TASK FORCE PUSHES FOR MEDICINAL POT

Lockyer leads charge to clarify state law

Determined to get medicinal marijuana to suffering patients, California law
enforcement and cannabis advocates are uniting on myriad proposals, ranging
from clinical studies to pondering a state-run pot field.

In a tough balancing act, state officials seek to draft a law that
clarifies California's murky 1996 medicinal marijuana initiative without
drawing the fury of federal officials who vow to snuff out medicinal pot.

The campaign is headed by new Attorney General Bill Lockyer, who is a stark
contrast to his Republican predecessor, Dan Lungren, the arch foe of
Proposition 215, which voters approved to allow doctors to prescribe
homegrown medicinal pot.

Lungren joined federal prosecutors in a lawsuit last year that shut private
"cannabis clubs" that distributed marijuana to patients.

Lockyer brings a personal commitment to the issue after watching his mother
and sister die from leukemia. "It always amazes me that doctors can
prescribe morphine but not marijuana," he said.

He has assembled a task force of unlikely allies -- prosecutors and
narcotics agents, pot advocates and doctors -- determined to hammer out a
law that brings marijuana relief to patients who genuinely need it.

The 31-member task force is drafting legislation to buttress Proposition
215, which was criticized for failing to define what illnesses were
protected or how much pot a patient could possess.

The task force co-chairman, state Sen. John Vasconcellos, D-San Jose, has
introduced a draft that urges the federal government to reclassify
marijuana, now deemed an addictive drug with no medical benefits, as a
prescribed medication.

But the new proposal says that until the federal government takes action,
"this bill would require the state to develop and implement a plan for the
safe and affordable distribution of medicinal marijuana."

The task force draft report suggests "a desirable alternative (to homegrown
pot or cannabis clubs) would be state-grown marijuana," cultivated by
University of California researchers and distributed by county public
health clinics.

Lockyer recently went to Washington, D.C., to lobby U.S. Attorney General
Janet Reno and federal drug czar Barry McCaffrey for leeway on medicinal
marijuana. But when Lockyer pointed to a 1972 state law authorizing him to
provide marijuana for research projects, McCaffrey warned that anyone who
flouted federal law risked arrest.