Fullerton’s newly elected City Council voted in February 2021 to undo the previous council’s decision to legalize cannabis sales. Nearly five years later, the city continues to struggle to shut down illegal dispensaries, with court filings describing enforcement efforts as a game of “whack-a-mole.”
Since the ban was reinstated, Fullerton has fallen into a recurring enforcement cycle. Code enforcement identifies an illegal dispensary and refers the case to the City Attorney. The City Attorney then petitions the court for authority to act. Once approval is granted, the city shuts the operation down, only for the same operators to reappear weeks later, often in a nearby unit or at a different address altogether.

For example, in May 2024, an illegal dispensary was discovered and shut down at 1140 S. Raymond Ave., Unit F. In June 2024, another illegal dispensary was found and shut down in the building next door at 1120 S. Raymond Ave., Unit G. After that operation was closed, a dispensary was discovered at 1100 S. Raymond Ave., Unit A. Just four months later, in September, yet another dispensary was discovered and shut down in the same building in Unit F.

Official court filings have described this multi-year cycle as a “game of cat-and-mouse” and “whack-a-mole,” acknowledging that enforcement actions frequently fail to produce lasting results.

The clustering of illegal dispensaries following the ban also undermines one of the central arguments raised during the legalization debate: that zoning buffers were necessary to prevent cannabis businesses from concentrating in certain neighborhoods or near sensitive uses such as schools. Mapping enforcement actions from mid-2023 onward shows that illegal dispensaries not only persisted after the ban but also continued to cluster in specific areas of the city, including near schools.

It is important to note that clustering in illegal markets is often driven by factors that would be irrelevant under a regulated system. Unlicensed operators may prioritize locations that allow for quick relocation, anonymity, or evasion of enforcement rather than compliance with zoning or distance requirements. The result, however, is the same: prohibition has neither dispersed cannabis activity nor reduced its proximity to areas where residents expressed concern.

The financial toll of enforcing this ban is staggering. According to estimates, the costs for a single part-time code enforcement officer and necessary equipment can reach around $72,000 annually. This figure, however, represents only a portion of the total expenses incurred. The roles of the City Attorney, court filings, utility shutoffs, and related legal actions significantly inflate the actual cost of enforcement. With an average time to close a single dispensary estimated at six months, the city finds itself pouring resources into a fruitless endeavor to regulate an unregulated market.

Enforcement data and experience from across California suggest that banning retail cannabis does not eliminate demand; it pushes it into unregulated and untaxed markets. In Fullerton’s case, the result has been a persistent underground market paired with ongoing enforcement costs.

At the same time, the city is forgoing potential revenue. A 2020 city-commissioned survey found that more than 70 percent of Fullerton residents supported regulating cannabis. As the city faces ongoing budget pressures, the continued reliance on costly enforcement without regulatory alternatives raises questions about whether its cannabis policy will be revisited.

During the February 2021 debate, Councilmember Nick Dunlap questioned whether the city should devote so much time and effort to cannabis enforcement, asking, “How do you think our roads would look if we invested this much time and effort into cannabis as we did in our streets?”
Years later, the city continues to spend resources on enforcement and legal action while receiving none of the revenue from legal cannabis sales.

Fullerton’s current cannabis policy has proven ineffective at reducing illegal marijuana sales, is resource-intensive to enforce, and has resulted in an unpredictable and unregulated market. As the city struggles to balance its budget, whether this policy will be reconsidered remains an open question.