PATIENTS CAN KEEP 1 POUND OF MARIJUANA, COUNCIL SAYS

Sick people with their doctor's approval can keep as much as 1 pound of
marijuana to ease their symptoms under guidelines adopted last night by the
San Diego City Council.

The guidelines were approved by a 6-3 vote over the objections of Mayor
Dick Murphy and Police Chief David Bejarano after a seven-hour public
hearing. More than 50 people testified on the recommendations from the
Medical Cannabis Task Force.

What the council adopted was more stringent than what the task force wanted
and represented what Councilman Michael Zucchet said was a compromise
between showing compassion for the sick and respect for the needs of police.

The guidelines take effect immediately and will undergo a two-year trial,
with the the city manager and police giving the council updates every six
months.

"This is the right thing to do," said Councilwoman Toni Atkins, who led the
push for the guidelines.

Council members Scott Peters, Ralph Inzunza Jr., Donna Frye, Charles Lewis,
Atkins and Zucchet voted for the guidelines. Murphy and Councilmen Brian
Maienschein and Jim Madaffer voted against them.

"Today's action will give some relief and hope to those in San Diego who
are suffering," said Inzunza, who insisted the guidelines be stricter than
those the task force recommended.

The task force said patients should be allowed to keep 3 pounds of
marijuana and grow 20 plants outdoors or 72 indoors, but the council opted
for lower numbers and prohibited outdoor marijuana gardens. The guidelines
allow 1 pound and 24 plants to be grown indoors or in locked greenhouses.

A San Diego County doctor also would have to recommend that the patient use
marijuana to treat an illness.

Caregivers growing marijuana for others could store no more than 2 pounds
and could grow no more than 48 plants indoors or in locked greenhouses. The
task force recommended they be allowed to store 12 pounds and grow 90
plants indoors or outdoors.

The council also eliminated a 72-hour waiting period that the task force
wanted police to follow before seizing processed marijuana or plants of
people who say they are patients.

Minors, people on parole or probation, and those convicted of a serious or
violent felony or for selling drugs could not become caregivers.

Murphy, a former judge, said the guidelines "will allow large quantities of
marijuana on our streets, which will make more marijuana readily available
to our kids."

By allowing patients and caregivers to grow and store so much marijuana,
Murphy said the city "will allow unscrupulous drug dealers to hide their
drug dealing behind these guidelines."

In adopting the guidelines, San Diego joins other California cities and
counties that have taken steps to implement Proposition 215, a 1996 ballot
measure that allowed the medical use of marijuana but set no rules.

"What we're attempting to do here is enact the will of the voters of
California," Atkins said.

The amount of marijuana patients can have varies widely among the cities
and counties with guidelines, from a half-pound in Arcata and Marin County
to 3 pounds in Oakland and Sonoma and Tehama counties, the task force said
in its report to council.

The District of Columbia and 27 states have laws allowing some medical use
of marijuana. Seven states - Arkansas, Colorado, Maine, Hawaii, Oregon,
Washington and California - allow home cultivation, said Rosalie Liccardo
Pacula, an economist and drug policy researcher with the Rand Corp.

The San Diego guidelines and a planned city identification program expected
to begin later this year are meant to give patients, those who care for
them and police a sense of how much marijuana can be grown and stored
legally, said Juliana Humphrey, head of the task force. The council
appointed the 12-member panel in 2001.

The goal of the guidelines is to establish what the task force called a
"safe harbor" so patients and caregivers would know that if they stayed
within the guidelines they would not be subject to arrest by San Diego
police, said Humphrey, a San Diego County deputy public defender.

Bejarano said the guidelines are unnecessary.

"The use of marijuana by legitimate patients has not been an issue," he said.

Since 1999, San Diego police have had 19 cases involving medical marijuana.
Of those, Bejarano said, six were found by police to be legitimate patients
who were allowed to keep their marijuana.

The guidelines will not protect medical marijuana growers or users from
federal prosecution.

Because federal law still makes it a crime to grow or possess marijuana for
medical use, Maienschein said, "I'm worried that this is going to give
people a false sense of security and they will wind up being prosecuted
under federal law."

Because of the conflict with federal law, Deputy City Attorney Les Girard
said he couldn't guarantee the guidelines would withstand a court challenge.

More than a dozen medical marijuana users told how the drug had helped them.

Michael Bartelmo, a quadriplegic and task force member, said conventional
pain medication left him unable to function and confined to his house.
Bartelmo said using marijuana eases his pain without leaving him so
disoriented that he must stay home.

"We can help those patients who need it in a responsible fashion," Bartelmo
said.

David Bearman, a Santa Barbara physician and former San Diego resident who
runs drug treatment programs, said he often has recommended marijuana to
patients with ailments from cancer to muscle spasms caused by paralysis.

"There's no question that it works," Bearman said.

Presiding Juvenile Court Judge James Milliken said he feared the guidelines
would increase what he said already is a serious drug abuse problem among
youths in San Diego. Milliken said 85 percent of the cases he sees involve
drugs.

Representatives of the San Diego Prevention Coalition and others said the
guidelines would send youths a message that illegal use of marijuana is
accepted in San Diego.

"We believe there is a direct effect between permissive marijuana laws,
public safety and teen use," said coalition executive director John Redman.

Humphrey said young people must be told that they shouldn't use marijuana
just as they shouldn't abuse prescription drugs.