MEDICAL MARIJUANA DISPENSARIES SURGE

Cities, County Use Temporary Bans While Writing New Regs

James Stacy operates his 300-member medical marijuana collective out
of a nondescript building between a strip mall and a used car
dealership in North County. The marijuana is kept in small glass jars
locked inside a small room. There is no advertising outside the
building, except for a simple banner with the collective's name.

"It's no place to hang out," Stacy said. "This is like an old-time pharmacy."

The number of medical marijuana establishments is poised to increase
now that the county and cities have turned their efforts from trying
to stop them to regulating them.

A martial arts instructor, Stacy said he was prescribed marijuana by
his doctor two years ago to calm pain from various bone, joint and
muscle problems. He said he started the collective six weeks ago when
he tired of driving to Los Angeles to get his marijuana.

There are no exact figures on how many medical marijuana
establishments are in San Diego County, though the Web site for the
marijuana advocacy group National Organization for the Reform of
Marijuana Laws lists about 30 cooperatives or collectives operating
in San Diego County, two of them in North County.

Activists say many others operate with as little fanfare as possible
to keep from attracting attention to themselves.

But there has been a surge in the number of such establishments in
the region, driven primarily by two recent events -- the county's
failed attempt to overturn the state's 1996 medical marijuana law,
and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder's March statement that federal
agents will now target marijuana distributors only when they violate
both federal and state laws.

So, after years of failed attempts to outlaw and crack down on
medical marijuana providers, cities and counties are now turning
their efforts to drafting ordinances regulating them.

California has 32 cities and eight counties that have ordinances
regulating the establishments, according to the advocacy group
Americans for Safe Access. Three counties and 51 cities have enacted
moratoriums, according to the group's Web site.

More than 100 cities and seven counties have ordinances banning
medical marijuana dispensaries.

Pent-Up Demand?

In North County, cities such as Escondido and Oceanside have placed
moratoriums on opening marijuana distribution sites.

The county Board of Supervisors is set to vote Wednesday on its temporary ban.

Joe Farace, a county planning manager, said officials are
recommending the moratorium because they don't want dispensaries to
be established that may conflict with existing regulations.

The county has received 20 inquiries from people interested in
establishing medical marijuana dispensaries, including one permit
application for a dispensary in Fallbrook, according to county documents.

Oceanside city officials said they received an inquiry about opening
one before the City Council adopted its moratorium in May. Escondido
received several inquiries, officials there said.

Last week, San Diego formed a task force made up of patients,
dispensary operators, law enforcement officials and others to review
medical marijuana guidelines.

Councilwoman Marti Emerald said Wednesday that San Diego needs to
look at the proliferation of medical marijuana dispensaries while
preserving the rights of legitimate users of the drug.

Officials say the bans are only temporary while they draft new rules
paving the way for medical marijuana providers. But medical marijuana
advocates such as Stacy say local politicians are blocking the law.

"What (local elected officials) are doing is advancing their
morality," Stacy said. "They are ignoring the law."

John Byrom disagrees. He works for the drug abuse prevention
organization Tri-City Prevention Collaborative, which is funded by the county.

"Bottom line, dispensary owners never follow the rules, no matter how
many rules you have, because they stand to make a profit at the
expense of public safety," he said.

Temporary Ban

If the county approves the ban Wednesday, it would be in effect for 45 days.

However, Farace said that drafting such a complicated law would take
longer, and that his department probably would ask for an extension
of the moratorium.

State law allows the county to extend the temporary ban an additional
10 months and 15 days, Farace said.

Some medical marijuana advocates say cities and counties are
preventing patients from receiving the medicine that they need.

"They are not trying to help us. They are just trying to stall the
law," said Rudy Reyes, an outspoken medical marijuana advocate who
uses the drug to alleviate the pain of third-degree burns suffered
during the 2003 Cedar wildfire.

In the meantime, Stacy said he operates his collective using the
guidelines released by state Attorney General Jerry Brown last year.

The guidelines say that for-profit medical marijuana dispensaries are
probably operating illegally. But formal cooperatives registered
under the state's Food and Agricultural Code or organized as less
formal "collectives" are legal under California law.

Cooperatives must follow strict rules on organization, elections and
distribution of earnings, and report individual transactions each
year, according to the guidelines. Collectives are not defined by
state law, but are businesses or farms jointly owned and operated by
the members of a group, according to the guidelines.

Stacy, 45, said he requires a patient's state ID and an original note
from a doctor to enroll new members. He gets his marijuana from
members who grow the plants and sells it to members who can't grow it
on their own, Stacy said.

Stacy said he pays taxes on the transactions to the state, as
required under the state Board of Equalization rules.

Most of the members are people about his age and older, he said. They
have various illnesses, including cancer, he said.

The building where he runs the collective resembles an old
schoolhouse, with a small, plain waiting room at the entrance with
two windows. On the left is a registration window. The window on the
right faces the storage room where the marijuana is kept.

In the storage room, a glass counter holds a cash register and
lighted magnifying glass on top. There's also a refrigerator and a
white, dry erase board where "the menu" is written. A faint, but
distinctive smell permeates the room, an earthy, dried-weed odor.

Though he advertises only in a few specialty magazines and on the
Internet, Stacy said he gets up to 10 calls a day from people wanting
to join the collective. He said that if properly regulated, cannabis
could be the region's economic recovery plant.

A Growing Industry

The state attorney general does not keep count of the number of
medical marijuana establishments, said Christine Gasparac, a
spokeswoman for the attorney general.

"If a group of patients and/or caregivers chooses to form a statutory
cooperative, they would have to file articles of incorporation and
other documents with the California secretary of state's office,"
Gasparac said. "However, it's known that some dispensaries forgo the
corporate formalities of statutory cooperative and instead operate as
collectives."

The county says there is only one known medical marijuana dispensary
in its unincorporated areas.

In 1996, voters in California approved the Compassionate Use Act,
which legalized marijuana for medical use.

The Legislature later approved Senate Bill 420, which required
counties to issue ID cards to help police identify legitimate medical
marijuana patients.

After its long, unsuccessful court battle, San Diego County began
accepting applications for medical marijuana ID cards July 6,
charging up to $166 for each card.

Attorneys for the county fought the state's medical marijuana law for
years until the case hit a legal dead end in May, when the U.S.
Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal from San Diego and San
Bernardino counties.

Dale Gieringer, the state coordinator for National Organization for
the Reform of Marijuana Laws, said moratoriums on medical marijuana
dispensaries are becoming commonplace in California, as cities and
counties rush to figure out how to regulate them.

"Many, many cities and counties have done exactly the same thing," he
said. "I will not speculate on what other ulterior motives there might be."