Pubdate: Sun, 13 Jun 2010
Source: Record, The (Hackensack, NJ)
Copyright: 2010 North Jersey Media Group Inc.
Contact:  http://www.northjersey.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/44
Author: James Ahearn
Note: James Ahearn is a contributing editor and former managing 
editor of The Record.
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/opinion.htm (Opinion)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?253 (Cannabis - Medicinal - U.S.)

N.J. PREPARES FOR MEDICAL POT

The Situation Is Similar to That for Alcohol at the End of Prohibition.

CHRIS CHRISTIE wants to delay the start of New Jersey's medical 
marijuana program for as long as a year.

The law authorizing it, signed by predecessor Jon Corzine in January, 
was supposed to take effect in July.

The new governor says he needs more time to make sure the program 
will work. Given the circumstances, I think he should be accommodated.

New Jersey will be the 14th state to legalize marijuana for medical 
purposes, but it will be unique. Patients will not be permitted to 
grow their own pot, for one thing. They will have to buy it from one 
of just six authorized non-profit dispensaries, two in North Jersey, 
two in Central Jersey and two in South Jersey.

The purchase limit will be 2 ounces a month, compared to an ounce in 
Alaska, Montana and Nevada, and 24 ounces in Oregon and Washington.

Patients' rights groups say 2 ounces a month isn't enough for 
severely disabled people. They may be right.  The limit can be raised 
later if experience warrants change.

Examples

The state Department of Health and Senior Services, the agency that 
must develop regulations, is busy investigating what other states are 
doing, trying to strike a balance for New Jersey between assuring 
access for qualified patients and assuring the integrity of the program.

Bear in mind that the products to be distributed are forbidden under 
federal law. State law varies. The situation is similar to that for 
alcohol at the end of Prohibition.

Regulation of newly legal liquor, wine and beer was left then pretty 
much to the states, which established various distribution systems. 
By and large, the system that evolved works well.

When Christie was campaigning for election last year, he said that 
the then-pending Compassionate Use Medical Marijuana bill might 
encourage recreational drug use.  He cited the experience in 
California, where such vaguely defined ailments as anxiety and 
chronic pain qualified for marijuana treatment.

However, that loophole was closed in the New Jersey bill. It 
authorized physicians to approve marijuana for severe pain caused by 
cancer, multiple sclerosis, glaucoma, HIV/AIDS, Lou Gehrig's disease, 
muscular dystrophy and any condition in which life expectancy is less 
than a year.

California also permitted too many dispensaries to open, seemingly 
one on every street corner. New Jersey, with only six, won't have 
that problem, either.

Switch

Christie's spokesman, Michael Drewniak, announced two weeks ago that 
the governor had changed his mind, that he now thinks the law as 
enacted is "very good."

Former Assemblyman John Rooney, a Bergen County Republican, had 
questioned whether marijuana was medically needed, suggesting that 
new, legal pain-relief medications would suffice, without all the 
hassle. Patients' rights groups disagreed. Marijuana works when 
nothing else will, they say.

The prime sponsor, Democratic Sen. Nicholas Scutari of Union County, 
has accused the governor of dragging his feet. True, the bill became 
law the day before Christie took office, and he had a lot of other 
things on his mind then. But that still left five months for him to 
get his act together, Scutari said.

Well, the experience in California, Colorado and several other states 
indicates that haste can cause problems.

In Denver alone, for example, with a population of 600,000, some 279 
stores that were vacant a year ago are now dispensing marijuana for 
medical problems. That works out to one pot shop for every 2,150 residents.

It's hard to believe there can be that many severely disabled people 
in the city, for whom all other medications won't work. But it is not 
hard to believe that all those stores are selling marijuana.

For New Jersey, the best course is to take things one step at a time.
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake