MEDICAL MARIJUANA BILL IN LIMBO AFTER LETTER FROM U.S. ATTORNEYS

OLYMPIA -- The Legislature's efforts to provide structure and
regulations to Washington's burgeoning medical marijuana operations
could be snuffed out by a warning last week from the state's federal
prosecutors.

A bill to require the state Agriculture Department to license medical
marijuana growers and processors, and the state Health Department to
license dispensaries, would run headlong into federal law, U.S.
Attorneys Mike Ormsby in Spokane and Jenny Durkan in Seattle told
Gov. Chris Gregoire in a letter Thursday.

The proposal has passed both houses in some version, but still must
be reconciled to eliminate the differences. It won't stop federal
prosecution of medical marijuana growers and sellers in its present
form, federal prosecutors said. There may not be any way the state can do that.

"Growing, distributing and possessing marijuana in any capacity,
other than as part of a federally authorized research program, is a
violation of federal law regardless of state laws permitting such
activities," Ormsby and Durkan wrote. "State employees who conducted
activities mandated by the Washington legislative proposals would not
be immune from liability under the Controlled Substance Act."

Gregoire, who had asked the U.S. Justice Department for written
guidance on some system to regulate medical marijuana, said last week
she'd veto the bill in its present form: "I will not sign anything
subjecting state employees to prosecution."

She called for meetings with key legislators trying to find a way
through conflicting federal and state laws. Sen. Jeanne Kohl-Wells,
D-Seattle, the bill's prime sponsor, said she remains optimistic some
compromise can be worked out.

But today starts the last week of the Legislature's regular session,
and much of the time likely will be devoted to budgets. Senate
Majority Leader Lisa Brown, D-Spokane, stopped short of saying the
medical marijuana bill is dead, because a compromise that's reached
could have a chance in an expected special session.

"We haven't made that decision yet," Brown said Friday afternoon. "It
would have been good to hear about these objections earlier."

But no one knows how to satisfy two diametrically opposing views on
medical marijuana. The state's voters in 1998 said overwhelmingly
they wanted it to be legal to use marijuana to treat certain medical
conditions. Despite that, and medical marijuana laws in 14 other
states, the federal government doesn't recognize any medicinal uses
for the plant and classifies it as a Schedule 1 drug, illegal for all uses.

A 2009 Justice Department memo says the federal government will not
spend time prosecuting patients who smoke marijuana to relieve
symptoms or who grow small amounts for personal use. But prosecutors
recently have stepped up efforts to close dispensaries where marijuana is sold.

Dispensary operators risk having their property seized, and landlords
who rent to dispensaries could suffer the same fate, Ormsby warned
early this month in a letter to owners of property being used for
dispensaries. That letter may have closed as many as 10 dispensaries
in Spokane as nervous landlords canceled leases in less than two
weeks, said Ken Martin, Spokane director of CannaCare, which operates
clinics and dispensaries in Washington.

The letter also sent a shock wave through the Legislature as it was
debating SB 5073, Kohl-Wells' bill that already had its share of
detractors. Law enforcement was opposed to anything suggesting
marijuana has a legitimate use. Some established clinics and
dispensaries argued the bill was unworkable, with its voluntary
registry for marijuana patients and zoning rules for where
dispensaries could be located, coupled with different agencies in
charge of licensing different aspects of production and sales.

"Nothing would make me happier than to see this bill dead," said
Steve Sarich, CannaCare's executive director in Seattle, who with
Martin testified against it in committee hearings. He fears that any
version of Kohl-Wells' bill that would pass now will be stripped of
protections for growers or dispensaries and simply set up a registry
of medical marijuana patients sought by law enforcement.

Like Brown, Kohl-Wells said Friday she was concerned the warning
letter from Ormsby and Durkan came so late in the legislative
process. She thinks Gregoire's concern for state employees is
misplaced because the bill doesn't require them to come in contact
with marijuana, so federal drug agents wouldn't be going into state
offices to arrest state workers.

Ormsby said the letter was a response to Gregoire's request; he
wasn't aware of the bill until recently. He understands that his
April 6 warning to landlords may have caused some state officials to
re-examine the bill, but that wasn't the purpose of that notice.

"We have a significant problem here in Spokane with the proliferation
of dispensaries," he said. The Legislature didn't ask for advice on
how to craft a bill to regulate medical marijuana, but even if it
did, he has no idea what would work.

"It's still an illegal drug on the federal level," he said. Until
Congress removes it from Schedule 1 and reclassifies it for legal or
medicinal use, the conflict will remain.

On that point, at least, Martin agrees. Taking marijuana off Schedule
1 is "really what we need to do," he said. Until then, conflicts
between Washington voters' decision to allow marijuana for medical
use and the federal government's total prohibition likely will be
fought in the courts.