GROUP DENIED ENTRANCE TO ALBANY CHAMBER EVENT

Chamber Group Accepted Money, Then Turned Them Away From Meeting

Local marijuana advocate Sandee Burbank got the bum's rush at an
event described as a drug-free workplace forum.

Burbank, who lives in rural The Dalles, founded Mothers Against
Misuse and Abuse (MAMA) 26 years ago and chairs the state's Advisory
Committee on Medical Marijuana in the Department of Human Services,
described the Workplace Legislative Work Group as a "moral crusade"
against Oregon's Medical Marijuana Act, which was approved by voters
10 years ago this month. MAMA operates a medical marijuana clinic in Portland.

According to a report in the Corvallis Gazette-Times, Burbank and a
handful of medical marijuana advocates have attended or tried to
attend several of the group's presentations to challenge what they
describe as distorted claims about medicinal pot.

She and other members registered and paid for an Oct. 23 forum in
Albany, but were turned away at the door by chamber of commerce members.

"What was really disturbing, more than anything, was that we'd driven
all the way to Albany, spent the night, paid ahead of time and were
told it wasn't a problem that we weren't chamber members," Burbank
told The Chronicle Oct. 30. "We even paid an extra $10 because we
weren't. They were so hateful. That contempt in their eyes was really
disturbing. I haven't seen that in a long time _ since the early '80s."

Burbank said they had attended a similar event hosted by the
organization in Clatskanie about a year ago and participated in the discussion.

"He kept talking about problems with drugs in the workplace, citing
statistics that were often about alcohol, pharmaceuticals, meth, but
always coming back to cannabis and making it the devil problem,"
Burbank said, "insisting drug testing is the way to go."

Burbank said many use medical marijuana to sleep at night or when
they are off duty, so they are not impaired. She advocates for
impairment testing, that catches impairment caused by any source,
including fatigue, emotional distress, and anything that might
prevent a worker from paying attention.

"We came away from there with people saying, 'Wow, he's got a point,
but there seems to be some stuff missing there,'" Burbank recalled.

Burbank said she was disturbed to read an account of that event
characterizing her as nasty and disruptive.

"I was very respectful," she said. "I am not the kind of person that
hollers at meetings."

Even though they were turned away at the later event, Burbank's group
did receive a packet of the meeting materials.

"It was obvious, when you look at what their plan is, it's not about
impairment in the workplace. It's about taking down the medical
marijuana program."

Quoted in the Gazette-times, Dan Harmon, the group's leader, as well
as the chairman of the Drugfree Workplace Legislative Work Group,
said the medical marijuana act "says something about permissiveness
in this state, and we've got to stop this permissiveness. It's a very
symbolic issue."

Hoffman said his corporation doesn't hire anyone with a medical
marijuana card. Risks of doing so, he said, include workplace safety,
legal liability and the potential for loss of federal contracts.

He also claimed the law is being widely abused and framed the effort
to scale back the law as a moral crusade. Harmon told the Albany
meeting his group would push hard this next session to keep medical
marijuana out of the job site and roll back major portions of the act.

Burbank says employers could accommodate medical users if they tested
for impairment rather than metabolic traces of pot. She also said
it's unfair to group medical users with abusers who use the drug to get high.