctor. And voters in Colorado and Washington approved ballot measures in November that ease state restrictions against recreational use.

The DEA has long classified marijuana as a Schedule I drug, the most-restrictive category, finding it "has no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States." The production, sale, and use of marijuana remain illegal under federal law as a result.

Judge Harry Edwards, who wrote Tuesday's opinion, took note of the controversy. "There is a serious debate in the United States over the efficacy of marijuana for medicinal uses," he said.

But the issue for the court, he said, "is not whether marijuana could have some medical benefits." Instead, Edwards said, the court's job was to determine whether the DEA acted within the scope of its authority in declining to reclassify the drug, given claims in the lawsuit that peer-reviewed scientific studies found some evidence that it could be beneficial.

"We defer to the agency's interpretation of these regulations and find that substantial evidence supports its determination" that no studies exist that are "adequate and well-controlled" proving its effectiveness in medical treatments.

The dissenting judge, Karen LeCraft Henderson, expressed no view on whether marijuana has medical benefits.  Instead, she said the court should have dismissed the case on the grounds that none of those filing the lawsuit had legal authority to bring the case to court in the first place. 

In Los Angeles, where pot dispensaries have proliferated despite city lawmakers' efforts to regulate or ban them, advocates for medical marijuana have taken the initiative to rein them in — with two groups putting forward rival ballot initiatives to manage the budding industry.

Los Angeles City Council in October reversed a ban on the pot shops — which they had passed less than three months earlier after activists mounted lawsuits and gathered tens of thousands of signatures opposing it. The lawmakers have been slow to draft alternative plans for the pot industry so medical marijuana advocates have stepped in.

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An initiative that qualified for the ballot on Friday, after gathering tens of thousands of signatures, proposes that all comers are allowed to enter the business of selling medical cannabis — but only if they pass a background check and meet strict operating and zoning requirements. The measure would also hike taxes on medical marijuana sales by 20 percent to cover the cost to the city for regulation.

 

The current tax is $50 per $1,000 of gross receipts, and the increase would bump it up to $60 per $1,000 of gross receipts.

That measure is pitted against a medical marijuana initiative that qualified for the ballot just two days earlier — one that would force all the city's marijuana dispensaries to close down except about 100 that were set up before Sept. 2007, when the city imposed a moratorium on new shops.

In the face of vociferous opposition, the city council did not enforce the moratorium, instead letting it expire. The number of cannabis shops soared to an estimated 700 to 1,000 in 2012. They range in size from tiny mom-and-pop shops to large multi-million dollar businesses, the Los Angeles Times reported. Police say some are squeaky-clean outlets providing relief to desperately ill patients, while others are magnets for crime with a toxic mix of cash and narcotics, with a negative impact on neighborhoods.

Regulating medical marijuana has been complicated by lawsuits and the push-pull between federal and state laws.

Under California law it is legal to obtain medical marijuana and the court has ruled it is legal for the medical dispensaries to sell it.  But under federal law marijuana is a controlled substance, illegal to possess and sell. If California issues licenses to pot sellers, even if it's in an effort to limit their numbers, it may be in violation of federal law.

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David Welch is a Los Angeles attorney advocating for Angelenos for Safe Access, which gathered more than 73,000 petition signatures to get their initiative qualified for the ballot on Friday. He says that the proposed zoning — designed to keep pot sales at a specified distance from schools, parks, churches, substance abuse facilities and other designated sites — would naturally limit the number of dispensaries to about 150. The proposal also calls for background checks for dispensary operators, prescribed operating hours and higher taxes.

"Currently there is no regulation so that’s why there is proliferation. Our goal is to have good operators stay in business," said Welch. "It would put out 70-85 percent of the dispensaries operating out of business."

This ballot measure, "Regulation of Medical Marijuana for Safe Neighborhoods and Safe Access" is backed by many of the dispensaries that have opened since the 2007 moratorium.

The competing initiative, called the "Medical Marijuana Collectives Initiative Ordinance" would grandfather in about 100 medical marijuana dispensaries set up prior to the 2007 moratorium, and bar all others. It would also add restrictions on hours of operation and location.

Los Angeles residents will have a chance to vote on the proposals in municipal elections in May, according to the Los Angeles Times.

The new ballot drives have "forced our hand," City Councilman Paul Koretz  told the Times.

