WEST SAC GETS SOBER ABOUT POT

It seems our marijuana laws were crafted by people who are
stoned.

Federal law says pot is illegal. It's also illegal under California
law, except when it's "medical pot." Then users and sellers are given
legal cover, with certain stipulations.

Storefronts selling pot have popped up like mad in Sacramento, and no
one is certain if all are complying with the law. For example, these
places aren't supposed to turn a profit. Do you really believe they
aren't?

"Most of them are making profits," said Sacramento Police Chief Rick
Braziel.

When California voters passed Proposition 215 in 1996, language was
added to the California Health and Safety Code that allows "seriously
ill Californians the right to obtain and use marijuana for medical
purposes."

Instead, legions of meat-heads feign medical illness to get high --
and everybody knows it.

"Most of our defendants don't have cancer. They have back pains,
PMS, diarrhea or stress," said Cindy Besemer, chief deputy district
attorney in Sacramento County.

It's enough to make you cynical. And it would be funny if some
California cities weren't under pot siege.

In Los Angeles, hundreds of marijuana dispensaries have opened without
permission while city officials scramble to keep up. The city had a
moratorium on dispensaries, but it was invalidated by a judge.

Into this quagmire, the city of West Sacramento is trying to make some
sense. Tonight, the City Council will discuss making West Sacramento
the first local city to develop a legal framework to approve and
regulate legal dispensaries within its city limits.

If the measure is passed next month, West Sac will put the two
dispensaries in commercially zoned areas away from homes and schools
- -- and try to hold pot sellers to the letter of the law.

That means getting a conditional use permit and business license. It
means no drug paraphernalia sold on site. It means the marijuana
proprietor has to be a West Sacramento resident who sells to West
Sacramento residents. It means the seller cannot be a felon or have
had misdemeanor convictions within the past five years.

"This has been one of the biggest issues before our City Council,"
said West Sacramento Mayor Christopher Cabaldon.

West Sac didn't want to put a moratorium on pot dispensaries, because
- -- as evidenced in Los Angeles -- some judges shoot moratoriums down.
And they didn't want to wait until marijuana storefronts proliferated,
as happened in Sacramento.

West Sacramento has blossomed in recent years, gilding its waterfront
and shedding its past as a haven for prostitutes.

They aren't looking to make money off pot, because no city yet has
proved that possible. And they don't want to be known as Pot City --
just a city following our goofy pot laws.