ID CARDS IN MEDICAL POT USE APPROVED

Sick and dying people who use marijuana to ease their symptoms with a
doctor's approval will be able to get an identification card to protect
them from arrest by San Diego police under an ordinance the City Council
approved yesterday.

The measure, adopted 6-3, formally establishes the ID-card program and puts
into law guidelines the council adopted in February governing the medical
use of marijuana. The guidelines and the ID-card program will be tried for
two years before the council re-evaluates them.

Yesterday's vote was identical to the one in February, with Mayor Dick
Murphy and Councilmen Brian Maienschein and Jim Madaffer - the council's
three Republicans - opposed.

The ordinance must come back for a final vote, as a procedural matter, to
be enacted. It will allow adult marijuana patients with the approval of a
San Diego County doctor to keep up to 1 pound of marijuana and grow up to
24 plants.

Under the measure, caregivers can keep up to 2 pounds of marijuana and grow
up to 48 plants for as many as four patients.

The measure prohibits smoking in public, bans outdoor marijuana cultivation
and requires plants to be grown in locked greenhouses or inside other
locked structures.

Police Chief William Lansdowne said police have been following the
guidelines as a matter of policy. Putting them into law "clearly defines
the issue and makes it easier to enforce," said Lansdowne, who became chief
in August.

His predecessor, David Bejarano, opposed the guidelines. Bejarano resigned
in April to take over the Southern District of the U.S. Marshals Service.

Lansdowne didn't address the council. Asked after the meeting whether he
supported the ordinance, Lansdowne said it was the law and he would enforce
it. He added that the ordinance "makes my job easier."

Jerry Meier, chairman of the city's Medical Cannabis Task Force, said he
hopes to have the ID-card program running within four months. He said the
task force is privately raising $20,000 to pay for it. The council
established the task force in May 2001 to implement Proposition 215, a 1996
ballot measure authorizing the medical use of marijuana.

"We're elated," Meier said after the council vote. "Just to get the
ordinance on the books . . . is an important positive step."

Murphy said establishing a city medical marijuana program might be "a
potential trap for the unwary."

The measure creates what supporters call a "safe harbor," shielding
patients who follow the rules from arrest by San Diego police. But patients
with the city ID card could still be arrested and prosecuted by federal agents.

"What we're doing here is not a good idea," Murphy said. "I think it sends
a bad message that the use of drugs is OK."

Murphy, a former Superior Court judge, said, "I have seen first-hand in
hundreds of cases the devastation caused by drugs to families and society,
and I cannot support legislation that supports drug use."

Councilwoman Toni Atkins said the council vote "reaffirms what California
voters voted on in 1996." The ID-card program will "provide law-abiding
citizens with clear guidelines," Atkins said.

The ID program will be run by a nonprofit agency, which has yet to be
chosen. The cards will be issued to patients and caregivers. They will
include a photograph of the cardholder, a serial number, an expiration date
and a phone number of the nonprofit agency for police to contact to verify
the card.

The ordinance provides that police will not detain cardholders for longer
than necessary to verify a patient's status and will not seize the
marijuana or plants of cardholders as long as the amount and conditions are
within the rules.

Several patients told the council that the ordinance would give them a
measure of security.

Ronald Little said he turned to marijuana to ease chronic back pain because
prescription drugs he tried had unpleasant side effects. Yet, he said, "I
am subject to arrest."

David Broner said marijuana allows people to get off prescription drugs
"that really chew up your liver."

Critics said allowing the medical use of marijuana would encourage
recreational use.

"It really amounts to de facto legalization," said Donald Thornhill, a
special agent with the federal Drug Enforcement Administration. "There is
no medical use for marijuana, period." He said sick people could use other
legal drugs to ease their symptoms.

Jo Ann Smith, a breast cancer survivor, said she feared that approving the
medical use of marijuana would lead more youths to try the drug. Marijuana
appeals "to healthy young people who have bought the lie that marijuana is
not harmful."

Diana Lavery, a June graduate of San Dieguito High School Academy in
Encinitas, said laws allowing the medical use of marijuana would make more
of the drug available to youths.

"Please, keep our neighborhoods and communities safe and healthy," Lavery said.

Ray Huard: (619) 542-4597; ray.huard@uniontrib.com

(Inset)

Medical marijuana law

In February, the San Diego City Council adopted guidelines for the use of
marijuana for medical purposes. The council voted 6-3 yesterday to make the
guidelines law and establish a medical marijuana identification card.
Features of the law are:

Patients with a San Diego County physician's recommendation can obtain a
city-issued identification card.

Patients can keep up to 1 pound of marijuana and grow up to 24 plants for
their own use.

Caregivers can keep up to 2 pounds of marijuana, grow marijuana for up to
four patients and grow up to 48 plants.

Outdoor cultivation is prohibited.

Marijuana may be grown only in enclosed locked greenhouses or other locked
structures.

Smoking in public is prohibited.

San Diego police will not detain a card-carrying patient longer than
necessary to verify the patient's status.

San Diego police will not seize the marijuana or plants of card-carrying
patients.