A WORLD OF WEED OUT WEST

Medical Marijuana Culture In California Could Serve As Example For
States Like Maine

BERKELEY, Calif. -- It's 9 a.m. and as soon as the uniformed guard
pulls open the black iron gate in front of the Berkeley Patients
Group, a small line forms inside the city's oldest and busiest
marijuana dispensary.

Sara Romano leans over a glass case and checks out the day's
selection. She lifts a couple of samples to her nose and sniffs before
handing over $300 cash for an ounce of Space Queen, a favorite remedy
for anxiety and depression, she says.

The 39-year-old software saleswoman tucks the marijuana buds into a
small brown paper bag, along with $60 worth of "baking marijuana" to
put in brownies and marshmallow treats for some older women she cares
for.

"Edibles are kind of a lot less scary for people who are just getting
introduced to the weed world," she said.

Maine is about to get its own introduction to world of medical
marijuana, California-style.

Approved by voters last fall, eight medical marijuana dispensaries are
due to open around the state over the next six months. Portland,
Bangor, Augusta and Thomaston could have theirs by the end of the year.

Maine has some of the nation's tightest rules about who can operate
dispensaries and who can buy the marijuana -- a clear attempt to avoid
excesses and abuses that earned California a reputation as the Wild
West of cannabis.

California has an estimated 400 dispensaries, but no one keeps count.
In Los Angeles, there are said to be more marijuana dispensaries than
there are Starbucks shops.

Maine's dispensaries, however, will be modeled after what are
considered northern California's largest and most well-run
dispensaries, including the Berkeley Patients Group here and
Harborside Treatment Center in nearby Oakland.

Rebecca DeKeuster, the chief executive officer of the group that will
operate four Maine dispensaries, is the former general manager for the
Berkeley Patients Group.

'Best business in town'

A look inside the bustling storefronts in California reveals an
operation that's part pharmacy, part boutique, part social club -- and
entirely unlike anything Maine has seen before.

"The best business in town. They're busy from the time they open until
the time they close," said Roger Ramirez, owner of the Berkeley Auto
Service a few doors down San Pablo Avenue.

About 700 or more people each day file into the Berkeley Patients
Group, which is open 9 a.m. to 8 p.m., every day of the week. It's
been in operation since 1999.

Some visit weekly or monthly to stock up. Others come back every day
to relax, socialize and smoke their medicine.

In California, patients can buy as much as 2 ounces per week. Maine
plans to limit purchases to 2.5 ounces every two weeks.

Brad Senesac, marketing director for Berkeley Patients Group, would
not say how much the dispensary generates in sales, although it is
clearly many millions a year. Most of that is paid to growers, who
effectively get wholesale prices.

But, Senesac said, Berkeley operates as a not-for-profit, which means
its net revenues go into services for patients and donations to
community organizations. It donated about $250,000 last year to
organizations such as a nearby preschool and health clinic, he said.

California does not require dispensaries to file any accounting of
their revenue, expenses or charitable donations.

The dispensary employs 65 people. Entry-level workers earn $15 an
hour, along with health and dental coverage, Senesac said. He would
not say what the top officers and directors earn, except that it's
consistent with other nonprofits.

'It probably saved my life'

The first thing a newcomer sees is the security outside the building,
a former used-car showroom with a circular glass facade behind a tall
iron gate. The security staff uses 32 cameras to watch over the
dispensary, inside and out; two unarmed guards also patrol the lot at
all times.

Each visitor has to show identification and a medical marijuana
registration card, proving they have a signed recommendation from a
doctor. First-timers typically get a friendly introduction from the
staff.

Then they enter the lounge, a bright room where they can smoke their
marijuana or inhale the drug smokelessly using a special vaporizer.
There's free coffee, tea and snacks, and jazz playing in the background.

Richard Lahrson shuffles into the lounge, sets down his cane and
settles at a small table. He's not buying today, but came to the
dispensary because it's a safe and friendly place to smoke his medicine.

"It's a great place," said Lahrson, who didn't want to talk about his
illness.

He packs marijuana into one of the dispensary's bongs, or water pipes.
He lights up and inhales as a woman at the next table rolls and lights
a marijuana cigarette.

Not all of California's dispensaries -- often called marijuana clubs
here -- allow patients to smoke on-site, and it's not clear if any of
Maine's will.

