MEDICAL POT INDUSTRY SPLIT ON PROP. 19

The Canna Care medical marijuana dispensary has a truck driving around
Sacramento with a sign telling people to vote "no" on the state ballot
initiative that would legalize pot for recreational use.

George Mull, a lawyer for several Northern California pot shops, is
fighting Proposition 19 on claims it threatens protections put in
place for medical pot users with the 1996 passage of California's
medical marijuana law.

And a Humboldt County dispensary operator complains that the new pot
measure simply isn't needed. "They say they're legalizing marijuana,"
said Stephen Gasparas, who runs the iCenter pot dispensary in Arcata.
"It's already legal. All they're doing is taxing it."

California's landmark initiative to legalize marijuana use for adults
over 21 and permit local governments to tax retail pot sales is backed
and bankrolled by leaders in California's medical cannabis movement.

And yet some of its more stubborn opposition comes from a vocal
segment of the same community who worry their dispensary operations
may be negatively affected.

"I'm against this because I feel patients have been sold a bill of
goods that is going to take their freedom away," said Lanette Davies,
who runs Canna Care.

Another opponent, Don Johnson, who operates the Unity Non-Profit
Collective in Sacramento, said he worries about contradictions between
California's medical marijuana law and Proposition 19.

For example, Johnson's marijuana store can legally serve an
18-year-old who has a physician's recommendation. He wonders how that
squares with Proposition 19, which restricts recreational pot use to
people over 21.

"It seems to me there will be a double rule on the books," Johnson
said. "It's mass confusion."

Proposition 19 supporters say they are puzzled over the opposition and
argue the initiative will protect tens of thousands of Californians
from arrest and generate a windfall in taxes.

In Sacramento, for example, voters will consider a companion measure
to Proposition 19 that would levy a 2 to 4 percent gross receipts tax
on existing medical pot dispensaries and a 5 to 10 percent tax on new
retail pot outlets.

"Proposition 19 will have zero, zilch, nada impact on the current
legal rights granted to patients, caregivers, doctors, collectives and
cooperatives under California's existing medical cannabis laws," said
Dan Newman, a spokesman for the Yes on 19 campaign.

But Mull, a Sacramento attorney, said he believes the initiative will
undercut ongoing legal fights in numerous cities on behalf of pot shops.

Some 140 California cities ban marijuana dispensaries. Pot shops argue
they have a right to operate under the state's 1996 medical marijuana
law and follow-up legislation from the state. Mull says Proposition 19
provisions that authorize cities to tax, regulate and also ban
retail pot shops could empower cities to target medical pot outlets.

"They (cities) basically are expressly given a right they are claiming
that local governments can control things within their borders,
notwithstanding Proposition 215," Mull claimed. "All of the things
that I have been arguing for in court, I lose."

The nation's leading medical marijuana advocacy group, Americans for
Safe Access, is taking no position on Proposition 19. But Don Duncan,
the organization's California director, said the group does not think
the initiative would undercut the rights of medical users.

Proposition 19 has been funded largely by Oakland marijuana
entrepreneur Richard Lee, operator of the city's Coffee Shop Blue Sky
dispensary and a marijuana trade school, Oaksterdam University.

It also has gotten financial support from a major Bay Area dispensary,
Berkeley Patient's Group Inc., and political backing from Steve
DeAngelo, executive director of Harborside Health Center, an Oakland
outlet billed as the largest dispensary in the world. DeAngelo, who
initially thought this was the wrong year to put the measure on the
ballot, now strongly advocates its passage.

"If it wins, you're going to see a major shift in the political
dynamic for cannabis," DeAngelo said. "And I think politicians who
thought there was a downside to supporting cannabis will receive a
wake-up call."

Harborside, a nonprofit network that handles $26 million in marijuana
transactions annually, may be well-equipped to convert into a retail
operation that serves both medical and recreational users.

"I don't think there is any reason we wouldn't be able to serve any
qualified person who wants to purchase cannabis providing the city of
Oakland licenses us to do so," DeAngelo said.

Still, Yamileth Bolanos, a cancer survivor who runs the Purelife
Alternative Wellness Center in Los Angeles, has mixed feelings.

Bolanos plans to vote "yes" on 19. But she worries legalizing
recreational pot could create shortages of high quality marijuana for
medical needs and stir a frenzy in cities trying to figure out the new
law.

"They can't even get medical marijuana right," Bolanos said. "How are
they going to open up these places for recreational use? Is it just
going to be bedlam?"