Short answer. Yes. A place used on two or more occasions as the site of the unlawful sale or delivery of dangerous drugs may be declared a public nuisance and abated. But this follows a set procedure — an administrative board created by local ordinance, written notice to the owner, and a hearing where the owner can defend the property.
What the law says
Any place or premises which have been used on two or more occasions as the site of the unlawful sale or delivery of dangerous drugs may be declared to be a public nuisance, and such nuisance may be abated
RA 9165, Section 52 — Abating Drug-Related Nuisances. Read the full provision →
The "two or more occasions" threshold
The law targets premises with a pattern, not a one-off. It says "any place or premises which have been used on two or more occasions as the site of the unlawful sale or delivery of dangerous drugs may be declared to be a public nuisance, and such nuisance may be abated." A single incident of dealing does not, by itself, trigger this remedy — the section is written around a place that has repeatedly been the site of unlawful sale or delivery. That threshold matters, because it keeps the drastic step of declaring a property a public nuisance tied to a demonstrated, recurring problem.
It runs through a local administrative board
The remedy is not self-executing across the country. The section works only where a city or municipality has, by ordinance, created an administrative board to hear complaints about such nuisances. So the local legislature has to set the machinery up first. This design puts the decision at the local level, with a body meant to weigh complaints about specific premises, rather than leaving it to any single official to brand a place a nuisance and move against it. Where no such ordinance and board exist, this particular procedure has nothing to operate through.
Notice and a hearing for the owner
The owner is entitled to due process before anything happens. A complaint may be brought by any employee, officer, or resident of the city or municipality, but only after giving not less than three days' written notice to the owner at his last known address. At the hearing, the owner has the opportunity to present a defense. The board, for its part, may consider a range of evidence — including, unusually, evidence of the general reputation of the place. Only after that hearing may the board declare the premises a public nuisance.
What declaration means, and its limits
Once the board declares the premises a public nuisance, the nuisance may be abated — the legal basis for shutting down the operation exists. But the procedure's safeguards are the point: the repeated-use threshold, the enabling ordinance, the written notice, and the owner's chance to be heard together guard against an innocent property being swept up. Because the section allows reputation evidence, an owner who receives the three-day notice should take it seriously and appear, rather than ignore it. This is general information about the procedure, not advice on a specific property.