CLEARING THE SMOKE

Medical Marijuana Issue: Debate Grows Over Issue of Patient Supply
Versus Drive to Legalize the Drug

Measure 33 supporters argue that the initiative is necessary to
provide the state's medical marijuana patients with an adequate supply
of the drug to treat their ailments.

Law enforcement groups and others opposed to the measure argue that
medicine has nothing to do with it, that the law is only the next step
in the drive to legalize marijuana in Oregon.

"Many of the most visible advocates for Oregon's medical marijuana
program were extensively involved in the legalization movement years
before the medical marijuana concept was hatched," says Douglas County
Sheriff Chris Brown. "The first thing people need to recognize is that
this is not a medical issue."

Riddle resident John Sajo, chief petitioner and main author of the
measure, makes no secret of his past involvement in the drive to
legalize marijuana. However, medical marijuana is a different matter,
he says.

"This is really an issue of getting high quality medicine to patients
rather than forcing them" to grow their own, Sajo says. "Are we doing
this because it's legalization in disguise? No."

However, he adds, "I hope we get a chance to revisit the legalization"
issue in the future.

Sajo said the authors of the 1998 medical marijuana measure did not
address the issue of how patients would get their medical marijuana
because it was seen as too politically risky at the time.

He believes the current law enjoys widespread public support, so the
time is right to provide a means for patients to get their medical
marijuana when they need it.

Law enforcement officials are not the only ones up in arms over the
proposed revision to the law. Stormy Ray, a medical marijuana user and
chief petitioner for the 1998 measure who now runs a foundation in
Salem, also opposes Measure 33.

"Today's illegal black market would become tomorrow's dispensaries,"
Ray writes in her Argument in Opposition published in the state voters
guide. "How dare Measure 33 put personal agendas ahead of the welfare
of Oregon's patients (and) endanger our program."

Indeed, some fear that the federal government would clamp down on
medical marijuana laws in Oregon, California and other states if
measures such as this were to pass.

Sajo puts little stock in such talk, however, citing a favorable
ruling recently from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals over a Justice
Department challenge to California's medical marijuana law.

The U.S. Supreme Court is set to hear arguments in the case during its
current term.

"We anticipate a legal conflict with the federal government similar to
what we've had with the death with dignity (Oregon's assisted suicide)
law and similar to what we've had in other areas," Sajo says. "We are
confident, however, that the initiative will hold up ... we don't
expect any rights that patients have won to be taken away."

California's network of medical marijuana dispensaries is a good
example of how such a system could work in Oregon, Sajo says. The
difference would be that Oregon's dispensaries would be state
regulated, whereas dispensaries in California are monitored at the
local level.

Brown and other critics have a different perspective -- they see it as
legalized drug trafficking.

"What mental picture do you have when you read 'state dispensaries?'"
Brown asks. "The fact is, anyone can be a dispensary ... dispensaries
will pop up in residential neighborhoods all across the state; beside
schools, beside churches, beside you."

Brown worries that marijuana will proliferate in Douglas County, which
already has the second-highest number of medical marijuana cardholders
in the state, trailing only populous Multnomah County.

"Marijuana use among (people) ages 18 to 25 rose 30 percent in Oregon
from 1999 to 2001," Brown says. "Nationally, the increase was 3 percent."

Attacking the practice of using marijuana for pain management, Brown
says this legitimization of the drug has caused it to surge again in
popularity among teens and young adults. Meanwhile, a law that
purportedly represented the needs of the terminally ill and severely
disabled has provided cover for thousands of marijuana users
complaining of ailments far less debilitating, Brown says.

"Originally, the advocates suggested that this was largely an
end-of-life option. In other words, people who were terminally ill
could benefit from smoking marijuana because the harmful consequences
were irrelevant and it may ease their pain," Brown says. "Of the
roughly 11,000 cards issued as of July 1, 2004, 8,711 were issued to
people reporting 'pain.' Only a fraction have been issued to people
with any sort of condition that could be construed as
end-of-life."

One medical marijuana user and primary caregiver who takes issue with
positions such as Brown's is South County resident Don Coon, who
defends the law and its medical efficacy.

"Whether it's a bad foot or a broken shoulder, who are we to question
somebody who's in pain?" asks Coon, who uses marijuana to treat
chronic back pain and arthritis.

Coon found marijuana to be a much more palatable way to manage his
pain than the cocktail of narcotics once prescribed to him by his
physician. So have his wife and children.

"When he was on pain pills he was a couch potato ... and when he came
down off the medication he was irritable and grouchy," says his wife,
who asked not to be identified. "My kids vowed that they would leave
home if he ever went back on pills."

Coon said his liver failed twice from all of the prescription drugs he
was taking.

A self-professed "green thumb," Coon says few people know how to grow
marijuana as fruitfully as he has learned to do. Then, when their crop
fails to produce as much marijuana as they need to get through the
year, they are forced to go without.

"My body is shutting down, and I don't know how many years I can keep
the pace helping people up because I can't even help myself anymore,"
Coon says. "I need to have a place where I can go get my medicine."

Over the years he has been growing marijuana, Coon estimates he has
helped treat the pain of hundreds of people like himself.

"I'm not standing before you talking about legalization - but then
again, where would the problem be?" Coon asks. "It is a natural,
organic herb."

[sidebar]

HOW THE LAW WOULD CHANGE

The main changes in medical marijuana laws that would take place if
Measure 33 passes include:

State-regulated dispensaries could sell the drug. To run a dispensary, an
adult must pay $1,000 and submit a petition of at least 25 medical
marijuana cardholders who support the creation of the dispensary. The
dispensary will operate as a nonprofit entity.

A dispensary cannot distribute more than 6 pounds of the drug to any one
patient per year. Confidential records would be kept of each cardholder's
purchases to ensure he or she doesn't visit more than one dispensary to get
more marijuana than allowed by law.

Dispensaries must provide free medical marijuana to indigent patients equal
to at least 20 percent of the dispensary's gross monthly revenue.

If no private dispensaries are operating in a county within six months of
the measure's passage, the county itself would be required to act as a
dispensary.

Medical marijuana providers could sell the drug at a price agreed upon by
buyer and seller. Providers could serve up to 10 patients without
registering as a dispensary.

The amount of marijuana a registered cardholder may possess would increase
from 3 ounces of harvested marijuana, three mature plants and four immature
plants, to 1 pound of harvested marijuana and 10 plants. Cardholders who
can prove they derive their entire year's supply from one outdoor harvest
could possess up to 6 pounds of harvested marijuana right after the harvest.

The status of being a medical marijuana patient shall not, in and of
itself, constitute cause for dismissal or denial of employment.

Nurse practitioners and naturopaths would be allowed to prescribe medical
marijuana in addition to the physicians and osteopaths already authorized
to do so.