Maine rules say only that the marijuana cannot be smoked in public and
that employees can't smoke at work. But state officials may revisit
the issue to more expressly say that smoking on-site by patients won't
be allowed, said Catherine Cobb, head of licensing for the Department
of Health and Human Services.

On one side of the Berkeley lounge is a room where, on different days
of the week, patients might talk to a counselor, get a massage or have
an acupuncture session.

And, on the other side is the store, where patients can buy pipes or
bongs, cannabis lotions and balms, marijuana cookbooks and clones --
six-inch tall marijuana plants grown from cuttings that sell for $12
apiece. The dispensary accepts cash and credit cards.

Ross DeGregory buys three "kush" clones for his home marijuana
garden.

The 22-year-old, who helps run a family painting business, said he
relies on the drug to help with insomnia and to ease pain from a back
injury that got him addicted to prescription painkillers years ago.

"I don't think I could have gotten clean and sober without marijuana,"
he said. "It probably saved my life."

Before leaving, DeGregory also buys an ounce of processed buds that he
plans to share with family members, including his grandmother. She is
a registered medical marijuana patient, too, he said.

The heart of the operation is the actual dispensary, an open room with
chairs along the back wall and a long glass case in front with samples
of all the buds in stock, as well as edibles such as pot brownies and
lozenges.

Overhead, a color-coded electronic sign shows the available varieties,
including Super Silver Hazer and Purple Afgoo. Prices depend on
quality, and range from $20 to $55 for an eighth of an ounce, or as
much as $440 for an ounce.

Patients queue up as if waiting for a bank teller.

Alan Clark, one of four employees behind the counter, explains some of
the choices to a first-time visitor. Each variety of plant has
different medical effects, such as relieving pain or increasing
appetites, he said. And the effects also can vary from person to person.

Clark and other employees get training, but many of them also are
medical marijuana users who can speak from personal experience.

"I smoke for anxiety," Clark said. "A lot of people here love the
kushes. But, for me, they send me straight to nap time and I get
nothing done."

He usually recommends All Star Jack Frost for anxiety.

"It gives you a heady, euphoric high and a sense of well-being," Clark
said. "And you're not all cloudy-headed like you're smoking a
granddaddy or something."

His pick for insomnia is Purple Afgoo. "That will give you some
quality time with your couch."

Relieving pain or muscle spasms could require a stronger blend, Clark
said. "If you cross a purple with a train wreck, you're likely to get
something very heavy."

For Sara Romano, Space Queen is the best medicine for managing
anxiety, stress and depression.

"I've gone the (traditional) medical route with these things, and I've
tried different pills. They may help on one level, but they do bad
things to your body," Romano said.

She quit the pills and now sticks to weed, along with therapy, she
said. "The depression is under control. Anxiety is
nonexistent."

Having a safe, reliable -- and legal -- place to get her medicine has
also been good for her health, she said.

More conservative clinics

Maine's dispensaries will be modeled after California's, but they
clearly will be smaller.

Operators say they expect to start with a handful of employees at each
site and that they expect to serve dozens of people a day instead of
hundreds. Most project sales of $1 million to $2 million in the first
full year of operation.

Along with a smaller population, Maine has far tighter limits than
California on who can buy medical marijuana.

Anxiety and insomnia, for example, are not among the short list of
conditions, such as AIDS and cancer, that qualify a patient to legally
use the drug in Maine. A state commission can add new qualifying
conditions over time, but access in Maine is expected to expand much
more slowly in Maine than it has in California.

California's access rules are so open now that dispensary employees
know they are selling some pot to perfectly healthy recreational users.

But, just as at a pharmacy counter, it's impossible to tell just from
looking who is really sick and who is not, said Clark.

If a patient has a doctor's recommendation, that's good enough for
him, he said.

Like Berkeley Patients Group and Harborside Health Center in Oakland,
Maine's dispensaries will blend into their neighborhoods and have
plenty of security, operators said.

At the same time, the operators also say they plan to tailor the
Maine's new dispensaries to fit Maine's rules and its more
conservative culture.

"We are looking to be as good as Berkeley Patients Group and
Harborside or better, and that's the cream of the crop in California,"
said Tim Smale, who is working to open a dispensary called Remedy
Compassion Center in the Auburn area.