YUCCA POISED TO BAN MARIJUANA DISPENSARIES

YUCCA VALLEY - The fate of medical marijuana availability in Yucca
Valley could be decided at Tuesday night's planning commission meeting.

The Town's moratorium on new dispensaries could be replaced by a
development-code amendment prohibiting the establishment of a new
business and the use of an existing business to distribute or sell marijuana.

The Town houses the only medical marijuana outlet in San Bernardino
County. California Alternative Medicinal Solutions, a nonprofit
health collective that furnishes medical marijuana under state
guidelines, received a business permit and has been operating
lawfully for about a year at the Monterey Business Center. Except
for complaints that dispensaries breed crime, CAMS' operations have
been incident-free.

Marijuana has been legal for medical use in California since 1996,
and an ID card system identifying users as medically directed was
established shortly thereafter. San Bernardino County has been
fighting in court against issuing ID cards until this year, when the
U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear the county's appeal.

This month the county began taking applications from medicinal-use
patients who wish to get official identification cards. Applicants
must appear in person at the county's San Bernardino offices,
furnish a doctor's recommendation, picture ID and completed
forms and pay a fee before the state will issue the card.

But unless they have green thumbs, the county's legal users might
have a difficult time getting the drug. On Aug. 4, the Board of
Supervisors extended an ordinance that could prohibit the
establishment of medicinal dispensaries in unincorporated areas
until June 2010.

Legal patients are allowed to grow a limited amount of marijuana
plants for personal medicinal use.

At Wednesday's meeting of the Hi-Desert Marijuana Anti-Prohibition
Project at the Castle Inn in Landers, long-haired hippies and
gray-haired grandparents vowed to have their legal rights respected.

"The law is on our side," Hi-Desert MAPP chairman Rich McCabe told
the assembly.

"They can't ban us," agreed his wife, JoAnn. "They used to use the
feds against us, but not now!"

One of the attendees was a little more cynical. "If they prohibit
dispensaries, where should we get the marijuana from - the Mexican
drug cartels?"