MEDICAL MARIJUANA SUPPORTERS KICK OFF REPEAL EFFORT

HELENA -- Opponents of the 2011 Legislature's strict new medical
marijuana law said Tuesday that they are well on their way to
gathering enough signatures to put the measure before voters in the
2012 general election.

Representatives from the state's medical marijuana community and the
once-thriving caregiver industry held a news conference at the
Secretary of State's Office Tuesday, where they announced the launch
of Initiative Referendum 124. The campaign seeks to gather enough
signatures from registered voters to put the controversial Senate
Bill 423 before voters next year.

In the waning days of the legislative session earlier this year,
state lawmakers passed a highly restrictive revision of the Montana
Medical Marijuana Act, which originally was approved by 63 percent of
voters casting a ballot in 2004. The new bill essentially puts an end
to the once-thriving medical marijuana caregiver industry by making
it illegal to sell medical marijuana for profit. Patient advocates
say that severely restricts patients' ability to get the drug safely
and legally, and instead forces them to find the drug on the black market.

The law currently is tied up in the courts, where a Helena judge
temporarily blocked portions of it.

Medical marijuana patient Sarah Baugh, spokeswoman for a group called
Patients for Reform -- Not Repeal, called SB423 "an affront to the
voters who approved medical marijuana, and an insult to seriously ill
patients who need it."

"We can all agree that Montana needs effective regulation, but SB423
completely repeals what voters did, and replaces it with a new policy
that won't work at all, especially not for the state's most severely
ill patients," Baugh said.

She also said medical marijuana advocates support a "consensus"
reform package that solves some of the problems created by loopholes
in the existing law, without putting an end to the industry in the state.

"During the session, the Legislature voted (four) times on this
issue," Sen. Dave Wanzenried, D-Missoula said. "Each time we had a
vote I asked, 'are you sure this is what the voters want?'"

Wanzenried said the Republican majority said "yes" that question each
time it was asked, despite the fact that the bill changed
significantly from vote to vote.

"The Legislature has no business second-guessing the voters," Wanzenried said.

Members of the group said Tuesday that they already have more than
1,500 volunteers signed up to gather signatures to place the measure
on the 2012 ballot.

Campaign coordinator Rose Habib said the group has trained more than
500 signature gatherers, who collected more than 2,000 signatures in
the first week. The group has have until Sept. 30 to turn in the more
than 35,000 signatures required to get the measure on the ballot.

"It is the largest gathering of volunteers I have seen in the 20 plus
years I have been involved in initiatives," said C.B. Pearson, a
consultant brought on to help the campaign.

Opposition lawmakers, led by Republicans who first tried to do away
with medical marijuana altogether, argued a very stringent law is
needed to reign in an industry they said it is creating a runaway
marijuana culture in Montana. They argued the old law was being
abused and leading to an easy supply of marijuana to noncardholders.