Dispensaries

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Coming Into Los Angeles: Toke Tags Along To The Cannabis Cup With NORML Women’s Alliance

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on February 10, 2012 Culture, Dispensaries, Growing

Kyndra Miller

NORML Women’s Alliance West Coast Coordinator Kyndra Miller: “We need help everywhere”

By Jack Rikess

Toke of the Town

Northern California Correspondent

The NORML Women’s Alliance is looking for many good women.

According to most every poll, cannabis use by mainstream America is on the rise, except for women — their numbers are stagnant. Men are 10 to 16 percent “higher” in their support of legalization and medical marijuana.

The Women’s Alliance is a on a quest to change that.

This coming weekend I have the pleasure of tagging along with NORML Women’s Alliance as they bring their message to the High Times 2012 Medical Cannabis Cup in Los Angeles. Since its inception a few years ago, from New Jersey to the West Coast, the Women’s Alliance has been reaching out to women via networking groups, parties, movie screenings, conferences and where I first met them, in the streets of San Francisco, marching and protesting.

When Obama last visited San Francisco, there was a huge demonstration organized by the medical marijuana community to protest the federal crackdown, a complete about-face by the administration, forcing the closure of California dispensaries and blocking safe access to medicine.

Medical Marijuana Profit Is Allowed Under California Law

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on February 9, 2012 Dispensaries, Legislation, Medical

Chronic Fatigue

In a Recent Letter, the Originator of SB 420 Clarifies That Medical Cannabis Providers Can Make a Profit.

By Robert A. Raich

There is a widely held misperception that businesses in the California medical cannabis industry are prohibited from making a profit. In reality, no California law prohibits cannabis-related businesses from making a profit.

Opponents of medical cannabis, however, have done a masterful job of spreading disinformation since SB 420 was signed into law in 2003. That disinformation has become so prevalent that it is affecting safe access to medical cannabis by patients around the state and has prompted retired state Senator John Vasconcellos to release a letter [PDF] debunking the widely held misinterpretation that profit is not permitted for medical cannabis providers under California law.

Washington Patient Group Worried About Medical Cannabis Bill

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on February 8, 2012 Dispensaries, Legislation, Medical

Cannabis Defense Coalition

Seattle-based medical marijuana patient advocacy group the Cannabis Defense Coalition (CDC) has expressed serious concerns about Senate Bill 6265, currently in the Washington state Legislature.

A internal email sent to CDC members on Tuesday, February 7, outlined the group’s five biggest concerns with SB 6265 thusly:

1. Giving too much for too little

“SB 6265 would legalize a limited number of medical cannabis access points in a limited number of jurisdictions, but it will come at great cost to the Washington State medical cannabis community,” CDC said. “Governor Gregoire — whose partial veto last year put an end to the ‘designated provider model’ under which most access points were operating — has set boundaries on any medical cannabis bill she is to sign, and SB 6265 represents what is acceptable to her.

“The bill would provide broad authority to local counties, cities and towns to regulate medical cannabis collective gardens and access points through zoning, taxation, licensing, health and safety requirements, etc.,” the email said. “This will allow pot-friendly jurisdictions like Seattle and Tacoma to license, tax and regulate the medical cannabis businesses which have sprouted up in their midst, and over which they have uncertain authority.”

Sacramento Group Files Medical Marijuana Act; Will Gather Signatures

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on February 7, 2012 Dispensaries, Legislation, Medical

CSPARC

The Patient Access to Regulated Medical Cannabis Act of 2012 has been filed with Sacramento County Elections Office and will begin gathering signatures to qualify for the November ballot.

Medical cannabis patients, providers, activists and supporters in Sacramento County, California have come together in an effort to qualify a measure for the November 2012 ballot that will establish a reasonable and controlled system for qualified patients to access their medicine.

Over the past two years, medical cannabis advocates said they have attempted to work with Sacramento County officials to develop a regulatory system that would allow for safe access points throughout the unincorporated areas of the County.

Citizens Urged To Report Dispensaries To IRS For Cash Rewards

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on February 6, 2012 Dispensaries, News

Rap Dictionary

The extremist anti-drug group Coalition for a Drug Free California (CDFC) has encouraged citizens from around the state and nation to become dispensary whistle-blowers.