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Colorado’s governor has a message for those excited by the decriminalization of marijuana in his state: “Don’t break out the Cheetos.”

The reason is that marijuana is still a controlled substance under federal law, raising all sorts off issues for how Colorado and Washington, the other state where voters decriminalized the recreational use of marijuana Tuesday, will implement their initiatives.

“The voters have spoken and we have to respect their will,” Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper (D) said after the vote. “This will be a complicated process, but we intend to follow through. That said, federal law still says marijuana is an illegal drug, so don’t break out the Cheetos or goldfish too quickly.”

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In both states, adults aged 21 and older will be allowed to possess a small amount of marijuana, which will be sold in only state-licensed stores where it will be heavily taxed. For the most part, pot could not be consumed in public. In Colorado, the amendment also allows people to grow a few plants at home.

Dr. Kevin A. Sabet, former senior drug policy advisor to the Obama administration and director of the Drug Policy Institute at the University of Florida, suggests these results could portend a growing weed war between the feds and the states.

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“Once these states actually try to implement these laws, we will see an effort by the feds to shut it down,” Sabet said. “We can only guess now what exactly that would look like, but the recent U.S. attorney actions against medical marijuana portends an aggressive effort to stop state-sponsored growing and selling at the outset.” 

The texts of each initiative -- Amendment 64 in Colorado and Initiative Measure 502 in Washington -- make clear that the elimination of penalties for possessing up to an ounce of marijuana if you are 21 or older takes effect after 30 days, once the election results are certified. But the provisions allowing commercial production and sale of cannabis for recreational use require regulations that will be written during the next year in both states.

The Justice Department has so far declined to discuss how the initiatives might function under federal law. Late Tuesday, a spokesman said in an e-mail to NBC News that they were reviewing the Colorado initiative and had no immediate comment.

Obama has cracked down harder on medical marijuana than any president to come before him, argues Rob Kampia, the executive director of the Marijuana Policy Project. In the 17 states where medical marijuana is legal, U.S. attorneys have enlisted the Drug Enforcement Agency and the Internal Revenue Service to take down hundreds of pot shops in just a few short years, Reuters reported.

Three states weighed in on medical marijuana Tuesday with mixed results. Massachusetts voters approved an initiative allowing people to use marijuana for medicinal purposes. In Arkansas, a similar initiative failed. In Montana, voters approved a plan to revamp an existing medicinal marijuana law to make it more restrictive.

Former DEA Chief Peter Bensinger, an outspoken opponent of marijuana legalization, said legalization would lead to an increase in crime and threaten public safety.

“You’ll lose productivity, you’ll have accidents on the highway, you’ll have absenteeism, and you’ll really have a much more weakened society if you have widespread use of marijuana,” Bensinger said.

Still, proponents argue it’s about time pot was made legal and that the war on weed hasn't worked. 

“The violence associated with it has become greater, use rates have gone up, the respect toward law enforcement has gone down so the government isn’t achieving any of its stated goals," legalization advocate Allen St. Pierre said. 

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Marijuana-legalization backers believe they’re well schooled on all things leafy – from cannabis to political tea leaves. With pro-pot measures leading in recent polls in Washington and Colorado, proponents don’t foresee federal agents interceding in those states if voters approve the initiatives.

Their rationale: Two years ago, when California voters considered a similar proposal to legalize the adult possession of an ounce or less of pot, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder publicly vowed the feds would continue to prosecute anyone in that state caught possessing marijuana — even if the law passed. It failed.

This year, in contrast, federal anti-drug authorities have repeatedly declined to discuss decriminalization proposals in three states — including a measure in Oregon that would end the prohibition of marijuana there. (That initiative trailed in recent polls.) The response routinely delivered by U.S. Department of Justice spokeswoman Allison Price, including in an e-mail to NBC News: “We are not going to speculate on the outcome of the various ballot initiatives in each of the states.”

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“That, to me, is significant because they didn’t just copy and paste what they did and said in 2010. We feel pretty good about that,” said Alison Holcomb, campaign director for Washington’s Initiative 502, which seeks to regulate and tax marijuana production and distribution in that state. According to a poll released Thursday, Initiative 502 had the support of 55 percent of Washington voters.

But Dr. Kevin A. Sabet, former senior drug policy advisor to the Obama Administration and director of the Drug Policy Institute at the University of Florida, predicts a far different law-enforcement reality on the ground in Washington — as well as in Colorado, where Amendment 64 would allow the state to regulate marijuana as it does alcohol.

“Once these states actually try to implement these laws, we will see an effort by the feds to shut it down,” Sabet said.

Sabet’s vision of post-election pot realities in Washington and Colorado — where Amendment 64 has majority support, according to a recent poll — seems to suggest a possible weed war between the feds and the states.

“We can only guess now what exactly that would look like,” Sabet said. “But the recent U.S. Attorney actions against medical marijuana portends an aggressive effort to stop state-sponsored growing and selling at the outset.” (That includes, he said, letters sent by federal prosecutors last January to medical marijuana dispensaries in Colorado operating within 1,000 feet of schools, ordering those businesses to halt sales.)

“The question voters should be asking themselves,” Sabet said, “before voting on these initiatives is this: Is your right to buy pot from a store down the street worth the risk of increased teenage drug abuse, increased enforcement action by the feds, and increased problems like 'stoned driving?’ "

Whether a legal showdown is ignited or not, some state-legalization proponents see their measures as possible footholds in a march toward national marijuana decriminalization.

“Exactly 80 year ago, Colorado voters approved a ballot measure to appeal alcohol prohibition, and that came prior to it being repealed by the federal government,” said Mason Tvert, co-director of the Yes on 64 campaign in Colorado, a state that already regulates the sale of medical marijuana. “And it was the individual states taking that type of action that ultimately resulted in the federal (Prohibition) repeal.

“The same kind of thing is underway with marijuana,” he added. “Whether there’s going to be a critical mass, who knows?”

In Washington, Holcomb echoed that uncertainty: "I'm not sure how that’s going to play out.”

“It may be there’s going to some generational evolution on this. Medical marijuana was introduced in the mid-90s and we were still talking to a lot of people that were coming out of the ‘Reefer Madness’ era, who had a lot of fear. And (medical marijuana) was a really powerful way to help them see that marijuana is not this terribly scary thing that they had been told,” Holcomb said.

Indeed, the most recent poll on Colorado’s Amendment 64 found that 73 percent of state state’s residents who are under age 30 want pot legalized. At the same time, more than half of seniors are against decriminalizing marijuana.

Anti-drug watchdog Sabet, meanwhile, sides with most current political leaders — “the overwhelming majority of Congress (and) both major presidential candidates” — as well as the American Medical Association standing against the decriminalizing of marijuana: “I don't envision national legalization as a realistic possibility in the near future.”

“The state-level efforts could soon prove to be a tipping point for more aggressive legalization initiatives,” Sabet said. “However, there is a growing consensus within the medical and treatment community — who deal with the problems of marijuana use and addiction everyday — to reject both extreme prohibition and lax legalization. I think we'll end up with a policy that is more centrist, for example, not punishing people by barring them from a job for a past marijuana arrest, but also not allowing marijuana to be marketed and sold like alcohol or cigarettes.”

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Come November, Arkansas voters will be faced with a question unprecedented in the South: Should qualified patients be allowed to buy medical marijuana from nonprofit dispensaries with a doctor's recommendation?

The Arkansas Supreme Court upheld the proposed ballot measure on Thursday, making "The Natural State" the first in the South to ask its voters about medical marijuana, The Associated Press reported. Seventeen other states and the District of Columbia have already legalized medical marijuana to some degree.

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The court's review of "The Arkansas Medical Marijuana Act" came after the Coalition to Preserve Arkansas Values filed a lawsuit in August that tried to get the proposal off the state's ballot, NBC station KARK 4 of Little Rock reported. The conservative coalition claimed that the 384-word ballot question doesn't properly explain the consequences of passing the 8,700-word law, according to the AP. Even if the act were passed, approved patients could still be prosecuted under federal law.

"We hold that it is an adequate and fair representation without misleading tendencies or partisan coloring," the court wrote. "Therefore, the act is proper for inclusion on the ballot at the general election on Nov. 6, 2012, and the petition is therefore denied."

The conservative coalition, which includes leaders from the Arkansas Faith and Ethics Council, the Families First Foundation and the Family Council Action Committee, has five days to ask the court for a rehearing, according to KARK 4.

Related: Legalize pot vote coming up in 3 states - Colo., Ore. & Wash.

