Law Enforcement Admits That Oregon Medical Marijuana Law
Not Causing Problems They Predicted – A Great Article

(Marijuananews note: This is an excellent article, but it also makes a very important point: Even the former opponents of the state’s medical marijuana initiative now admit that it is not causing the problems that they predicted.
See
The Thin Blue Party Line Against Medical Marijuana;
Law Enforcement Lies From Alaska And Oregon – 2 Op-eds
and
The Party Line On Medical Marijuana In Oregon From A Sheriff And An "Addiction Specialist"
The fact that the law is working reasonably well will help get similar laws passed in other states, either by initiative or by the legislatures. The Wilamette Week has given the issue outstanding coverage.)

See
Patients In Oregon and California Struggle to Get Medical Marijuana – 2 Articles

December 1, 1999
From The Willamette Week
mzusman@wweek.com
http://www.wweek.com/
By Patty Wentz pwentz@wweek.com

TOKIN' GESTURES

A Year After Oregon's Medical-Marijuana Law Went Into Effect, The Visions Of A Law-Enforcement Nightmare Seem To Have Gone Up In Smoke.

Last week No. 1 and No. 500 went to a show at Harvey's Comedy Club. It was 500's idea--she'd gotten a bunch of tickets and invited her friends along. Nos. 257, 258 and 498 were there, too, laughing heartily when comic Ron Osborne poked fun at the idiosyncrasies of stoners.

As the evening wore on, however, No. 500--otherwise known as Madeline Martinez--shifted in her chair, struggling against the pain that plagues her from degenerative disk disease. She wondered whether she and No. 1--Jeanelle Bluhm--would have a chance to go out to Bluhm's van to light up a bowl and self-medicate. But she wasn't sure it was kosher.

"I'm so new to all of this," she says.

On Nov. 10, Martinez, a 48-year-old former prison guard, became the 500th person to receive official permission from the state to break federal drug laws and use or grow marijuana for medicinal purposes.

Her story illustrates the huge gap between what was predicted about Measure 67 and what turned out to be the reality, as well as how patients and doctors are working their way through the new law.

A year after Measure 67 went into effect, the anticipated evils of Oregon's medical-marijuana law are certainly not evident.

During the 1998 campaign, opponents claimed that pot dealers would use the law as a means to legitimize their illicit ways. Cops would be forced to make judgments on who was a real patient and who an impostor. There would be a few notorious "pot doctors" who would, with a wink and a nudge, recommend marijuana to "patients." People would mock law enforcement, openly smoking marijuana on the streets. Children would see this example and begin the steep descent into the bowels of drug addiction.
See
The Oregonian Puts Prohibitionist Spin On Headline For Straight Story About New Medical Marijuana Laws
and
Oregonian Gives Balanced Coverage Of State Medical Marijuana Controversy
One of the most outspoken opponents of the law was Multnomah County Sheriff Dan Noelle. While he notes that the cards have been available only six months, he concedes that so far things are going well.
See
Oregon Editor Chides Sheriff For Comments On Medical Marijuana; "He has no standing..."
"We assumed we would see a lot of abuses...and we could all jump up and say 'nyah, nyah,'" he says. "We haven't seen it."

Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schrunk, who didn't oppose the measure, agrees that from a law-enforcement perspective, the measure's proponents were right.

"The rhetoric in the campaign was that only the really sick would use it," he says. "It would seem Oregonians are acting responsibly."

The state of Oregon began issuing registration cards on May 1 of this year. As of mid-November, the number issued stood at 530, and Kelly Paige, who heads the medical-marijuana program, receives several new applications per day. Three hundred and eighteen of the cards are for patients, including one 16-year-old with cancer. The rest are for "caregivers," people sanctioned to grow marijuana for others.

"We didn't know if doctors would be reluctant to turn over information or if some of the things law enforcement was worried about would happen," says Paige, whose office was created to administer the new program. "Everything's going so much better than we thought it would."

Since the law passed, a network of patients has created an active support system where veteran pot activists welcome neophytes like Martinez into the fold. Grow rooms are sprouting up in the basements and spare bedrooms of homes across the state. The Oregon Medical Association has issued guidelines for physicians who don't want to stand in the way of their patients who want to use marijuana, and more than 225 doctors have given
the green light.

"It's been an astronomical year," Bluhm says.

It's not perfect, though. Some patients are put off by the annual $150 fee to get a card. Others cannot find a doctor willing to sign off.
See
House Republicans To Introduce Student Drug Testing Bills In Congress;
Oregon First State To License Medical Marijuana Patients -- NORML PR
Martinez had her share of obstacles.

