Pubdate: Wed, 08 Aug 2012
Source: Verde Independent (AZ)
Copyright: 2012 Western News & Info, Inc
Contact: http://verdenews.com/Formlayout.asp?formcall=userform&form=1
Website: http://verdenews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/4433

STATE FORCING GAMBLE ON MEDICAL MARIJUANA

If all the threats pre-election and post-election have not been
enough, the sight of lottery balls being plucked out of the Atom
Action Bubble Top Bingo Blower was a convincing sign to medical
marijuana proponents that they are taking a gamble.

In fact, the mixed signals they continue to get from government
officials are forcing the whole process into a real dice game.

There could be legal and financial repercussions for those trying to
make use of the Arizona Medical Marijuana Act.

Law enforcement hates this law. The arguments they made against the
act before the voters went ahead approved it are the same arguments
they are making now.

Going full steam ahead, however, the Arizona Department of Health
Services has a helpful and detailed webpage for those interested or
involved in medical marijuana. Need a card? Want to become a
dispensary? Want to prescribe MMJ? The ADHS will tell you how.

At the same time Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne not only issued a
formal opinion about the Arizona Medical Marijuana Act but has also
gone a step beyond. While telling the health department to go ahead
with Tuesday's lottery drawing for dispensary applications and
assuring medical marijuana card-holders that they will have no legal
problems, he wants to go to court to ask the judges if the law passed
by voters is actually legal.

The state is telling applicants, go ahead and try to set up a business
but you could be losing a lot of money for nothing. Sure, go ahead and
throw those dice.

Proponents of the Arizona Medical Marijuana Act tried to write in
every remedy to every legal problem that occurred in other states that
legalized MMJ. That includes not allowing local governments to
override the state law. It also includes a disconcerting
confidentiality clause that keeps dispensary applications private.
While these "fixes" do fix some loopholes, they also create other problems.

Even without Horne proactively challenging the law, elements of the
law itself could be its undoing. That could undo all the work the
dispensary applicants have put in. And that makes it all a big gamble.
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MAP posted-by: Matt