CALIFORNIA COOPERATIVE GIVES, SELLS MARIJUANA TO SUFFERING

Nevada to vote on illegal drug for medical use

OAKLAND, Calif. -- Step up to the counter at the Oakland Cannabis Buyers'
Cooperative. Today you'll find baggies of Big Bud and Humboldt Octane sell
for $55 per one-eighth ounce. African Sativa fetches $50, AA Sativa goes
for $20 and RX Sativa, just $15.

For the real connoisseur, hash oil can be purchased, along with powdered
keef, small vials of cannabis blended with alcohol and larger baggies of
ordinary cooking pot. Cookie recipes are available on the counter at no
charge.

A smell similar to new-mown hay wafts in from the adjacent room. There,
under growing lights are dozens of green, symmetrical plants that have
reached a 4-foot height. Give them another couple of months and they end up
in someone's pipe.

"It smells like marijuana," employee Stacy Traylor quickly corrects with a
chuckle.

Whether you call it by the botanical name of cannabis sativa or one of the
cute slang terms concocted by growers, the substance for sale behind the
counter is still marijuana. One-eighth ounce makes about a dozen joints.

Like most employees at the Cannabis Buyers' Cooperative, Traylor, 25, also
is a patient. She said she suffers from a pancreatic disorder that prevents
her from digesting food properly and having normal bowel movements.

"I smoke all day long," said Traylor, who laughs and smiles a lot, but as
the public information officer for the cooperative, manages to answer a lot
of questions. "What kind of people would not want people they love to have
pain relief?"

Before marijuana, Traylor said she took large dosages of prescription
morphine each day.

"If I didn't have marijuana, I wouldn't be here now," she said.

The Cannabis Buyers' Cooperative is the model of the marijuana dispensing
operations that opened in California after 56 percent of its voters
approved Proposition 215 in 1996. About 2,200 people, presumably all with
appropriate recommendations from doctors, acquire their marijuana here.

For users who cannot afford the specialty prices, the cooperative gives
them a "compassionate use" baggie with enough marijuana for about three
joints.

In August, the Oakland City Council designated the staff of the cooperative
as officers of the city, a step that presumably makes them immune from
federal and state prosecution.

"Right now, you are talking to a city officer," quipped Jeff Jones, the
short-haired, 24-year-old executive director. "We are sending a message to
the rest of America that this can be done properly in places that are
committed."

The California law was designed to let AIDS and cancer patients and other
sick people with doctors' recommendations use and grow marijuana without
fear of state legal reprisal. The Oakland cooperative is the largest of
four remaining marijuana dispensaries in California.

Nevada voters on Nov. 3 could approve a similar proposition in Question 9
on their election ballots. More than 73,000 residents signed petitions in
the spring to put the medical marijuana proposal on the ballot.

Voters in five other states, including Oregon and Washington, also have
medical marijuana questions on their ballots.

The impetus and money for the petition drives came from the
California-based Americans for Medical Rights. The group is bankrolled by
billionaire global financier George Soros; John Sperling, founder of the
University of Phoenix; and Peter Lewis, chief executive officer of
Progressive Insurance Co.

Critics have claimed the agenda of Soros, in particular, goes far beyond
medical marijuana. Soros has donated millions to reform marijuana laws.

But Dave Fratello, spokesman for Americans for Medical Rights, insists his
organization only wants to legalize marijuana for medical uses.

Unlike California residents, Silver State voters also must approve the
question again in 2000 before marijuana dispensaries open along the Las
Vegas Strip.

Under the Nevada initiative, the Legislature in 2001 would set up a system
that would permit doctors to recommend marijuana for patients with cancer,
glaucoma, AIDS, epilepsy, nausea, multiple sclerosis and other medical
conditions.

The Nevada proposal goes further than the California initiative to ensure
marijuana use would be restricted to medical patients. It calls for
creation of a registry of patients that law enforcement officers may use to
verify whether people are approved users. The state proposition also
prohibits the use of marijuana in public, even by permitted users.

"We have gone out of our way in the new initiative states so use is more
carefully limited and controlled," Fratello said.

Except for Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jan Jones, a cancer survivor,
most top state officials oppose the medical marijuana question. Nevada's
two congressmen, Republicans John Ensign and Jim Gibbons, sided with the
majority on Sept. 15 as the House of Representatives voted 310-93 for a
resolution that declares members are "unequivocally opposed" to allowing
sick people to use marijuana.

Their votes dismayed leaders of the Marijuana Policy Project, an
organization pushing for the legalization of medical marijuana.

"This resolution shows that the House is completely out of touch with
American people," said Robert Kampia, executive director of the policy
project. "Eighty percent of the American people support medical marijuana,
so it is clear the vast majority also oppose this mean-spirited resolution."

While the medical marijuana initiatives today are controversial, there was
scarcely any attention directed to Nevada in 1979 when the Legislature and
Gov. Robert List backed a medical marijuana law.

Until its repeal in 1987, state law allowed doctors to prescribe marijuana
for cancer patients and people with glaucoma, although there is no evidence
that any ever was prescribed or that the federal government made it
available to legal users.

