MEDI-POT PATIENT AIMS TO OPEN GRASS VALLEY DISPENSARY

If you had to pick a marijuana user out of a crowd, Carole Chapman is
probably the last person you would select.

The south county grandma is always dressed as if she was still selling
high-end retail clothing, one of her past professions, along with
operating her own art and clothing business.

Now Chapman wants to open a marijuana dispensary in Grass Valley and
is advocating full legalization and taxation of pot through a drive to
get it on the state ballot called the Tax Cannabis 2010 California
Ballot Initiative.

Prohibition has never worked — imagine trying to stop alcohol,"
Chapman said. "This is an herb that grows easily, it's insane.

People would rather buy it legally than go to some guy on the corner,"
Chapman said. "I'm just trying to put a little ray of sanity into the
picture."

Like many Baby Boomers, Chapman smoked marijuana in the 1960s and then
grew out of it. Like others who have resumed pot consumption, Chapman
was reintroduced to cannabis by pain.

About 10 years ago, "I had carpal tunnel syndrome, bursitis and lower
back pain," while living in San Francisco, Chapman said. "I was in
physical therapy and they would give me pills for pain and I just
couldn't take them because they just wiped me out."

Neighbors were talking about medicinal marijuana in conversations and
pointed out to her that a dispensary had just opened down the street.
She got a prescription and has been treating her pain ever since with
smokable and edible marijuana products she buys mostly in Sacramento
and San Francisco.

Chapman didn't know there was a marijuana dispensary in Colfax after
she moved here several years ago, but even the knowledge of it hasn't
deterred her from wanting one in Nevada County.

We're a little behind the times up here, but now it's time," Chapman
said.

The hopeful entrepreneur attended Oaksterdam University in Oakland,
where legal marijuana guru Richard Lee teaches students how to run a
medical marijuana nonprofit collective and "everything you need to
know about cannabis," Chapman said.

At the marijuana dispensaries she visits, Chapman has learned to ask
for the Indica strain as opposed to the Sativa strain of marijuana.
Indica effectively reduces her pain and joint swelling, she said.

It really helps with insomnia," Chapman said. "Take a toke of Indica
at night and you're out, and you might even get some technicolor dreams."

Chapman says she doesn't use marijuana recreationally.

I'm not trying to con anybody," she said. "It's medicine and I need
it."

Although her daughter briefly ate medical marijuana products while
undergoing chemotherapy for cancer, family members do not use now and
understand her need, Chapman said.

When she was still struggling with her pain, Chapman asked the Kaiser
health system to give her medical marijuana before turning to the
neighborhood dispensary.

They laughed," Chapman said. "Now they're not laughing, everybody's
for it."

The 56 percent vote for Prop. 215 in 1996 that established legal
medical marijuana indicates that people will vote for full
legalization in 2010 in California, Chapman said.

In a year or two its going to be legal, just like Amsterdam," Chapman
said. "They know it's coming.

Nobody wants to pay taxes, but we want the schools, fire departments
and roads," Chapman said. Taxing legal marijuana through the proposed
initiative would provide an alternative revenue source for government,
she added.

In the interim, Chapman has taken out a business license with Grass
Valley for a medical marijuana dispensary.

I envision a medical-style office up by the hospital with plenty of
parking and handicapped access," Chapman said. "You'd have to have
somebody to greet (patients), I'd probably hire two."

For now, Chapman awaits the city's proposed medical marijuana
ordinance, expected to be complete late this summer.

I want to see if I qualify," Chapman said. "I would offer a discount
to vets, older and disabled people."