CALIF. CITY PLANS MARIJUANA GIVEAWAY

SANTA CRUZ, Calif. - City leaders plan to join medical marijuana users at a
pot giveaway at City Hall next week, hoping to send a message to federal
authorities that, in this town, medical marijuana is welcome.

The invitation comes one week after agents from the Drug Enforcement Agency
arrested the high-profile owners of a pot farm and confiscated 130 plants
that had been grown to be used as medicine.

"It's just absolutely loathsome to me that federal money, energy and staff
time would be used to harass people like this," said vice mayor Emily
Reilly, who with several City Council colleagues plans to pass out medical
marijuana to sick people from the garden-like courtyard at City Hall on
Tuesday.

Though the council passed a resolution denouncing the raid, there is no
official city sponsorship of the event - council members and medical
marijuana advocates are simply acting on their own in a public space, said
City Attorney John Barisone.

DEA spokesman Richard Meyer was surprised at the plan.

"Are you serious? That's illegal. It's like they're flouting federal law,"
he said. "I'm shocked that city leaders would promote the use of marijuana
that way. What is that saying to our youth?"

State law in California, as well as Alaska, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine,
Nevada, Oregon and Washington, allows marijuana to be grown and distributed
to people with a doctor's prescription. Federal law prohibits marijuana use
under any circumstances.

In recent months, federal agents - working without local support - have
been busting pot clubs and farms in Northern California, including a small
pot farm last week about 55 miles south of San Francisco, arresting owners
Valerie and Michael Corral.

No indictment was filed against the couple, leading activists for medical
marijuana; their attorney said federal authorities do not plan to
prosecute. A spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney's office said she could not
comment.

California medical marijuana growers and distributors work closely with
local law enforcement, and are quite open about their programs. In fact,
the farm raided by DEA agents had been featured in national media, and the
program is listed in the local telephone book.

"The courage of the Santa Cruz City Council and the growing anger in
Congress are signs of a genuine grassroots rebellion all across this
country that will put an end to these attacks on the sick and vulnerable,"
said Robert Kampia, executive director of the Washington, D.C.-based
Marijuana Policy Project.

In 1992, 77 percent of Santa Cruz voters approved a measure ending the
prohibition of medical marijuana. Four years later, state voters approved
Proposition 215, allowing marijuana for medicinal purposes. And in 2000,
the city council approved an ordinance allowing medical marijuana to be
grown and used without a prescription.