But neither Gov. Bob Miller nor Republican gubernatorial candidate Kenny
Guinn would be as bold today as List was in his time.

"Federal law prohibits the use of marijuana," Miller said. "As long as that
is the case, state law isn't going to change it."

Miller fears passage of the ballot question could lead to drug abuse, as
has occurred in some marijuana cooperatives in California.

Earlier this year as many as 20 marijuana dispensaries were operating in
California, most notably the San Francisco club operated by Dennis Peron, a
flamboyant man who openly smoked marijuana and made an abortive run for
governor.

Most were shut down by the U.S. Department of Justice and the California
attorney general's office after undercover agents made buys of marijuana.

"I don't accept the idea that only sick people go to these clubs," said
John Gordanier, the California deputy attorney general who closed Peron's
club.

At the height of the San Francisco club trend in the spring, as many as
20,000 people were purchasing marijuana.

"Some of them were terminally ill people, but I don't believe the majority
had medical problems," Gordanier said. "The rest were there to party."

He said one of his agents bought a pound of marijuana from Peron and that
even a 16-year-old made a purchase.

As a former Clark County district attorney, Miller has a particular
interest in stopping the recreational use of drugs. Nevada law makes
possession of even a small amount of marijuana a felony. An amended law
approved in 1995, however, allows minor users to clear their records if
they complete an anti-drug course.

"I haven't seen evidence that marijuana is more effective than other kinds
of drugs," Miller added. "I will try to keep an open mind, but the
potential for abuse is great. But I have sympathy for people who need these
kinds of drugs."

Like Miller, Guinn opposes medical uses of marijuana as long as the drug's
use remains against federal law. He also wants the American Medical
Association to conduct tests on the efficacy of medical marijuana before he
backs use of the drug by sick people.

"I believe in alternative medicine," Guinn said, "but only if the AMA
approves it."

Las Vegas Mayor Jones, however, said she supports the use of marijuana as
medicine, as long as physicians prescribe the drug to patients and the
Nevada State Medical Association oversees the distribution.

The Nevada State Medical Association takes no position on the medical
marijuana question.

Larry Matheis, executive director of the association, said members want the
federal government first to allow the medical industry to conduct rigorous
studies to determine whether marijuana can help sick people.

"There is anecdotal information that patients prefer it," Matheis said. "It
should be studied. The federal government should not discourage controlled
studies."

But Chuck Thomas, spokesman for the Marijuana Policy Project, contends the
Clinton administration has been blocking marijuana studies. The National
Institute on Drug Abuse controls the only legal supply of marijuana in the
United States, and Thomas said the agency thwarted studies to prove the
value of medical marijuana. The agency did not return telephone calls.

"The goal of the government is to keep marijuana illegal at any cost,"
Thomas said. "They say we need more research but they won't allow more
research."

Matheis essentially agrees. He said there is a schizophrenia on the part of
the federal government over anything that deals with drugs.

While he expects Nevada voters to have a "great deal of sympathy" for the
marijuana question, Matheis warns them not to put the cart before the horse.

"Anecdotes that it helps patients are not science," Matheis said. "There
still is a question on whether there are medical benefits to marijuana use."

Six days a week in Oakland, Jeff Jones and Traylor make sure the people who
come in their office receive their preferred medicine.

"The government has put doctors in a horrible situation," Traylor said.
"They are taking away our rights as patients to choose the type of medicine
we want to take."

Jones calls marijuana an "herbal remedy." He also consistently refers to
the substance as cannabis, its scientific name, rather than marijuana,
partly because of his desire to reduce the negative stigma of the word.

Just finding the Cannabis Buyers' Cooperative is difficult. There are no
signs for the cooperative along Broadway Avenue in downtown Oakland.

Visitors must push a buzzer in the lobby of a nondescript office building
before a guard permits them to take an elevator to the cooperative office.

Once at the cooperative, another guard checks identification cards before
anyone can purchase marijuana. Smoking is not permitted in the building.

Jones said his staff call to verify a physician has recommended a patient
use marijuana. Despite the precautions, the Oakland cooperative faces a
future hearing in federal court on why an undercover officer was sold
marijuana.

Jones insists the agent came with a fake recommendation from a doctor,
along with other phony documents.

A conservative young man with white shirt and tie, Jones said he welcomes
regulations to ensure only sick people receive marijuana.

He became interested in marijuana as a remedy to relieve pain after his
father died of cancer in his native South Dakota when Jones was a
teen-ager. Six months after his father's death, Jones read that marijuana
could have helped alleviate his father's pain. "It has side effects," Jones
said. "It makes people lose short-term memories and causes people to be
hungry, but for many people cannabis is the best alternative. I don't want
other people to go through what my father went through."

San Leandro, Calif., user Steve Wilson has diabetes and AIDS. But he looks
as healthy as he did during his days as a fitness trainer.

"Marijuana is a blessing, really," Wilson said. "There were days when I
couldn't walk or eat. I almost died. This is the best I've felt in four
years. It's awesome."

Checked-by: Pat Dolan