Pubdate: Sun, 08 Jan 2012
Source: Daily Sentinel, The (Grand Junction, CO)
Copyright: 2012 Cox Newspapers, Inc.
Contact:  http://www.gjsentinel.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2084
Author: Dennis Webb

PITKIN COUNTY TO RETHINK INACTION ON MEDICAL POT

Pitkin County commissioners will rethink their previous shelving of 
proposed regulations allowing and governing medical marijuana 
operations, after learning that simply doing nothing is tantamount to 
making existing operations illegal.

Commissioners plan to take up the issue Jan. 17.

Rachel Richards, chairwoman of the county commission, said county 
staff last spring advanced fairly far in developing codes allowing 
for such operations. But she said commissioners took no action on 
adopting them after the county attorney indicated the county could 
face possible liability for permitting something that's illegal under 
federal law.

She said the concerns ranged from county personnel being prosecuted 
for aiding and abetting a criminal activity if the Drug Enforcement 
Administration busted a grow operation, to a grower suing the county 
for entrapment if the federal government shut it down after it had 
obtained a county permit.

Although the county hasn't banned medical marijuana operations, Julie 
Postlethwait, spokeswoman for the state's Medical Marijuana 
Enforcement Division, said its failure to adopt regulations licensing 
them means the division would have to deny applications for them, 
"which basically causes them to shut down."

That's because the division is prohibited by state law from approving 
such applications where no local license or other approval for 
medical marijuana operations has been granted.

Postlethwait said Pitkin County is the first county or city in the 
state that the division knows of that had decided to take no position 
regarding licensing, but she wouldn't be surprised if more do the same.

She said the division received 21 applications from within Pitkin 
County, but it doesn't know how many of those are in the 
unincorporated part of the county, and thus under county jurisdiction.

Richards said she doesn't think the county understood the 
consequences of doing nothing.

"We're going to take another look at it. ... I think our actions 
should be deliberate one way or the other. I don't think it should be 
a default type of action," she said.

Postlethwait said operations have until July 1 to receive their state 
licenses. She said the division is aware the county plans to rethink 
the matter, and it will communicate with the county before taking any 
action on applications.

Richards said she can't predict what commissioners might decide, and 
she still needs to hear from the public. But she said she's now 
feeling confident enough in the state's regulations and the lack of 
federal action against counties that have proceeded with permitting 
medical marijuana operations that she's inclined to support Pitkin 
County doing so as well.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom