BILL CURBS MEDICAL MARIJUANA

SENATE OKS POT LIMIT, MANDATORY REGISTRY

JUNEAU - The state Senate passed a bill Thursday placing new limits on the
medical marijuana law voters adopted last fall.

"I assure members that this does not repeal the law," the bill's sponsor,
Sen. Loren Leman, said. "It makes it work."

Senate Bill 94 passed 15-5, with the minority Democrats voting no. It moves
to the House.

The voter initiative allows people with terminal or debilitating diseases to
use marijuana if they have a recommendation from their doctor. It passed
with nearly 60 percent of the vote in the November election.

Leman, an Anchorage Republican, angered proponents of the marijuana
initiative in March, on the day the new law went into effect, by introducing
a bill to change it. He said he was trying to make it easier for police to
determine who is a legal user of marijuana and who isn't. He said he wanted
to prevent arrests of innocent patients.

On the Senate floor Thursday, Leman told his colleagues he had compromised
with the Alaskans for Medical Rights, the group that campaigned for the
voter initiative. The bill before them was different from the one he
originally proposed, he said.

The revised bill would still change the initiative in several ways. Most
significantly, it would require patients who want to use marijuana for
medical purposes to register with the state. The voter initiative
established an optional registry to give patients an identification card
that would ward off arrest. It would also limit the amount of marijuana a
patient can possess to one ounce or six plants. The initiative allowed
patients to seek an exemption if they could show they had a medical need for
more.

Sen. Kim Elton, a Democrat from Juneau, where the marijuana initiative
passed overwhelmingly, said he didn't think he should second-guess the will
of the voters.

"I think it's somewhat presumptuous of me to change an initiative that got
more votes than I did," he said.

After the vote, Senate Minority Leader Johnny Ellis of Anchorage said the
electorate liked the initiative they approved.

"The idea that the citizens didn't know what they were doing or that they
were ignorant or that legislators know best is pretty arrogant and
obnoxious," he said.

David Finkelstein, a former legislator who is working for Alaskans for
Medical Rights, said he still doesn't like the bill but it's much better
than it was. It's true that SB 94 doesn't repeal the initiative, he said,
but it burdens the patient with new requirements.

Many medical marijuana users planned to register, he said, but some -
particularly AIDS patients - feel they have to keep their condition a secret
and won't sign up. If Leman's bill becomes law, the medical marijuana
initiative will offer no protection from prosecution to patients who refuse
to register.

"To make it mandatory just isn't fair," Finkelstein said. "They're not
criminals. They're not sex offenders."

Bill Kozlowski said he doesn't like the mandatory registration or the strict
limits on how much medical marijuana is allowed. Kozlowski is a 27-year-old
Juneau man with severe hemophilia. He testified to a committee this week
that he smokes about an ounce of marijuana every 10 days. That's not so
much, he said, considering the doses of morphine and other narcotics he's
been prescribed to control the pain from his internal bleeding. Marijuana,
he said, lets him sleep at night and makes the days more bearable.

"It doesn't take away the pain, but it makes it so, in my head, the pain
isn't the only thing that's there," he said Thursday.

He declined to say how he gets his supply. Both the initiative and Leman's
bill allow patients and caregivers to grow marijuana, but they don't say
where the plants or seeds would come from in the first place.

"I don't know how this all works, but the people wanted it," Sen. Robin
Taylor, R-Wrangell, said during Senate debate.

Kozlowski said part of the reason he doesn't want to register is that no
matter what the state does, marijuana use still violates federal law.

"Why should I risk my already short and difficult life to be put on a list
that can be used against me?" he asked.

Even though the registry would be confidential, his disease wouldn't be
listed and law enforcement officers could use it only for certain purposes,
Kozlowski is skeptical that his privacy would be respected. He doesn't want
to put his name on a government list because of his medical condition and
legislators wouldn't want to either, he said.

"Would they want to be put on a list for their heart medication or their
diabetes medication?" he asked. "I don't think so, because it is nobody's
business."

Finkelstein said there is at least one thing he likes about SB 94: money.
The funds for the patient registry aren't in the House or Senate versions of
next year's operating budget. If SB 94 becomes law, it would provide $58,000
for the administration costs.

"We want the money. We want the registration system," he said. "We just
don't want it mandatory."