The Fresno City Council voted 6-1 Thursday to ban indoor medicinal marijuana grows. Outdoor grows and marijuana dispensaries were already outlawed in Fresno County last month following a vote by the Board of Supervisors.
Councilman Clint Olivier, who represents the seventh district, was the only council member to vote against it.
"The City of Fresno, our police officers are looking to stop the kinds of crimes that are related to this where we have break-ins, where we have robberies, where we have even violent crimes surrounding these pot grows," Olivier says, acknowledging the reason for the ordinance.
Some city leaders say even legal pot grows are often magnets for crime.
"What we have seen is an abuse. We see structures that have been damaged inside to accommodate the grows, we've seen home invasion robberies. In fact, we had one this morning, and so what that does is subject the people in these neighborhoods to being injured," says Fresno Police Chief Jerry Dyer.
But banning legal grows leaves medicinal marijuana users, like Veronica Methola, to turn to other options to treat their illnesses.
"I have cerebral palsy, also I had a hip replacement." Methola says medicinal cannabis, for her, is an alternative to using addictive prescription pills.
In California, medicinal marijuana is legal. This ban creates a conflict between state and local laws.
Attorney Brenda Linder says this ban could push legitimate users into the wrong avenues.
"If the city and the county keep talking about how they're trying to control crime, in reality I think they're creating more crime and making criminals out of sick patients who have a right to do this other places in the state," Linder says.
"Hopefully they think about the people that are not abusing it," Methola says. "We're using it for help, for medicine."