kearns to LA city atty: medical cannabis peace mission letter (2054)
chers—
this is the second publication of this letter, which originally went to rocky degadillo, the LA city attorney at the time (march 4, 2009). in it, i itemize the many problems with a “cultivation only” type ordinance for people who are sick & dying, an ordinance such as the current city attorney, carmen trutanich, has currently proposed, an ordinance whose intent is to shut down medical cannabis in los angeles by making the regulations unreasonable, contrary to the intent of voters and the LA city council.
i will be offering a copy of it to mr. trutanich at the lgbt community forum tonight. he is a big supporter of same-sex marriage, and rode in gay pride in councilmember dennis zine’s motorcycle brigade. what’s the problem with medical cannabis? his friend, cm zine, was one of the sponsors of the medical cannabis ordinance, and has said a dispensary-model ordinance is needed in los angeles. cultivation only won’t work. and that stuff about not using cash to reimburse for reasonable expense in producing cannabis? that’s silly.
we need to work together to save legitimate dispensaries that are saving people’s lives, as well as to shut down dispensaries that are profiteering, illigetimate scoffers of the law. they’re not saving anybody’s life.
here’s a link to mr. trutanich’s current draft ordinance: http://clkrep.lacity.org/onlinedocs/2008/08-0923_RPT_ATTY_10-20-09.pdf
hope you can join me there & be part of the community discussion.
namaste
—rk
[richard kearns personal letterhead]
March 4, 2009
Rocky Delgadillo, City Attorney
800 City Hall East
200 North Main Street
Los Angeles, CA 90012
Dear Mr. Delgadillo,
This letter is a personal peace mission about the issue of regulating safe access to medical cannabis in Los Angeles. My name is Richard Kearns. I am a 57-year-old gay AIDS activist & long-term surviver — more then 20 years — and a medical cannabis patient & advocate beginning with the passage of Prop 215. i publish http://AIDS-write.org. I am poet-secretary of the Patient Advocacy Network. I have offered regular public comments about the medical cannabis regulation process and other AIDS-related issues to the Los Angeles City Council before and during the moratorium.
At a February 26th press conference, newly installed US Attorney General Eric Holder indicated he would stop the practice established by the Bush administration of raiding legally licensed medical marijuana dispensaries. Holder said Obama’s campaign promise to stop the raids is “now American policy.” I have attached a YouTube link and transcription of the relevant 51 seconds from the Wednesday news conference with DEA administrator Michelle Leonhart.
We are at a critical juncture in the establishment of medical cannabis community in Los Angeles. If we do not move quickly, Mr. Holder’s announcement, rather than enabling us to move forward, will spark the opening of a host of new, unregulated clinics, similar to our city’s experience with the moratorium on new digital signage and “building decoration” (40 per cent of which is in place contrary to that recently-extended ICO). It is to everyone’s best interest, patients and non-patients alike, that a sensible medical cannabis ordinance — based on a successfully working statewide and countywide model — be put in place quickly.
The current medical cannabis ordinance proposal from your office would create so many hardships for the poor, sick and dying in our community that it does not seem to us like a good-faith response. While we are glad other patients are willing and able to grow their own, here’s a grocery list of our problems with your current cultivation-only proposal:
• I can’t take care of myself, let alone supervise and perform the activities required to raise a finicky plant. I have a black thumb. I’ve killed jade plants.
• Your proposal requires patients to make an initial financial investment in growing equipment of anywhere between $2,000 and $10,000. I live on a fixed income. I don’t have the money.& access to personal resources required (startup expenses would include hydroponic equipment — lights, timers, fans, buckets, pH meters, thermometers, hydrometers, etc. — books, soil material, classes, fertilizer, water, electricity and seeds, to name a few)
• my lack of skill at growing cannabis creates risk that
o the “grow,” or crop,will fail
o the grow will not be as potent as would be the result of the efforts of talented, skilled, experienced growers
o for patients requiring concentrates, grows must be larger
• I am not healthy enough to make the time investment that growing requires
o hours per day (10-12) 7 days week
o depending on the strain, growing seasons can vary between 8-14 weeks
o curing process (also tricky and capable of ruining a grow or preventing things like fungus or bug infestation) can take another 2 weeks to month
o it takes 2 harvests to get hang of not killing the plants
o it takes 6 months from first crop from seed to produce theoretically ingestable, effective medicine
o it takes years before growers gain enough adequate experience to begin dependable cultivation
• many patients’ regimens and circumstances require the effects of different strains of cannabis for different activities and needs; for instance, one strain to help with sleep, a different strain to reduce nausea. the cultivation-only model is insensitive to those needs
• the city attorney’s proposed ordinance includes a ban on concentrates when harm reduction guidelines call for concentrates for safer consumption
• ditto with the ban edible products, another safer method of consumption
• requiring all patients to permits is excessive, stigma-generating and unnecessary
• the city attorney’s proposal calls for the shutting down of the 187 legitimate clinics, rather tnan enforcing the ICO and shutting down the rogue clinics, thus stigmatizing & punishing the legitimate clinics’ cooperation and dedication. If the city enforced the ICO, we wouldn’t be experiencing the neighborhood complaints, which originate with the illegal, rogue clinics
the longer we wait and delay making a decision about thoughtful regulation — as we’be seen with the digital signage moratorium — the more “rogue” clinics will open. if we wait 6 weeks, i estimate 150-200 new, unregulated clinics can very easily open despite the moratorium. We will come very quickly to the same pass that the moratorium on digital signage has ended up — 40 percent of what’s out there is illegal.
The city council will be voting to extend the ICO at its friday, March 6 meeting. I invite you to join us in the creation of a system of safe access to medical cannabis for legitimate patients in Los Angeles. Please
1. support the working group version of the ordinance — let us follow the successful county & state model and get regulation in place with target dates for the application & approval process for new dispensaries
2. support a volunteer community advisory/oversight board, similar to what has been done in San Francisco,
a. to oversee revision of the ordinance at specified intervals (6 months to a year each, for instance), and
b. to train and recruit volunteer community members to administer the in-place ordinance, including
i. permitting new dispensaries to open,
ii. adjudicating on the more than hundred hardship cases pending
iii. closing dispensaries for non-compliance, and
iv. interfacing with the community at large
This peace mission is my personal invitation to participate in the community-building public health policy-making process, building infrastructure to provide safe access for patients as well as the community at large. Peace missions are rarely successful. i hope we might set a new trend here. I will share this letter with the city council at Friday’s (3-6) meeting, and hope this “heads up” will be sufficient for you to respond by then.
thank you for your thoughtful consideration. I look forward to hearing your response.
namasté
richard kearns