CURB ON GROWING MARIJUANA SOUGHT

WILLITS -- Voters in this rugged stretch of Northern California took
marijuana laws to new heights in 2000, allowing residents to grow up
to 25 marijuana plants for medical, recreational or personal use.

But eight years later, some are campaigning to scale back the law,
saying it's time to weed out pot profiteers.

"We want to take that welcome mat away," said Ross Liberty, spokesman
for Measure B, which goes before Mendocino County voters Tuesday.

Opponents say they, too, want to evict large-scale, criminal
operators, but they say Measure B won't address that issue and will
instead go after the people who need medical marijuana.

"What (Measure) B does is redefines who gets arrested and the who'
will be medical patients that are growing more than six plants," said
Laura Hamburg, who became active in the No on B campaign after her
medical marijuana garden was raided.

The issue offers a glimpse into the murky world of medical marijuana
in California, legal under state law, banned by federal law, and
according to some reports, bringing some serious green into the Golden State.

Using marijuana for medical purposes has been legal in California
since 1996, when voters passed Proposition 215, but that law had only
a sketchy mechanism for how marijuana would be produced and dispensed.

State lawmakers subsequently allowed counties to issue ID cards to
protect medical users from being prosecuted by local authorities.
Each cardholder is allowed to have up to a half pound of dried
marijuana or six mature marijuana plants, although local governments
can set laws exceeding the state's limits.

Meanwhile, federal authorities, who never recognized Proposition 215
and deny that marijuana has medicinal properties, have won a number
of legal showdowns over the measure.

In 2000, Mendocino County voters approved Measure G, which had a
25-plant limit and permitted personal and recreational use, the
latter a symbolic gesture since neither state nor federal laws allow
personal pot use.

The new law, Measure B, would repeal Measure G and set plant limits
at state levels. (It's not entirely clear what that will mean since
state guidelines are at issue in a Southern California court case.
The No on B side interprets the case as undermining Measure B. The
Yes side disagrees, noting the case is under appeal.)

Sheriff Tom Allman says the problem with Measure G is it gave the
impression marijuana had been legalized in Mendocino County.

"There's this perception that we're just a bunch of Cheech and Chong
marijuana growers up here," Allman said.

Blessed by ancient redwood groves and bordered by a breathtakingly
beautiful coast, Mendocino County has long also been famous as a
source of high-grade pot.

Estimates on how much money is generated by marijuana in Mendocino
County and statewide vary; officials say it's hard to come up with a
definite total since so much of the industry is undercover.

Figures from the state's Campaign Against Marijuana Planting show
more than 220,000 plants were seized in Mendocino County last year,
up from about 136,000 the year before.

Statewide, CAMP reported seizures of 2.9 million plants with an
estimated wholesale value of $11.6 billion.

Hamburg, the daughter of former Rep. Dan Hamburg, grows medical
marijuana for herself, her mother and her sister as well as a
neighbor. She argues that it's not Measure G that spurs marijuana
growth in Mendocino County but its climate, topography and the
institutional knowledge gleaned from decades of marijuana farming.

But Allman and others say cannabis became a lot less covert here
after Measure G passed.

"It's in your face bad," said Allman.

On the other side of the Measure B issue are George and Jean
Hanamoto. Carefully tended shrubs bloom in their front garden on a
wooded hillside in Mendocino County. And in the backyard are their
marijuana plants.

Hanamoto, who is 74 and uses marijuana to relieve glaucoma and back
pain, said cutting plant limits to six would hurt people like him
because growing conditions mean he can't always get the maximum out
of each plant.

Allman says the Hanamotos aren't the kind of people he'll be sending
deputies after. He said he will continue to concentrate on large operations.