T
The420Guy
Guest
Newshawk: Jo-D and Tom-E
Pubdate: Wed, 16 Aug 2000
Source: San Diego Union Tribune (CA)
Copyright: 2000 Union-Tribune Publishing Co.
Contact: letters@uniontrib.com
Address: PO Box 120191, San Diego, CA, 92112-0191
Fax: (619) 293-1440
Author: Ray Huard, Staff Writer
CLARITY SOUGHT ON RULES FOR POT USE
City Council Wants Answers Soon On Medical Marijuana
Sick and dying people who use marijuana under a doctor's advice to ease their symptoms
shouldn't have to worry about being arrested, the San Diego City Council said yesterday.
"They need to be able to feel not like criminals," said Councilwoman Valerie Stallings.
Council members passed a resolution urging District Attorney Paul Pfingst to speed up work
on guidelines for police throughout San Diego clarifying who can use marijuana for medical
purposes and under what circumstances.
The guidelines are meant to implement Proposition 215, the 1996 ballot measure that legalized
the medical use of marijuana.
"We need to expedite this. We need to make something happen," Stallings said.
Mayor Susan Golding said she expected the district attorney's work group to complete its
recommendations by October or November.
But Deputy District Attorney Dave Lattuca, who heads the work group, declined to say when
the recommendations would be finished.
"It is a work in progress," Lattuca said.
Stallings, who underwent surgery and chemotherapy for breast cancer in 1996, has said she
didn't use marijuana to ease her symptoms but she knew others who had.
"I've been there in that kind of pain so I feel a little more pressure," Stallings said.
At the urging of Councilwoman Christine Kehoe and more than a dozen medical marijuana
activists, the council asked Pfingst to add doctors and medical marijuana patients to his
Medical Marijuana Work Group, which is developing those guidelines.
Medical marijuana activist Steve McWilliams said the council action was "a massive step
forward."
McWilliams and several other medical marijuana advocates have addressed the council at
nearly every meeting for almost a year urging the city to take action to implement Proposition
215.
Several marijuana patients in the audience applauded following the council vote.
"This will hopefully open the doors," McWilliams said. Until now, he said, marijuana activists
and physicians have been left out of discussions on how to implement Proposition 215.
The work group includes representatives of city police, the District Attorney's Office and the
City Attorney's Office, Lattuca said. He said Pfingst would take the council's
recommendation to expand the work group under advisement.
City officials said Proposition 215 was ambiguous on how much marijuana someone could
legally possess and how they could get it.
The council, as part of its resolution, called for the Legislature and the Attorney General's
Office to clarify the matter. The council also instructed city police to keep statistics on the
medical use of marijuana in San Diego.
San Diego police so far have interpreted the law to mean that sick people or their caretakers
could grow small amounts of marijuana under a doctor's instructions to ease pain and other
medical symptoms, said Deputy City Attorney Paul Cooper.
But under the city police interpretation, the law does not allow cooperatives of cannabis clubs
to grow, sell or give away marijuana for sick and dying people to use.
Kehoe said the guidelines being developed by the district attorney should allow cooperatives
or provide some other way for sick people to obtain marijuana besides growing it themselves
or having their caretaker grow it for them.
Council members Juan Vargas and Judy McCarty emphasized that the council wasn't
advocating the general use of marijuana.
"We don't want our kids to think it's all right to go out and smoke marijuana," Vargas said.
MAP posted-by: Jo-D
Pubdate: Wed, 16 Aug 2000
Source: San Diego Union Tribune (CA)
Copyright: 2000 Union-Tribune Publishing Co.
Contact: letters@uniontrib.com
Address: PO Box 120191, San Diego, CA, 92112-0191
Fax: (619) 293-1440
Author: Ray Huard, Staff Writer
CLARITY SOUGHT ON RULES FOR POT USE
City Council Wants Answers Soon On Medical Marijuana
Sick and dying people who use marijuana under a doctor's advice to ease their symptoms
shouldn't have to worry about being arrested, the San Diego City Council said yesterday.
"They need to be able to feel not like criminals," said Councilwoman Valerie Stallings.
Council members passed a resolution urging District Attorney Paul Pfingst to speed up work
on guidelines for police throughout San Diego clarifying who can use marijuana for medical
purposes and under what circumstances.
The guidelines are meant to implement Proposition 215, the 1996 ballot measure that legalized
the medical use of marijuana.
"We need to expedite this. We need to make something happen," Stallings said.
Mayor Susan Golding said she expected the district attorney's work group to complete its
recommendations by October or November.
But Deputy District Attorney Dave Lattuca, who heads the work group, declined to say when
the recommendations would be finished.
"It is a work in progress," Lattuca said.
Stallings, who underwent surgery and chemotherapy for breast cancer in 1996, has said she
didn't use marijuana to ease her symptoms but she knew others who had.
"I've been there in that kind of pain so I feel a little more pressure," Stallings said.
At the urging of Councilwoman Christine Kehoe and more than a dozen medical marijuana
activists, the council asked Pfingst to add doctors and medical marijuana patients to his
Medical Marijuana Work Group, which is developing those guidelines.
Medical marijuana activist Steve McWilliams said the council action was "a massive step
forward."
McWilliams and several other medical marijuana advocates have addressed the council at
nearly every meeting for almost a year urging the city to take action to implement Proposition
215.
Several marijuana patients in the audience applauded following the council vote.
"This will hopefully open the doors," McWilliams said. Until now, he said, marijuana activists
and physicians have been left out of discussions on how to implement Proposition 215.
The work group includes representatives of city police, the District Attorney's Office and the
City Attorney's Office, Lattuca said. He said Pfingst would take the council's
recommendation to expand the work group under advisement.
City officials said Proposition 215 was ambiguous on how much marijuana someone could
legally possess and how they could get it.
The council, as part of its resolution, called for the Legislature and the Attorney General's
Office to clarify the matter. The council also instructed city police to keep statistics on the
medical use of marijuana in San Diego.
San Diego police so far have interpreted the law to mean that sick people or their caretakers
could grow small amounts of marijuana under a doctor's instructions to ease pain and other
medical symptoms, said Deputy City Attorney Paul Cooper.
But under the city police interpretation, the law does not allow cooperatives of cannabis clubs
to grow, sell or give away marijuana for sick and dying people to use.
Kehoe said the guidelines being developed by the district attorney should allow cooperatives
or provide some other way for sick people to obtain marijuana besides growing it themselves
or having their caretaker grow it for them.
Council members Juan Vargas and Judy McCarty emphasized that the council wasn't
advocating the general use of marijuana.
"We don't want our kids to think it's all right to go out and smoke marijuana," Vargas said.
MAP posted-by: Jo-D