“By simply reporting a pot store to the IRS, average citizens who are fed up with these domestic marijuana cartels can now fill out a very simple form,” said Dr. Paul Chabot, founder of the CDFC. “If the IRS takes action and fines the pot store, the whistle-blower, by law is entitled to a 30 percent cash award.”

CDFC points to a recent case in which the IRS took action against a pot store in northern California with a $2.4 million tax investigation.

Firm Introduces New Technology For Medical Cannabis Industry

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on February 3, 2012 Dispensaries, Medical, Products

QuantaCann

QuantaCann Says Its New System Delivers On-Site Safety & Potency Analysis

Steep Hill Lab says it became the nation’s first medical cannabis screening facility in collaboration with some of the industry’s stakeholders, when it opened for business in Oakland four years ago.

Now, by utilizing their industry experience and developing innovative software and scientific instrumentation, Steep Hill says it has significantly improved the ease by which cannabis can be tested for medical use on site.

S.F. Marijuana Dispensaries Annual Sales Estimate: $41 Million

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on February 1, 2012 Dispensaries, News

Changing World

In an unprecedented analysis of sales tax revenue from the sale of medical marijuana at city dispensaries, the San Francisco controller’s office has estimated annual sales of medicinal cannabis at $41 million.

San Francisco’s roughly two dozen licensed collectives must pay the city’s 8.5 percent sales tax rate, coming from California’s 7.25 percent sales tax with a local one percent sales tax going to S.F.’s general fund, and a .25 percent sales tax that goes to other areas like transportation, reports David Downs at the East Bay Express.

Counting the most recent reporting period — which ended with the third quarter of 2011 — a year’s worth of general fund revenue from sales tax on medical marijuana totals “just over 410,000,” said Curt Fuchs, senior economist in the controller’s office, East Bay Express reports.

Since that figure is one percent of sales, that means S.F. dispensaries sold about $41 million worth of marijuana in a year, “which equals a $50 (or about an eighth of an ounce) dispensary purchase for every person in the city,” Downs reports.

AZ Governor Humiliated In Dismissal Of Anti-Marijuana Lawsuit

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on February 1, 2012 Dispensaries, Legislation, Medical

CBS News

“That’s not how lawsuits work,” the exasperated judge told Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer’s legal team

You probably thought that Arizona Governor Jan Brewer’s recent anti-medical-marijuana lawsuit — through which she sought to thwart the will of Arizona’s voters, as expressed at the polls — was not only an exercise in futility, but also damn silly as well.

Turns out that you’re not the only one who thinks so. U.S. District Court Judge Susan Bolton agrees, and she gave quite a spanking to Gov. Brewer and Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne on January 4 while dismissing the lawsuit.

The dismissal came after a December 12 hearing that didn’t go well for one of Atty. Gen. Horne’s lawyers, reports Ray Stern at Phoenix New Times. Horne — go figure — decided to stay away from this one and sent assistant AG Lori Davis to “take one for the team,” New Times reports.

S.F. Resumes Medical Marijuana Dispensary Licensing (Again)

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on January 31, 2012 Dispensaries, News

The Fresh Scent

San Francisco’s on-again, off-again program to license medical marijuana dispensaries in the city has once again resumed operations. The medical cannabis dispensary program resumed licensing and inspecting collectives, Department of Public Health officials announced on Monday.

The ove came after the agency said last week that the application process was “suspended indefinitely,” and that announcement had come after the city had announced it would continue licensing the shops. And that announcement had come after the initial suspension of licensing in December following a court ruling.

Spokane City Council Calls For Rescheduling Of Medical Marijuana

By Steve Elliott ~alapoet~ on January 31, 2012 Dispensaries, Legislation, Medical

Out There Monthly

The Spokane City Council unanimously agreed on Monday that marijuana should be federally legal to possess by people who have a legitimate medical need for the drug.

State voters passed a medical marijuana law 14 years ago, back in 1998, but the city council is concerned about federal raids continuing in Spokane and elsewhere in Washington and other states that have legalized cannabis for medicinal purposes.

The council approved a nonbinding resolution endorsing a letter that Gov. Chris Gregoire and Rhode Island Gov. Lincoln Chafee sent to the federal Drug Enforcement Administration in November requesting that marijuana be reclassified from being a Schedule I drug to a Schedule II drug under the federal Controlled Substances Act, reports Jonathan Brunt at The Spokesman.

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