The pot thickens as proposal for Sand City marijuana dispensary is snuffed out.

The Sand City Council voted unanimously for a 45-day moratorium – effective immediately – on medical marijuana dispensaries in town.

“I personally put it on the agenda because I don’t want it in the city,” says Mayor David Pendergrass. “Marijuana is dope to me.”

The controversy started earlier this month when a tall, freckle-faced 26-year-old man rose to address the City Council with a statement that he says grabbed everyone’s attention: “I’m Daniel Maniscalco, and I want to open a medical marijuana dispensary in your town.”

Monterey resident Carrieanna Hess, who was at the meeting, said: “I have multiple sclerosis and it helps me with my leg spasms and appetite.’’

Maniscalco had his eye on several Sand City storefronts for what would be Monterey County’s first medical marijuana outlet. “It’s an up-and-coming hip town,” Maniscalco says.

He says he wants to get medical pot to people who need it legally, safely, and at fair prices.

It’s an open secret that almost anyone with a pulse can get a doctor’s recommendation for medical cannabis, but Maniscalco says he knows people who are wracked with pain without it, and in Monterey County, he says many travel to Santa Cruz or the Bay Area, or simply buy on the streets. Maniscalco envisions a cozy alternative close to home with teas, baked goods, a full line of smokeable pot, and a full-time security guard.

He also says pot dispensaries are good business – for entrepreneurs like him and for the cities where they set up shop. The city of Oakland, for example, is estimated to take in some $300,000 annually from a new tax on medical pot approved by voters last July.

“This guy,” Pendergrass says, “I don’t think he’s an activist. I think he’s an idealist.”

Still, that hasn’t swayed the mayor. Pendergrass says he wants Maniscalco and others to know, “our city is not a pushover.” He says he was wondering when such a business would try to come to his town. Seaside had already been approached and enacted a ban, as has Marina. Salinas currently has a moratorium on dispensaries.

Maniscalco, who says he suffers from chronic back pain and has his own medical pot recommendation from a doctor, currently operates a fledging delivery service out of his 1998 BMW. He carries a metal briefcase full of neatly labeled apothecary jars with names like Grapefruit Kush and Purple Haze and responds to callers around the county who’ve seen his Craigslist ads.

Like a lot of would-be dispensary operators, Maniscalco was encouraged by the Obama administration’s announcement that it would no longer prosecute medical marijuana users or sellers. The policy shift has cities around the state either scrambling to ban a bumper crop of dispensaries or figuring out how best to regulate them.

In Sand City, the council will likely vote in Deecember on whether to extend the moratorium for a year. If it’s approved, Maniscalco says, he says he’ll try his luck in Monterey or in an unincorporated area of the county.