INN IS OASIS FOR MEDICINAL MARIJUANA

New bed and breakfast tests law in California

SANTA CRUZ, Calif. - Andrea Tischler is perched atop ground zero of
California's escalating medicinal-marijuana wars.

On Thursday, she and a partner opened the nation's first "bed, bud and
breakfast," a cozy Victorian inn with a backyard oasis where medicinal-pot
users can fire up right next to the clothing-optional hot tub.

"This inn will be a comfort zone for people with a medical need for
marijuana," said Tischler, a former schoolteacher. "While it may be the
nation's first, many more will follow."

The Compassion Flower Inn opened on the heels of a new city ordinance that
allows people with diseases such as AIDS, cancer and arthritis to legally
grow and use pot.

Defying federal authorities, Santa Cruz is one of several California
communities that has jump-started efforts to put the state's
medicinal-marijuana law into practice.

State voters passed Proposition 215 in 1996 to permit the sick to obtain
marijuana under a doctor's care.

But federal prosecutors stepped in and closed down six cannabis buyers clubs
in Northern California, saying marijuana use is still illegal under U.S.
law. State legislators have steered clear, backing off of a proposal for a
statewide cardholder system that would allow registered medicinal-marijuana
users, providers and growers to avoid arrest.

"This issue has been a political hot potato, and it's been hard for state
officials to reach any consensus," said Anthony Condotti, assistant city
attorney in Santa Cruz. "So cities and counties at the grass-roots level
have taken the lead."

Both the Santa Cruz law and the new bed and breakfast are being closely
monitored, not only by cities statewide, but also by the Clinton
administration.

"Our position continues to be that marijuana remains a prohibited controlled
substance," said Gretchen Michael, a U.S. Justice Department spokesman.
"What we say to people in Santa Cruz is that no matter what laws you pass,
the federal government could still come knocking."

Santa Cruz City Councilman Mike Rotkin said the city is not looking for a
fight with the federal government. "But the need for this law is so great,
it's worth the risk," Rotkin said. "How do you tell a cancer patient
enduring painful chemotherapy they can have morphine but not marijuana? It's
just so illogical."

The Santa Cruz ordinance was inspired by Valerie Corral, a
medicinal-marijuana user who has long provided free pot to dying friends and
relatives.

Since 1993, operating from a secret and isolated mountainside location, she
has helped run the nonprofit WO/MEN's Alliance for Medical Marijuana, which
has dispensed the drug free of charge to more than 200 sick and terminally
ill patients around Santa Cruz.

"To make this concept palatable to the feds, we've got to take the
profiteering out of medicinal marijuana," said Corral, who said she
regularly smokes pot to counteract the pain from epilepsy.