OAKLAND'S NOBLE POT EXPERIMENT

San Francisco Area Takes Leadership Role in the Fight for Saner Drug Policies in U.S.

OAKLAND, Calif. - I emerged from the BART subway station squinting into the
sunlight glinting off a red Ferrari ostentatiously parked outside the
Cannabis Buyer's Co-op. The licence plate read: "Growhydroponics com."

Inside the co-op there was the usual head-shop collection of vapourizers,
rolling papers, lighters, paraphernalia and hemp products. Those with a
doctor's recommendation or a recognized cannabis-patient card -- good
across the state -- can also buy from a menu of cannabis products -- kif,
several strains of marijuana, hashish and selection of edibles.

Next door, the hydroponic shop offers equipment and advice on growing.

Two doors down is the Bulldog Cafe -- named after one of the legendary
coffeeshops in Amsterdam that successfully challenged the Netherlands' pot
prohibition policies in the mid-1970s.

Here, recreational users can order from a menu of cannabis products, sit
and enjoy a cappuccino and a smoke.

Prices are about twice what they are in Vancouver -- an eighth of an ounce
of good stinky sold for $40 US -- about $48 Cdn-- less potent weed for $30
US -- about $36 Cdn -- plus state sales tax, of course.

"It's called goo," Richard Lee, the owner, told me holding up the
crystal-encrusted bud of marijuana that smelled of citrus and sandalwood.
"As good as any of your B.C. Bud."

From his wheelchair in a small room behind an appropriate Dutch door, he
dispensed the pot in small glassine bags and the edibles packaged in
appropriately satirical wrappings -- Kiefkat, Indo' Joy, Stoners, Reefers...
There was chocolate milk infused with THC (the most active
psychotropic chemical in marijuana) as well as cheesecakes laced with pot.

"We're trying to be low-key responsible neighbours and so far it's working
out well," Lee said. "We're celebrating our fifth anniversary."

Throughout this downtown neighbourhood are similar outlets, the oldest
dating back to the early 1990s, the co-op to 1995. They call it Oaksterdam.
Across California there is a growing network of medical marijuana
dispensaries and clubs using the state's constitutional privacy rights to
keep police at bay.

Believe it or not, there are an estimated 60,000 registered medical
marijuana users -- some 20,000 in the Bay area -- and more than 100 pot
outlets, some offering more than 60 strains of the demon weed.

Lee has been at the forefront of the fight that established this
marijuana-friendly enclave in the belly of a country whose federal
government is engaged in a jihad against the drug.

Forget what you have heard about Vansterdam -- our town is well behind the
Bay area in terms of access to medical marijuana and tolerance of
recreational pot consumers. Forget, too, what you hear about the U.S. being
so afraid of Ottawa liberalizing our laws.

The U.S. federal administration is desperately trying to maintain a
worldwide pot prohibition.

But a dozen states already have decriminalized possession and moved to
protect medical users from prosecution. Another handful currently have
marijuana initiatives on their political agenda.

Over the weekend some 500 primarily American members of the National
Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws were in San Francisco to
celebrate the advances on the eve of a much-anticipated U.S. Supreme Court
ruling on medical marijuana.

The acme, in my opinion, is Oakland, where cannabusiness is hailed as the
catalyst for urban renewal in a once blighted neighbourhood and the working
model that led to the passage Nov. 6 of Measure Z -- the Oakland Cannabis
Regulation and Revenue Ordinance. Electors voted by 65 per cent to tolerate
private adult sales, cultivation and possession of cannabis with envisioned
regulated retail sales and smoking dens.

It's a noble experiment, though to truly enact such a policy requires
changes to state and probably federal law.

"This is just the beginning," said Mikki Norris, who leads the Cannabis
Consumer Campaign, a lobby group advocating a legalize, tax-and-regulate
approach. "The debate is finally moving in the right direction."

Her group believes the state could save $150 million or so in enforcement
costs and raise an estimated $1 billion in tax revenue.

The question, though, is whether pot opponents here will be able to attack
the initiative and defeat it the way Vancouver shut the Da Kine Cafe retail
pot outlet and dampened optimism among pot users here that liberalization
is on the horizon.

Ethan Nadelmann, who travels the world on billionaire George Soros' nickel
stumping for saner drug policies, and a key player in Vancouver's so-called
Four Pillar approach, thinks what happens in Oakland will depend on pot users.

"San Francisco has a leadership role now," he said. "But people must be
responsible. Don't be a target. Be a place we want to bring people to show
them what works, not a place for their side to bring people and say look at
this disaster."