An attorney for Arkansas for Compassionate Care — the group behind the measure — said he is pleased with the ruling.

"Now that we've passed muster with the Supreme Court we'll begin our campaign to show the people of the state of Arkansas that this is truly a compassionate measure," attorney David Couch told the AP.

Following the decision, opponents soon responded on Thursday.

"We've shifted into campaign mode," coalition spokesman Larry Page said, according to KARK 4. "We respect the court's decision, but we are very disappointed that this flawed measure will appear on the ballot."

According to the AP, the proposal lets qualified patients or designated caregivers grow marijuana if the patient lives more than five miles away from a dispensary. It also allows minors to use medical marijuana with parental consent. Cancer, Alzheimer's disease, glaucoma, HIV and AIDS would all be qualifying health conditions.

Arkansas Gov. Mike Beebe, a Democrat, is against the measure and told reporters Thursday that he's requested an estimate on how much it will cost to regulate the dispensaries if voters pass it.

"If I understand what I think I understand about it, if it passes, it's going to require a whole of administration from the health department," Beebe said, according to the AP. "I don't know where we're going to get it from."

Beebe also told reporters that he doesn't believe Arkansas voters would legalize medical marijuana.

While voters in Arkansas and Massachusetts are expected to have their say on this issue on the November ballot, voters in North Dakota won't, after its state Supreme Court ruled the initiative can't appear on its ballot, the AP reported.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.

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LOS ANGELES -- A medical marijuana trade group sued the city of Los Angeles Friday, seeking to stop officials from enforcing a new ban designed to shut down more than 1,000 pot dispensaries.

The Patient Care Alliance, Los Angeles, or PCA-LA, announced that it filed a lawsuit Friday seeking an injunction against a controversial ordinance approved by the city council last month that supporters said was needed to grapple with the proliferation of marijuana dispensaries.

"The city council's actions are not only reckless, heartless and pointless, they're just plain stupid," said Marc O'Hara of PCA-LA. "The city knows that it will never be able to successfully defend this lawsuit."

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It comes the same week that the city sent out letters to 1,046 locations where medical marijuana dispensaries are thought to be operating, according to the office of City Attorney Carmen Trutanich. The letter -- sent to 1,774 business and property owners, according to the city -- is cited in the lawsuit.

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The letter, mailed Tuesday, instructs business owners that a new ordinance making their operations illegal becomes effective Sept. 6.

The new city ordinance affects any "medical marijuana business," which is defined as "Any location where marijuana is cultivated, processed, distributed, delivered or given away to a qualified patient, a person with an identification card, or a primary caregiver," the letter states.

"Continuance of a medical marijuana business at this location may subject you to legal action resulting in a court ordered closure and imposition of monetary penalties of $2,500 a day, as well as prosecution for a misdemeanor, punishable by six months in jail and a $1,000.00 fine," the letter states. "Each day that the property is used in violation of city law is a separate violation."

The city attorney's office said in a statement that the letter "is not part of any enforcement scheme," noting it advises business owners to consult with their attorneys.

The city's ordinance, approved unanimously after many hours of debate before a packed council chamber on July 24, generated lawsuit threats immediately.

Medical marijuana advocates also vowed to put a referendum on the ballot asking voters to halt enforcement of the ban until a forthcoming California Supreme Court decision is issued clarifying pot-shop regulation. Many dispensaries in the city have in recent weeks been gathering signatures for the ballot measure.

When the ordinance passed, city officials said Los Angeles had 762 registered dispensaries. The list of 1,046 locations that received letters this week were compiled from several sources, the city attorney's office said, adding that the locations had not been verified.

At the same time it approved its ban, the council also passed a measure asking city attorneys to study and draw up plans to allow 182 pot shops -- ones that registered with the city under a 2007 ordinance attempting to regulate the dispensaries -- to continue to operate. That seeminlgy contradictory move could take months to realize.

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Friday's lawsuit was filed on behalf of 11 patients who have been prescribed medical marijuana for serious medical conditions, according to the complaint.

It states that the city's ordinance is in conflict with California's 1996 law legalizing the medical use of marijuana – legislation that was passed by voters through Proposition 215.

Supporters of the city's pot-shop ban say that voters who approved of medical marijuana use never envisioned the development of a multi-billion-dollar industry in the state, nor the explosive growth of dispensaries and pot-focused medical clinics.

