Source: Chicago Tribune (IL) Contact: http://www.chicago.tribune.com/ Pubdate: Thu, 23 Jul 1998 Author: Dina Rabadi CITY WIDENS MARIJUANA LIMIT FOR MEDICINAL USE LOS ANGELES - Chronic pain and muscle spasms make Irma Carter's weekly expedition to buy medicine an ordeal. Her medicine of choice is marijuana. But a new municipal policy, the first of its kind in the nation, promises to ease the Oakland resident's ordeal--and to inflame a simmering controversy over the parameters of marijuana use in California. After a lengthy debate that spilled over into the wee hours of Wednesday, the Oakland City Council voted to allow its residents to possess 1 1/2 pounds of marijuana for medicinal use. The amount is based on estimates of what a patient would use in three months, according to Food and Drug Administration medical research. The unprecedented action places Oakland squarely in the eye of a political storm that began after the November 1996 passage of Proposition 215, a statewide ballot initiative that legalized marijuana use for medicinal purposes. The Compassionate Use Act was approved by 56 percent of California's voters despite opposition from key state and federal drug officials. In the wake of the measure's passage, the interpretation of what is legal marijuana use remains as controversial as the debate over marijuana's medicinal effectiveness. California's law is in direct conflict with federal drug laws, which make it a felony to grow marijuana. In retaliation, the federal government has threatened to punish physicians who recommend marijuana for their patients. Doctors could face criminal prosecution, the loss of their licenses to prescribe drugs and exclusion from Medicare and Medicaid programs. Last spring, a federal judge ordered six cannabis clubs in Northern California to shut down for illegally selling the drug. California law enforcement officials have not looked kindly upon the law either. It is opposed by Dan Lungren, California's attorney general and the Republican nominee for governor, who was lampooned by the comic strip "Doonesbury" over the subject during the 1996 campaign when he ordered a raid on a San Francisco emporium that sold marijuana to people who claimed to be sick. After Proposition 215's victory, Lungren proposed allowing patients to possess one ounce of marijuana or two plants. But a committee investigating the issue for the Oakland City Council concluded that the 1 1/2-pound limit was reasonable. Oakland City Councilman Nate Miley, who heads the public safety committee that initiated the new policy, said Lungren's office had told him the policy would face a legal challenge, a statement denied by a Lungren spokesman. Matt Ross, a spokesman for the attorney general, said Lungren opposed the Oakland policy. "Law enforcement will do the right thing when they stop someone with 1 1/2 pounds of marijuana," Ross said. Elihu Harris, who is the city's mayor until Edmund "Jerry" Brown Jr. takes office in January, opposed the measure, though he said he doesn't oppose medical marijuana use. The mayor expressed concern that allowing patients to have such a large amount, more than they might legitimately need, would enable them to use it for illegal purposes, such as selling it. Ken Estes, a paraplegic who has used marijuana for 20 years since a motorcycle accident at age 18, said police have harassed and arrested him because of his marijuana use. "Local government is beginning to address this issue so that people who use medical marijuana can quit being treated as criminals," Estes said. As a result of the new policy, Oakland police won't arrest anyone with up to 1 1/2 pounds of marijuana. They won't confiscate the drug so as long as patients can verify their status as "qualified patients" within two days, and so long as the quality of the cannabis in their possession meets the city's standards. Carter, the pain patient, said the new policy will allow her to stop feeling like a criminal. "It means so much to me and to people like me to not be afraid anymore," she said. - --- Checked-by: (Joel W. Johnson)