Pubdate: Sun, 19 Jun 2011
Source: Daily News, The (Longview, WA)
Copyright: 2011 The Daily News
Contact:  http://www.tdn.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2621
Author: Tony Lystra, The Daily News

ATTITUDES SHIFTING ABOUT MARIJUANA AS MEDICAL USES GAIN LEGITIMACY

Earlier this month, sheriff's deputies were called to a West Longview
apartment where people were smoking marijuana. A woman presented a
deputy with a medical marijuana card, according to a report, and the
deputy left. No citations. No arrests.

The deputy later explained to the person who called in the complaint
that "there was nothing to be done."

Marijuana, once reviled as a dangerous narcotic, lumped with heroin
and cocaine, has become more widely accepted in recent years than many
thought possible.

A clinic opened in Castle Rock this spring to provide medical
marijuana certificates and advice about the drug. Castle Rock also is
debating whether to allow residents to collectively cultivate their
own marijuana gardens for medical use. A marijuana dispensary has
opened in Rainier.

Meanwhile, more than a dozen states, including Washington, have passed
medical marijuana laws. A bill legalizing and licensing marijuana
dispensaries was approved by the Washington Legislature, but Gov.
Chris Gregoire vetoed that part of the bill, citing federal laws
against marijuana use.

But Melissa Robinson, the owner of Castle Rock's Healing Hand of God
marijuana clinic, said it's only a matter of time before marijuana is
legal for any adult to grow and consume.

"There's no stopping it," Robinson said. "The force behind it is so
grand. If we are not legalized in the next five years I will be blown
away."

Marijuana advocates say the public is starting to realize that pot can
provide more benefits to patients with fewer side effects than highly
addictive and legally available opiate pain killers. The drug has also
become destigmatized, they said, because many American voters have
smoked pot and suffered few if any ill effects.

"You're starting to see a generation or two of folks who may have at
one point in their lives experimented with marijuana and so they have
direct experience with it," said 19th District Rep. Brian Blake,
D-Raymond, who voted for the Legislature's medical marijuana
dispensary bill. "It's almost become mainstream."

Blake said he doesn't believe Washingtonians are quite ready to
legalize pot for everyone, but he said, "I think the public is getting
there."

What's clear, he said, is that voters "are starting to see that some
people actually do get some relief ... from medical marijuana and are
sympathetic to that. They've seen folks suffer and are willing to give
folks an opportunity to try to relieve that."

States, however, can't act independently of federal law, which
prohibits pot possession and cultivation. Gregoire's rejection of this
year's marijuana dispensary legislation came after a federal
prosecutor in Spokane staged raids on dispensaries in that city.

And the public is far from totally at ease with expanding pot use. A
ballot initiative to legalize the drug failed in California last year.
In Castle Rock, some residents wore "Not in Our Town" stickers to a
recent City Council meeting where they said medical marijuana gardens
would make the drug more available to children.

Ed Orcutt, an 18th District State Representative, said pot is slowly
becoming accepted by the public because medical marijuana advocates
have been successful in easing regulations.

"It's incrementalism, obviously," he said. "You get a little bit here.
You get a little bit there. ... Suddenly, you get it accepted by
society as a whole."

Orcutt, a Kalama Republican who did not back the dispensary bill, said
some people have a "legitimate medical use" for marijuana. "But I
think the majority of the people who are pushing for medical marijuana
and the dispensaries are pushing for legalization of marijuana in
general," he said.

"I'm concerned about what kind of message we send to kids about
marijuana when people can go get a prescription and walk in and buy it
somewhere," Orcutt said.

Asked if he believed pot should be legalized for everyone, 19th
District Legislative Rep. Dean Takko, D-Longview, paused for a long
beat, then said, "That's a toughy. I think we'll get there, probably
someday. It's stigmatized as being a lot worse than it probably is."

Takko said it's taking longer than he expected for medical marijuana
to gain legitimacy. "A lot of us, 30 or 40 years ago, probably figured
by the time we got into the places we are in in leadership that there
would be a more enlightened view of marijuana's use as medicine. And
yet it hasn't happened," he said.

State Attorney General Rob McKenna, a Republican who is running for
governor next year, declined to comment for this story.

Meanwhile, law enforcement agencies and courts are showing signs of
relaxing their approach to marijuana. The city of Seattle directed its
police officers nearly a decade ago to focus on what it considered
more serious crime. In Cowlitz County, during a sentencing hearing
last year for a man who was caught growing a large amount of pot
despite letting his medical certificate lapse, a Superior Court judge
downplayed the offense, comparing it to letting a driver's license
expire.

Kelso Police Chief Andy Hamilton said medical marijuana laws have
created a gray area for the public and law enforcement, leaving some
citizens free to use the drug as they wish and others facing
prosecution.

"It used to be black and white: Pot's illegal. Period," Hamilton said.
Now, he said, it's "maybe" OK to grow and smoke pot.

Hamilton said his officers are sometimes tipped off about marijuana
grows that turn out to be legal because the owner has a medical
marijuana card.

"It does make it confusing for both the public and law enforcement
officials," he said. 
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MAP posted-by: Richard R Smith Jr.