COUNTY MAY ISSUE IDS FOR MEDICAL MARIJUANA

After years of just saying no, Solano County may soon join most other
counties in the state in offering a medical marijuana identification
card program.

The Solano County Board of Supervisors will discuss the issue today
and could become one of the last 10 counties in the state to process
applications and issue state-produced identification cards to patients
who qualify and have been recommended by a doctor.

Medi-Cal patients would pay $100 for the identification card, while
patients not on Medi-Cal would be charged $200. State charges are
included in the fee and all costs to the county would be offset,
according to staff reports.

Proposition 215, also known as the Compassionate Use Act of 1996, was
passed by voters to provide legal avenues for seriously ill patients
to use medical marijuana. Then came SB 420, which allowed counties to
issue the ID cards as part of the Medical Marijuana Identification
Card program (MMIC) in 2005.

San Diego and San Bernardino counties challenge that law in court in
2006, claiming federal law superseded state law.

While most counties went ahead and began issuing the cards, 10
counties, including Solano, decided to wait for the court ruling. In
the meantime, Solano has been sued by Americans for Safe Access, a
national medical marijuana advocacy group, for its refusal to issue ID
cards.

San Diego and San Bernardino lost an appeal in California and took the
case to the U.S. Supreme Court, which threw the case out in May. That
left counties like Solano with no other options so, earlier this
month, supervisors directed staff to look into the issue.

The county has since completed a study to find an appropriate fee to
recover all costs of the MMIC. The fee includes state fees of $33 for
Medi-Cal patients and $66 for other patients.

There are no legal reasons the county may not start the program, and
as many as 500 MMIC applicants are expected the first year, a staff
report said. Of those, 175 are expected to be Medi-Cal patients.

The supervisors meet today at 9 a.m. at 675 Texas St., Fairfield.