I recently participated in the Badger Groups forum on medical cannabis. I was the speaker supporting the desperate need for the availability of medical cannabis for local patients, and Franklin County prosecutor, Mr. Steve Lowe, was the speaker for the legal issues involved with this matter. I would like to thank the Badger Group for their invitation and Mr. Lowe for agreeing to discuss this controversial subject.
Unfortunately, Mr. Lowe didn't limit his discussion to the legal aspects of the medical cannabis issue, but tried his best to instill fear and disinformation about marijuana, cannabis's street name. I was astounded that he stated that “cannabis is terribly addictive” and that he tried to equate cannabis to the deadly narcotic Oxycontin as both have been shown to be false by the federal governments own studies (1999 IOM study among others).
My position has always been that it is the interpretation of the county prosecutor that is standing in the way of patient access to this very effective medication. In fact, Mr. Lowe stated "
….the policy varies from county to county in the state of Washington. That policy is usually dictated by the elected prosecuting attorney…um…and varies. I have actually issued a memo…I don’t have it with me…… …it’s about a page and a half, and I did particular training with each of my law enforcement at role calls to teach them what I believe we should be doing for enforcement.” I then restated the issue with this being directly in the purview of the county prosecutor and Mr. Lowe retorted stating " I respectfully disagree that it is a local prosecutor problem; it is NOT a local prosecutor problem. Dispensaries and collective grows are not authorized under the law, you have to remember it is still illegal to possess it. So until that is changed, and that’s really what this conversation is about, if you want it available and the way you want it available, legalize it. And that is essentially what they have done in King County…..legalized it.” He then stated "I choose not to do that for my county. They elected me to make that decision and I’m going to follow it and enforce the law whatever the laws may be.”
I have yet to understand how it can be Mr. Lowes' decision (or Andy Millers', the Benton County Prosecutor) on how to interpret the medical cannabis law for the county, and he even says he "chooses to interpret it this way, but it not be a county prosecutor decision but the federal governments". This is disingenuous at best and too terrible to contemplate at its worst.
Mr. Lowe and Mr. Miller have it within their power to allow collective grows as well as dispensaries so that patients would have safe local access to medical cannabis as the prosecutor for King County, Mr. Satterburg did. It is unfortunate that Mr. Miller has chosen to try to ignore us with games like phone tag and not returning calls. Our legal team was unable over a period of more than a year to secure a meeting with Mr. Miller. They tried day after day to get in touch with Mr. Miller to set up a meeting, but it never happened. We tried going to the city council and they were just as bad. At the council meeting where we first "came out”, Mr. Fox (Richland Mayor) said they would keep the door open for discussion. The next day I called the city to secure a 10 minute time slot at the next council meeting so that our lawyer, Douglass Haitt, could make a presentation. They refused to let us make a presentation…(the last council meeting had several presentations, but of course, none were about the medicinal use of cannabis).
Everything we have tried to do has been unaccepted by our local officials. They refuse to meet with us (while saying to the public that they will meet with us) and refuse to let us make a presentation to the council. They are disingenuous in saying that WE (the patients) must go to the State to change the law as they can do nothing about it. It is more a case that they do not want to deal with the issue and are hoping that if they make it impossible to move forward that we will give up in despair.
A constructive approach on this issue would be for the Mr. Miller to sit down with the invested parties (law enforcement is not one of these parties) and work on the issue. Mr. Miller needs to be proactive in meeting constituent needs and start working within the spirit of the law rather than choosing to impede the progress of patient access to medical cannabis. The voters have already indicated their support of this issue. The Collective is more than willing to work with him and to develop a system that works within the constraints of the law as King County has done, and I sincerely hope he will reconsider his position.
