BOTH SIDES WEIGH IN ON REVISED MEDICAL-MARIJUANA BILL

A Second Attempt to Reform the State's Medical-Marijuana Law Now
Grinding Through Olympia Is Drawing As Much Criticism As Its
Predecessor, Which Gov. Chris Gregoire Partially Vetoed Last Month.

Despite concerns, lawmakers are under pressure to act during the
legislative session because Gregoire's veto -- which left some parts of
the law intact -- muddled already confusing parts of the 1998
voter-approved law.

At a committee hearing Wednesday, medical marijuana's prime
legislative champion, Sen. Jeanne Kohl-Welles, said she worked quickly
to resolve key problems, including patient access to marijuana and
questions of how to monitor newly legal 45-plant "collective gardens."

She urged lawmakers to act. "We have a gray area of the law, and the
law is worse than it started out to be," said Kohl-Welles, D-Seattle.

The new bill, SB 5955, for the first time would give arrest protection
for patients who enroll in a voluntary registry and would give local
governments broad power to regulate newly legalized nonprofit
dispensaries.

Each of those elements drew criticism in brief public comments.
Thurston County Sheriff John Snaza said legalized dispensaries and
collective gardens will be difficult to monitor if they decline to
enroll on the registry. "We think it will make it more difficult for
local law enforcement," he said.

Rachel Kurtz of the Cannabis Defense Coalition, a patient-advocacy
group in Seattle, said patients will feel coerced to join the registry
despite concerns that it invades medical privacy.

A member of her group, John Worthington, said the local control
authority in the new bill would allow cities and counties to overrule
a doctor's medical advice regarding appropriate marijuana dosages. It
would allow cities to be "practicing medicine without a license," he
said.

Unlike the version Gregoire vetoed, this bill exempts dispensary sales
from state sales tax. The state Department of Revenue estimated in
February that taxed marijuana sales would generate least $2.1 million
in the 2011-13 budget, although the figure could be much higher.

The most pressure to act in the special session comes from municipal
governments. Randy Lewis, Tacoma's lobbyist, said the proliferation of
dispensaries and confusion after Gregoire's veto produced "chaos in
our communities."

Seattle also has embraced the pending bill, fearing that without
legalized dispensaries, patients will struggle to get marijuana.
"Without a new bill, we are concerned collective gardens will spring
up all over the city," creating a headache for police and
neighborhoods, said Aaron Pickus, spokesman for Mayor Mike McGinn.