The lawsuit argues that the city ordinance is unconstitutional and denies business owners due process. 

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A pair of San Francisco prominent medical marijuana businesses closed their doors Tuesday, a sign of the federal government’s recent crackdown on medical cannabis dispensaries.

HopeNet and the Vapor Room announced they would cease operations in response to threatening letters sent to the business’ landlords by the federal government.

“The Justice Department sent our landlord one of those nasty letters,” said HopeNet co-founder Catherine Smith. “So this is our D-Day, we have to leave.”

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Smith and her husband founded HopeNet in 1998 on Ninth Street in the city’s South of Market. The business was held out by medical marijuana advocates as an example of a legitimate pot club working within the city laws. Smith worked alongside city legislators, served on San Francisco’s Medical Marijuana Task Force and helped craft the city’s landmark marijuana ordinance.

“Hard to believe we did all these things and accomplished all these things in the City and they’re shutting us down,” Smith said.

Since November, the Justice Department has sent out 600 letters across California threatening landlords who rent space to medical marijuana operations. Since November, nine San Francisco pot clubs have shut their doors.

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The closures haven’t just affected marijuana clubs but also ancillary businesses. Ray Chico whose company Doob Tubes sells plastic containers for medical marijuana, said the litany of closures has hurt business.

“We have an employee that we had to let go, or at least lay off two weeks ago,” Chico said, “since the Harborside forfeiture letter and Vapor Room.”

The sprawling Harborside medical marijuana complex in East Oakland is vowing to fight federal efforts to shut it down. Chico said he was saddened to see HopeNet close-up shop.

“They are like a cornerstone to the little community here,” Chico said. “I think they’ve worked very diligently with local authorities and do everything you need to do to run it above board.”

Smith said the business would continue to run its delivery service, but wasn’t optimistic at finding another location for its dispensary and on-site smoking room.

“The word is out about the Justice Department sending the landlord letters,” said Smith. “The real estate people don’t want to deal with you anymore.”

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Longtime patient Ramon Flores said HopeNet represented more than just a pot club.

“A lot of people that come here are mental health patients, or they have physical afflictions,” Flores said as he sat in the club clutching a guitar. “They come here for the marijuana which is also medicine, but they also come here for socialization.”

Since last fall, the Justice Department has cranked up its campaign on California’s medicinal marijuana industry. The governments views the glut of medical pot businesses in violation of California’s voter-passed 1996 law.

The movement was dealt another blow last week when the Los Angeles’ City Council voted to tentatively ban the city’s 762 marijuana clubs.

With the medical marijuana movement facing a seemingly unfriendly tide, Smith looked around her club, watching as customers hugged each other and said their goodbyes.

“I don’t have much hope right now,” she said.

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LOS ANGELES -- While Los Angeles officials were working out exactly how to phrase a letter to 762 registered pot dispensaries ordering them to shut down, medical marijuana advocates vowed Wednesday to overturn the City Council's newly approved ban on the stores.

The ban was approved unanimously on Tuesday after hours of debate and years of consternation over the growing number of pot shops in the city.

The council's action followed a seemingly contradictory 9-5 vote on a proposal that would allow 182 marijuana dispensaries that registered with the city under a 2007 ordinance to remain in operation. But the specifics of that proposal still need to be written and reviewed – a process that could take months.

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Councilman Jose Huizar, who championed the pot-shop ban, had said the exemption for the 182 dispensaries would give "false hope" to medical marijuana advocates.

On Wednesday, his spokesman Rick Coca sought to clarify that there's only one ordinance right now: A ban that is slated to go into effect within 40 days.

The new ordinance allows groups of up to three patients and their caregivers to grow their own medical marijuana, and it provides an exemption for hospices, licensed clinics and home-health agencies.

City officials were discussing Wednesday whether to send a notice to the 762 registered pot shops from the Los Angeles Police Department or from the City Attorney's Office.

It's also unclear which shops will be targeted first, in case some refuse to shut down. "Enforcement priorities" will be determined by LAPD, City Attorney's Office spokesman Frank Mateljan said.

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"We do expect tremendous voluntary cooperation. Nobody likes to be the subject of a criminal prosecution," said Jane Usher with the City Attorney's Office said. "The harder cases, we'll work with LAPD. We'll be complaint driven. We'll only pursue those dispensaries that are disrupting their neighborhoods."

