SHERIFF LAYS OUT THE LAW ON MARIJUANA

Sheriff Tom Allman explained the Sheriff's Office's approach to
marijuana-related business at a courthouse meeting of mostly
attorneys Friday at noon.

Allman also discussed the proposed zip-tie tag program, which, if
approved by the Board of Supervisors, would charge $25 per medical
marijuana plant and also a possible eradication fee of more than $25
per marijuana plant.

"The purpose of today's meeting is very simple," Allman said. "I am
trying to take confusion out of the miscellaneous marijuana laws that
we have throughout the county and state.

"I am trying to provide consistency so when your clients contact you
for advice or after they are arrested and you are representing them,
there can be a clear understanding of what the Sheriff's Office's
policy is and what our eradication policy is," Allman said.

In addition to the Sheriff's Office's directive, a copy of State
Attorney General Edmund Brown's guidelines was also handed out and is
published online as well.

Some priorities for what the Sheriff's Office takes into
consideration on marijuana were also explained by Allman. One of the
priorities will be grows that are harming the environment.

County ordinances were also included in the Sheriff's Office's
directive. The ordinances include no more than 25 medical marijuana
plants on one parcel, that the 25-plant limit does not change with
the number of qualified patients, that no amount of marijuana can be
grown within 1,000 feet of a school, bus stop, park or church and
that medical marijuana grown outdoors must have a six-feet-high fence
with a locking gate.

The outcome of the Kelly case will have a significant effect on the
guidelines discussed Friday.

"If the Kelly case is affirmed, everything you are reading you might
as well put in the recycling bin," Allman said. "But if the Kelly
case is overturned I assume everything you are reading is going to
remain consistent as the law."

Objectives for sheriff's deputies to follow were also presented by the sheriff.

"We will be offering compliance checks to any body who calls the
Sheriff's Office and says, Listen, I think I am in compliance and I
don't know if I am in compliance, will you come out and look at our
garden,'" Allman said. "We are going to go after the commercial
gardens. We are going to go after the gardens that are causing
environmental damage." Citizen calls reporting marijuana as a
nuisance is also on the list of objectives.

Gardens diverting water illegally will also be a priority. Marijuana
grown on public lands will be eradicated and marijuana grown by means
of trespassing will be eradicated, Allman said.