cannabisnews.com: County Sets Rules for Medical Marijuana 





County Sets Rules for Medical Marijuana 
Posted by FoM on May 17, 2001 at 11:31:28 PT
By Chris Smith, The Press Democrat
Source: Press Democrat
Medical marijuana advocates and law enforcement leaders struck an accord on Sonoma County's first guidelines for how much marijuana an eligible patient may grow. The new rules allow patients with doctor approval to grow enough plants -- up to 99 -- to produce a maximum of three pounds of processed marijuana a year. Most other California counties that specify an allowable quantity of marijuana limit production to smaller amounts.The guidelines seek to settle a years-old argument over how much marijuana is enough for a patient. In the absence of guidelines on quantity, patients or people growing marijuana for them have risked arrest and confiscation by officers who suspect a collection of plants is too large for personal medical use.
The three-pound annual limit was proposed by the Sonoma Alliance for Medical Marijuana and approved by District Attorney Mike Mullins and the county law enforcement chiefs association.Mullins said Wednesday the guidelines should help officers and patients by bringing clarity to an issue muddled by the wording of Proposition 215, the 1996 ballot measure that legalized doctor-approved marijuana in the state. The measure doesn't specify how patients can legally obtain marijuana, a federally outlawed substance, or how much they can legally grow or possess.Ernest "Doc" Knapp of Sebastopol, an alliance member who uses marijuana for relief from anorexia, muscle spasms and pain, said the new, relatively liberal allowance makes Sonoma County a leader among counties seeking workable implementation of Proposition 215."It's a good time for medical marijuana patients in Sonoma County," he said.Alliance members praised Mullins, who in recent years drew scorn from medical marijuana advocates across the state and nation for prosecuting marijuana growers who claimed to be helping seriously ill people.Mullins recently lost a major jury trial against two men arrested for growing 600 marijuana plants in Petaluma that they said were to become medicine for 1,280 members of a San Francisco buyers' club. Also this year, a jury acquitted a Santa Rosa man who claimed his 110-plant pot garden was for personal use.Sonoma County Sheriff Jim Piccinini said those not guilty verdicts and others like it up and down the state demonstrated that the county needed to ease its standards on the growing of marijuana as medicine.Still determined to discourage large-scale cooperative marijuana gardens, Piccinini and Mullins supported the new guidelines in hopes of making patients feel more comfortable growing their own marijuana. A U.S. Supreme Court ruling this week also encourages personal gardens by keeping large-scale distribution operations subject to federal prosecution.Piccinini said it's sad that local authorities, whose job is to enforce laws, found it necessary because of inaction from Sacramento to write their own local guidelines on medical marijuana."We shouldn't be the ones writing laws," he said. "We still maintain (Proposition 215) was an ambiguous law from the very beginning."The county guidelines may help police and sheriff's deputies more readily distinguish a small, medicinal garden from a for-profit patch. Piccinini said that despite all the public debate about medicinal marijuana, illicit growers still are making money growing commercial pot gardens."Forty thousands pot plants were recovered last year in Sonoma County, and few if any of those were medical," he said. "We're talking large groves, people growing it for money. And that is still flat against the law."In forging the new guidelines, marijuana advocates and county authorities agreed that an average patient using marijuana for relief from illness or injuries smokes about three pounds a year.A sticking point in the medical marijuana debate has been how many plants are necessary to produce a pound of marijuana. Cazadero resident Mary Pat Beck of the Sonoma Alliance said individual marijuana plants produce wildly different numbers of buds, depending on variables such as lighting, soil and the skill of the grower.Some counties limit growers of medicinal marijuana to six or 10 or 12 plants, a restriction Sonoma County advocates argued is unreasonable because it is quite possible that many plants will produce only a tiny amount of usable marijuana.The alliance proposed, and county agreed, that a garden capable of producing three pounds of marijuana a year should have a canopy -- the mass of the leaves -- no larger than 100 square feet.Whether a grower has six plants or 99, under the guidelines those plants cannot legally produce more than three pounds of marijuana.Beck said the alliance hopes to persuade authorities that some patients legitimately need more than three pounds of marijuana a year and to allow them more with their doctors' permission.Alliance members said the new guidelines are cause for celebration by patients who for years have feared police would accuse them of growing marijuana commercially and seize the plants."We feel like a great weight has been lifted," Beck said. With an agreement worked out with local authorities, she said, "we can concentrate on making our gardens safe from thieves."Note: Ending long dispute, advocates, law enforcement agree on limit of 3 pounds per year per patient.Source: Press Democrat, The (CA) Author: Chris Smith, The Press DemocratPublished: May 17, 2001Copyright: 2001 The Press Democrat Contact: letters pressdemo.com Website: http://www.pressdemo.com/ Related Articles:Clubs May Shift Focus To Home Cultivation http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread9730.shtmlUp in Smoke http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread9442.shtmlCannabisNews Medical Marijuana Archiveshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/list/medical.shtml
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