Pubdate: Thu, 05 Sep 2013
Source: Sacramento Bee (CA)
Copyright: 2013 The Sacramento Bee
Contact: http://mapinc.org/url/0n4cG7L1
Website: http://www.sacbee.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/376

CALIFORNIA STILL NEEDS TO FIX MARIJUANA MUDDLE

As if California needed more impetus to tackle its marijuana morass,
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder just offered one.

The Justice Department announced last week that while marijuana
remains illegal under federal law, it would not block Colorado and
Washington state from licensing and taxing the sale of recreational
pot  if they police themselves. To stay free of federal interference,
the two states must prevent marijuana from being sold to children,
stop profits from flowing to gangs and drug cartels, crack down on
driving while impaired by drugs and keep marijuana from being grown on
public lands, including national forests.

Those are precisely the kinds of reasonable regulations that need to
be strengthened in California. But much more needs to be done to
return medical marijuana closer to what voters thought they were
approving in 1996.

The state should go after prescription fraud so that medical pot is
truly for "compassionate" use. It should encourage nonprofit
collectives and make it more difficult for profiteers to cash in. It
must not ignore the environmental damage being wrought by some
marijuana farmers.

Without clear laws, cities and counties are struggling to regulate
medical marijuana dispensaries, and California's federal prosecutors
are two years into a sometimes heavy-handed crackdown. In a statement
Wednesday, U.S. Attorney Benjamin Wagner in Sacramento said last
week's memo reinforces the priorities his office already has in
prosecuting marijuana cases.

Yet so far, all the varied interests  local governments, law
enforcement agencies, marijuana dispensaries, patient advocates and
others - have been unable to come close to a compromise at the
Capitol. Marijuana is big business now, so lobbyists are out in force.

For the second year in a row, Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, a San Francisco
Democrat, introduced a bill for state regulation and oversight of
medical marijuana. Assembly Bill 473, which would have assigned the
task to the state Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control, narrowly
failed on the Assembly floor in late May.

Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, a Sacramento Democrat,
introduced a more limited bill to shield medical marijuana collectives
from criminal prosecution. A version of SB 439 passed the Senate in
May, but is stalled in the Assembly Committee on Health. Steinberg's
office told The Sacramento Bee's editorial board on Wednesday that
given Holder's announcement, he may try to move the measure this session.

Legislators have a lot on their plate, but this is an issue worth
their attention early next year, in search of a comprehensive,
common-sense solution that works for California.
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MAP posted-by: Matt