She began using medical marijuana last year to control the pain that seizes her back and shoots down her legs. An open-faced woman whose warm smile comes easily, she says the physical demands of being a state corrections officer in Frontera, Calif., left her with a permanent disability. After seven years on the job, she left with a full pension in 1995 and moved to Oregon.

Before she started using marijuana, she says, she was on 2,400 milligrams of Motrin every day, which tore up her stomach. When the pain got too intense to bear, she would take 10 milligrams of Flexril, a muscle relaxant with the nickname "Gumby drug," because it makes patients' limbs feel rubbery. Good for pain. Bad for doing anything other than staying in bed.

To Martinez, that's a day lost. She has four grandchildren and a 70-year-old mother who need her attention. So she tried marijuana. She smokes two to three bowls a day, which keeps her pain in check without knocking her out. While she still occasionally turns to the
pharmaceuticals, it's rare.

The self-medication was effective, but it had a nasty side-effect: fear.
See
Oregon Medical Marijuana Update From a Reader -- Fear Rules The Day

She was mortified at breaking the law, so much so that she would smoke only in her Milwaukie bedroom with the blinds and door closed. Her anxiety infected her entire family, from her husband, Rafael, to her two twenty-something children. And even though she knew it was unlikely she would get busted for the 1/8-ounce bags she bought through the black market, the messages from the drug war rang in her head.

"I felt like I was one of the people I locked up. Other than my job, I'd never been near a jail," she says. "And I couldn't have my grandchildren over because I didn't want to jeopardize them if something should happen."

Measure 67 brought Martinez hope, but not immediate relief. Like many people, she knew nothing about how the law worked or how to get started growing her own supply. She contacted the Oregon Health Division, and Paige helped her with the law.

It was Stormy Ray, a legendary figure in medical marijuana circles, who helped her with the rest. Ray is a multiple sclerosis patient from Ontario and was one of the chief petitioners on Measure 67. She is the hearthstone of the patient network and runs the medical-marijuana hotline. She is adept at calming patients' fears and easing them into the system.

After talking to Ray, Martinez and her husband went last summer to the Eugene Hempfest, where Ray was working in a booth.

"I just had to meet this woman face to face," Martinez says. "I was so moved by her."
(Marijuananews note: Stormy Ray is one of the heroes of the medical marijuana movement.)

Neither Martinez nor her husband had ever experienced anything like the hempfest.

"We went into culture shock," Martinez says. "We looked so straight and narrow--we stuck out like a couple of narcs." While the tie-die, drumming and naked dancers were shocking to her, she says, she was driven by her belief in the healing properties of the herb. After meeting Ray, she entered into a tight circle of patients and growers with the expertise to teach her how to grow her own supply.

Once she was armed with knowledge, however, Martinez still needed a stamp of approval from a doctor. She had to go through three different Kaiser doctors before she found one who would agree to sign the note the Oregon Health Department needed to get her a card.

Today, Martinez and her husband are making plans to start their first grow.

It costs between $1,000 and $2,000 to buy the lights and ventilation systems necessary to grow the seven plants legally allowed to patients. She says she and Rafael--who, as her caregiver, also has a card--plan to start growing by the end of November and hope to have a harvest by their 30th anniversary in February.

"It's like preparing for a new baby," she says, "like we're getting the nursery ready."

In spite of difficulties in finding sympathetic doctors and the challenge of getting supply, most parties agree that implementation of the medical-marijuana law is going smoothly. For her part, Martinez has begun to spread the word about medical marijuana with the evangelical zeal of a true convert. "It's time for patients to come out of the closet and not be afraid," she says.

Just What Did the Doctor Order: how Measure 67 works by legal and semantic loopholes.

With everyone celebrating the success of Oregon's year-old medical-marijuana law, it's easy to forget that using pot for any reason is still illegal under federal law. Measure 67 is working only because the feds are looking the other way. Last year, the Oregon Medical Association sent a letter to the Department of Justice asking whether the federal agency would come after doctors. It still has not received a response.
See
Oregon Medical Association Advises Doctors To Wait For Federal Approval
Before Cooperating With Patients Under New State Medical Marijuana Law,
Defeating Purpose of Initiative
and
Debate About Medical Marijuana Among Oregon Doctors
Tells Us More About Doctors Than About Marijuana.
To keep doctors from being arrested for pushing an illegal substance, Oregon health officials engaged in a linguistic dance.

Doctors cannot write out a prescription for medical marijuana or even recommend that it might help.
(Marijuananews note: When prohibitionists complain that medical marijuana initiatives do not require a prescription they are being very disingenuous. Federal law does not allow it. That is why the initiatives are written the way they are. However, it may be overstating the case a bit to say that doctors cannot write a "recommendation." They do something very much like that in California.)