Coca said he expects broad compliance with the ban, even if there are some resisters.

"If there's 300 extra stores, that's about 600 less than we have now," Coca said.

City officials have estimated there are at least 850 pot stores within Los Angeles' nearly 470 square miles, some of them operating without proper permits and approvals.

Medical marijuana advocates, who packed council chambers and shouted out after the vote Tuesday, said they were prepared to continue fighting the ban.

Americans for Safe Access, a national advocacy group, issued a statement announcing a planned ballot-box campaign to overturn the council vote.

"This is an outrage that the City Council would think a reasonable solution to the distribution of medical marijuana would be to simply outlaw it altogether," said Don Duncan, California director of the group, in a statement.

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"The tens of thousands of patients harmed by this vote will not take it sitting down," Duncan said. "We will campaign forcefully to overturn this poor decision by the council."

Duncan could not be reached by NBC4 for comment Wednesday, but a spokesman for the organization told KPCC that a planned referendum campaign would seek voter approval for a delay of the ban. KPCC reported the group would need to gather more than 27,000 valid voter signatures to qualify the referendum for the ballot.

If enough valid signatures are gathered, that in itself could delay enforcement of the ban until voters weigh in, according the City Attorney's Office.

Americans for Safe Access supported the measure from Councilman Paul Koretz that would allow 182 registered stores to operate. 

An attorney who represents dispensary owners and members said some of them want to sue over the ban.

Lawyer Marina Turovsky said the ban could push clients and dispensary businesses into neighboring cities that will still allow them, such as West Hollywood, which has four pot shops.

The expansion of a small number of remaining shops could draw a crackdown from the federal government, which has in recent months raided large marijuana dispensaries in the Bay Area, Turovsky said.

"If only a few are allowed anywhere, they will expand, they will get bigger, and they will get on this radar. There is not much we can do about it other than try to fight this ban," Turovsky said.

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SAN FRANCISCO -- Credit cards are no longer being accepted at California medical marijuana dispensaries -- thanks to pressure from the federal government.

Someone -- likely the Treasury Department -- has informed credit card companies that they must no longer process credit card transactions involving medical marijuana, according to SF Weekly.

The credit card companies informed merchant services providers, who were warned that if they processed medical marijuana sales, they'd lose their relationships with Visa/Mastercard "forever" or face heavy fines, according to Stephen DeAngelo of Oakland's Harborside Health Center, the Bay Area's biggest dispensary.

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It's merchant services providers who process credit card transactions between retailers and the banks and credit card companies, DeAngelo said. Merchant services providers informed dispensary clients that their accounts would be closed as of July 1, the newspaper reported.

California cities back at federal crackdown on medical marijuana

Dispensaries have gone cash-only or installed ATM machines, though some do accept debit cards, the newspaper reported.

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Lawyers for a medical marijuana dispensary worker allegedly hurt in a police raid at a Long Beach shop filed a claim on Thursday seeking $1 million in damages from the city of Long Beach.

The claim, a precursor to a lawsuit, alleges that a police raid of a pot shop June 19 was illegal and that the officers involved used excessive force.

"In terms of the excessive force claim, we will investigate that aspect of it," said Long Beach City Attorney Robert E. Shannon.

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Shannon said that the Long Beach Police Department is also mulling whether to open a criminal investigation into the activities of the medical marijuana dispensary and that police are considering an internal investigation into the officers’ conduct during the raid.

The claim, filed Thursday with the Long Beach City Clerk’s office, alleges officers injured a volunteer employee, violated his civil rightsand violated the state’s disabled persons act.

It also alleges officers "engaged in conduct that violated various provisions of the state and federal constitutions," the claim alleges.

The claim stems from a YouTube video that shows officers smashing surveillance cameras and stepping on a suspect at THC Downtown Collective in the 300 block of Atlantic Boulevard. The video was posted by user "Long Beach Raids" on July 1. Officials said they learned about the video on July 3.

An advocate for medical marijuana dispensary owners and workers criticized the officers’ conduct.

"That behavior is so blatant it cannot be the first time," said Steven Downing, a retired Los Angeles Police Department deputy chief and current board member of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition."It was arrogant. It was unnecessary and it was brutal."

The claim seeks damages in excess $1 million for medical treatment and mental counseling.

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