Pubdate: Sat, 05 Feb 2011
Source: Kitsap Sun (WA)
Copyright: 2011 Kitsap Sun
Contact: http://web.kitsapsun.com/scripts/letters.html
Website: http://www.kitsapsun.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/4404
Author: Josh Farley
Bookmark: http://mapinc.org/topic/Dispensaries

POT DISPENSARIES POPPING UP TO SERVE KITSAP MEDIAL MARIJIUANA PATIENTS

BELFAIR -- A steady current of medical marijuana patients come and go 
from a quaint blue building on Highway 3 every day of the week, each 
emerging with a small brown bag.

The place is a pioneer on the Kitsap Peninsula -- a brick-and-mortar 
medical marijuana dispensary in a state that has been grappling with 
how qualifying patients can obtain the drug since voters approved it 
as medicine in 1998.

Yet Mari Meds, founded by a Grapeview couple in November, in some 
ways differs little from its fellow establishments along the bustling 
highway: it is set up to pay taxes with the state's Department of 
Revenue and is registered as a sole proprietorship. It has been 
approved to occupy its 400-square-foot location through Mason 
County's Department of Community Development. It keeps a careful 
paper trail and balances its books.

"I want to create a professional facility," said Lori A. Kent, its co-founder.

Similar storefronts across the state, from Port Angeles to Spokane, 
are cropping up. By the Washington State Department of Revenue's 
count, there's about 129. Forty of them are registered with the 
department, said its spokesman Mike Gowrylow.

They've taken the plunge into a murky area of law that lawmakers in 
Olympia are contemplating changing: the provision of providing to 
"only one patient at any one time."

Kent said the Belfair dispensary does indeed help only one 
card-carrying patient at a time -- but they come and go about every 
15 minutes. The dispensary has built a clientele of about 500 
patients in its two-and-a-half months of operation, and it is already 
looking to open a second location.

The state Department of Health says dispensaries are not allowed, 
though it does permit a provider to supply a patient. Making the 
message further mixed, the Department of Health's website has 
astatement saying that dispensaries are illegal -- yet the state's 
Department of Revenue is registering them as tax paying entities.

Philip Dawdy, spokesman for the Washington Cannabis Association, said 
legislation under consideration by state lawmakers would allow for 
dispensaries and create a system of regulation by both the state 
departments of health and agriculture. It would also allow collective 
marijuana-growing gardens for patients.

Dawdy said Senate Bill 5073 would also give patients protection from 
law enforcement arrests. Currently, the medical marijuana law enacted 
by voters in 1998 only allows for a legal defense in court for 
prosecuted patients.

SB 5073 would create a state database so law enforcement could check 
to ensure patients are authorized.

Kent and fellow Mari Meds founder Robert A. Wood Jr., both 
transplants from California, say they're committed to providing 
patients medicine in an above-board, open fashion.

"I respect the law," Kent said. "We don't want to go against John the lawman."

Michael Dorcy, Mason County's newly elected prosecutor, said he's 
aware of the Belfair location but hasn't yet made a decision about 
the legality of dispensaries because a case has not been referred to 
his office for review.

He said it's an issue he's watching, and he is working to formulate 
an opinion. But he would like legislative guidance.

"Just tell us what the law is," he said.

The sheriff's office will conduct an investigation "when we find a 
probable violation of the law," said Mason County Sheriff's spokesman 
Dean Byrd. But he acknowledged that without clarification, police 
have a difficult time knowing what to investigate and what will hold 
up in court.

"The criminal law should not be ambiguous," he said. "When there is 
ambiguity, it ties the hands of law enforcement."

'Free For All'

In Bremerton, Herbal Healing 420, a delivery service for medical 
marijuana patients, is contemplating opening a storefront on Callow 
Avenue. It also is registered with the state's revenue department.

Business owners are consulting an accountant and a lawyer to 
determine what other governmental hoops they'll need to jump through, 
said co-founder Archie Lee of Bremerton.

Lee, 33, a former contractor who was recently laid off, agreed that 
Washington's law was less-than-clear -- but he believes helping 
patients who qualify for medical marijuana is worth the risk.

"It's like a free-for-all right now," he said.

Kitsap County Prosecutor Russ Hauge said that a storefront, open to 
the public as a distribution point for medical marijuana, is simply 
not authorized under state law.

Hauge, who often testifies in Olympia on behalf of the state's 
prosecuting attorneys' association, agrees the law needs clarifying.

"Our position remains that we believe that the current law needs to 
be addressed, particularly in how people who have the right to use 
marijuana can obtain it lawfully."

Two developments helped spur dispensary organizers to act, Dawdy 
said. First, "King County pretty much decided it wasn't going to 
prosecute" dispensaries, he said. Second, the federal government, on 
decree from U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, issued a memo to all 
federal prosecutors in fall 2009 directing them away from pursuing 
medical marijuana cases.

'Circle of Life'

Belfair's first dispensary has drawn the attention of its neighbors 
in downtown.

"I was skeptical at first," said Bill Palmroth, of Mr. Bill's 
Sportscards & Variety shop, which is next door. "But it doesn't seem 
like too much of a problem."

Palmroth said a closed-down pawnshop that occupied the same building 
was more troubling. He suspected people attempted to sell stolen 
goods there, and at times they'd come to his shop as well.

Founders Wood and Kent are taking no chances with crime. No money or 
medication is left on the premises after hours and the building is 
armed with an alarm; surveillance cameras monitor the premises inside 
and out around the clock.

The source of the marijuana is "from all over," Wood said, declining 
to elaborate. The pot comes from medical marijuana growers who will 
at times exceed lawful supply -- 24 ounces of dried pot and up to 15 
plants -- and give it to the Belfair dispensary for patients.

Their donation, Wood said, is met with a donation from the dispensary 
for their troubles.

"It's a circle-of-life type of thing," Wood said. "We donate to them, 
they donate to us."

Patients have 47 different blends to choose from. Kent said they're 
seeking out strands of marijuana that alleviate pain and are not for 
getting high.

"There's no partying here," Wood said.

He added that the dispensary is strict about its rules:

no authorization card, no entry.

The pair, both 53, have a simple philosophy: no one with a doctor's 
authorization who needs medicine is turned away.

"We're giving people a better quality of life here," Wood said. "I 
have miracles walk through my door everyday."
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom