The poor San Bernardino Sheriff's department is going to need a new funding source, too.

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-01-28/marijuan...

Thanks for the link. I'm not a marijuana advocate, but from that article it sounds pretty plainly like so many other stories of law enforcement effectively stealing cash because they can, and are often instructed or incentivized to do so.

Civil asset forfeiture is fucking criminal. You don't even need to be arrested or convicted of a crime.

Every dispo in my area (Metro Detroit) has concrete pillars surrounding the building, usually every two feet or so.

One of the first to open a few years back got hit early and everyone seems to have learned the lesson.

Those short pillars are called bollards.

Every fan of physics is recommended to look up bollard test videos.

And one of the best Twitter accounts: https://twitter.com/WorldBollard

I just browsed this far longer than I'd care to admit.

same :)

‘I don’t even think it was my fault!’

Well the static, bright yellow pole didn’t waltz into the side of your car now, did it?

People are so ignorant it’s actually unbelievable.

https://x.com/WorldBollard/status/1781394728899993984

Edit: reminds me of my neighbour who dropped his motorbike because a car pulled out on him from a fuel station. I asked how fast he was going, he said with absolute conviction he was doing no more than 5mph.

When I told him that was too fast he couldn’t wrap his head around it.

Oh my god. As someone who can't see well enough to get a license, but somehow can see bollards just fine as a passenger: If you can't see them, you shouldn't be fucking driving.

I’m a bit late responding, but thanks for accepting that you are unable to drive.

As someone who hits the road most days, whether in a car or on a motorbike it’s absolutely crazy to witness the state of affairs going on on the roads.

My uncle, who isn’t far off 80, but very fit and healthy has given his licence up this year after some pressure from family - I’ve been in the car with him driving and he isn’t safe, he can drive for sure, but he isn’t fast enough to respond to a bad move by others, nor if there is an accident ahead.

I’ll be personally removing my mother’s car when she is unfit to use it too. I don’t care what it costs in taxis or public transport, I don’t want her risking someone else’s life, nor her own, over the ability to get up and go immediately, rather than wait 10 minutes for a driver.

I’m grateful that they are willing to accept this and agree, I’d like to think my mother has another 10 years or so in her at this stage, but the moment it’s clear she’s not fit, that vehicle is gone.

It's not really a matter of accepting it or not - my eyesight is poor enough that I couldn't get a license if I tried.

I was also lucky enough to grow up in a place that provided generous benefits to people who couldn't see well enough to get a license - free public transport and 50% subsidised taxis. Having access to this mitigated the loss of economic opportunity significantly. Where I'm living now I don't get those benefits, but I'm in a position where I no longer need them.

This is amazing, made me laugh out loud, have to be careful though, as I'm currently in the office. :D

Just did! =)

The gravity of physics always brings me down.

(sorry!)

Well-known to expert GeoGuessr players as a convenient way to quickly tell what country you're in on a random rural road, as different countries use mysteriously consistent different bollard styles even when their road surfaces are otherwise almost identical.

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=bollard+meta

The ones in DC typically seem to be either on 2nd floors or in basements. Security outside at the entrance to the steps.

The ones I've seen in the Detroit area seem to mostly be in areas zoned industrial, which typically means single story, stand alone buildings with few "eyes on the street". Going to guess Michigan has restrictive zoning requirements for marijuana businesses that keep it out of the public eye.

> Going to guess Michigan has restrictive zoning requirements for marijuana businesses that keep it out of the public eye.

It's up to each city/county if they allow any stores at all and their own regulations / licensing.

A recent change a lot of shops seem to be going through is removing the "lobby waiting area" (so 2-3 shop "in private") and just adding more shelves and display cases while building up a huge line. Never liked the farce before (and probably a holdover from when they were medical only) so its a nice change.

I guess the weed can still be stolen

then again, you can just grow it yourself w/o risk of being shot

Can't buy shit with weed. Gotta sell it. And that has time requirements and risks to you (including getting robbed yourself).

Meanwhile these are cash-only businesses, so if you're gonna steal then go for the money. Esp. since most dispensaries I've seen do a reasonably brisk business.

Crazy I know but even in places where weed is legal, there's still a black market for it.

First line in your link:

>"The owner says around $15,000 of products and items were stolen from the store."

It doesn't mention anything about cash.

"Smash and grab" in weed shops doesn't usually have much to do with having piles of cash sitting around (though I'm sure that might happen too) - it's the product that thieves want to steal because it's got no serial numbers, it's pretty light-weight and easy to run out with thousands of dollars worth of product, and it's easy to resell.

If there's any cash in the register that's often secondary to grabbing a few pounds of high-quality product. 3 pounds of high quality weed can be valued at $20k. I doubt there's that much in the cash register at the end of the day, and good luck getting into the safe. It's much easier to run out with 3 pounds of weed.

Cash has to leave the building at some point.

There's typically far more monetary value in product in any weed shop than there is cash, likely by an order of magnitude. Many of the purchases are done electronically, so there's not as much cash as you might think in most dispensaries.

How are these purchases done electronically if the stores cannot process credit cards? After there dispensaries more commonly using crypto that I don't know about?

they charge debit, so it's basically an atm withdrawal at point of sale.

Up to the 1990s (and probably still to this day, IDK how electronic payments have impacted this) there was a whole industry dedicated to getting cash off business premises and into banks.

For example, banks often had special "night safes" allowing small business owners to drop off bags of cash outside of branch opening hours. Some businesses would get daily armoured car visits to collect the day's takings. There were even supermarkets with a system of pneumatic tubes allowing cashiers to transfer money to the back room without leaving their stations, so their tills never had enough cash to be worth robbing. You could also get safes with a deposit slot, so employees could drop the takings into the safe, but didn't have the combination needed to get anything out again.

Assuming these all still exist, there are options for keeping cash secure, and getting it off the premises fast.

Of course, by similar logic they could store all the product in a safe out of hours. Jewellery stores manage to store loads of diamonds without getting robbed, after all...

The poverty and gangster culture is going to stay the same so this seems like a weird kind of social take, I mean wont grifters just find another way to hurt common folk?

I mean... I can leave a 2000 USD Macbook for a toilet break in Starbucks over here without any issues and have done so regularly.

Which Starbucks?

Not sure why I get downvoted from criminologists you have: Deterrence Theory, Social Learning Theory, Labeling Theory and Cultural Influence.