WHERE DOES YOUR POT GROW?

IT'S EASY to mock Supervisor Mark Leno's proposal for San Francisco to grow
and distribute its own medical marijuana.

Leno even provided extra fodder for late-night comedians by suggesting that
vacant lots could be turned into pot patches and that the city's venture
into agriculture could provide job training for the unemployed.

One Australian newspaper this week headlined a story about the proposed
November ballot measure: "Dopey plan for Frisco."

There is, to be sure, an eye-rolling aspect to the notion of this Board of
Supervisors venturing into the drug business.

Beyond the one-liners, however, is the serious matter of how to get medical
marijuana to patients in a structured, limited way that fulfills the will
of the overwhelming majority of California voters who passed Proposition
215 in 1996.

John Walters, the federal drug czar, is right when he argues that some
advocates of legalizing marijuana are trying to use the medical issue to
get around drug laws. He worries about the young people who are trying
potent strains of marijuana at early ages. He points to evidence that
experimentation with marijuana is linked to exposure to other drugs.

We share all those concerns, but we don't accept Walters' argument that
keeping pot away from healthy teens requires denying it to a middle-aged
patient trying to offset the effects of chemotherapy.

"I kind of hope the people of the city don't do this," he said when asked
about the Leno plan during a meeting with The Chronicle on Thursday.

His message was clear: "I like San Francisco," and feel the pain of people
trying to get relief through medical marijuana, but don't look to
Washington for help.

Therein lies this administration's -- and its predecessor's -- disconnect
with reality. The U.S. government's song remains the same: The scientific
evidence on the efficacy of medical marijuana remains inconclusive, federal
law trumps state law, and these "buyers' clubs" are part of the illicit
drug trade and must be stopped. But most Washington politicians, fearful
about appearing "soft on drugs," have done little if anything to address
those issues in a way that will let people with AIDS, cancer, multiple
sclerosis, glaucoma and various other conditions use marijuana under a
doctor's prescription.

So patients in California and eight other states that allow medical
marijuana are left to fill their prescriptions from a hodgepodge of public
and private sources, which have shown varying degrees of respect for the law.

"Where does it come from? Who's growing it?" Leno asked. "We don't ask
questions, the police don't ask questions. It's kind of a wink and a nod."

Leno's proposal is less outrageous when one considers the current situation.

Those who worry about city bureaucrats tending marijuana mini-farms -- with
meddling politicians looking over their shoulders, dictating organic
techniques and union work rules -- should recognize that much of today's
supply provides a sweet little side business for drug traffickers whose
methods and motives are hidden from public scrutiny.

San Francisco is not the best place to grow medical marijuana. The security
logistics alone would be daunting, whether the plants were sprouting in
urban gardens or in some of the remote watersheds that are part of the
city's Hetch Hetchy water and power system.

A better approach would be for Congress to pass a bill by Rep. Barney Frank,

D-Mass., that would acknowledge reality: that many doctors regard
marijuana, while admittedly experimental, as a potentially helpful
treatment for certain ailments. The anecdotal evidence of its effectiveness
is compelling. Physicians can decide the risks and suitability for
individual patients. States should be allowed to set up a consistent,
controlled way to make it happen, instead of leaving it to cities to grasp
at ideas that may or may not prove practical.

And the federal government should stay out of the way.