While it is perfectly fine for you to get hammered on booze in the back of a limo or party bus in Washington while smoking a disgusting cigar, don’t you dare light up some herb and catch a little buzz.
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| Flickr/Julie. |
The paranoid stoner who seems overly concerned that the government is keeping tabs on his or her movements and behavior is a classic marijuana-user stereotype. But when government organizations like the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment discuss pilot population health surveillance programs that are currently in operation, it’s not hard to see why pot-smokers might be a little paranoid — perhaps justifiably.
Crashes involving alleged stoned driving continue to get a great deal of attention following this year’s start of legal recreational marijuana sales. Note the story of Emily Strock, who reportedly admitted to consuming one bowl of pot and drinking one beer prior to a grisly Denver-area crash but has only been charged with driving under the influence of drugs. The accusation came down before blood test results were final.
But have legal pot sales led to more Colorado highway deaths thus far in 2014? One report says “no” — and that cheers a Colorado marijuana business representative. Denver Westword has more.
When tragedy strikes at an event designed for entertainment purposes — and particularly when it’s music — the scenesters and members of the musical industry tend to try to distance themselves from the disaster. There’s always blanket condemnation of drug use and talk of increased security and decreased tolerance for drug use and abuse.
But the fact remains that humans seem to enjoy the simultaneous activities of taking drugs and listening to music. For me, the question becomes not what concert promoters and security companies can do to protect music-lovers from the dangers of drugs; the question becomes what music-lovers can do as a community to take some responsibility for each other and for the scene as a whole.
State health officials are calling for a public rule-making committee this fall to iron out details involving the medical marijuana patient registry, including limiting the ability of caregivers to serve more than five patients. In a letter to the Colorado Board of Health earlier this month, Ron Hyman, director of the Medical Marijuana Registry, outlined areas that he says will require a rule-making hearing on September 16.
| Flickr Commons |
| Homegrown Lemon Kush |
Stretching from the eastern edge of Los Angeles County, all the way to the western Arizona border, Riverside County in California’s Inland Empire has been rapidly rising in the ranks of the most populous counties in the entire nation.
In an almost synchronized timeline of events, the population explosion in Riverside County coincided with the massive growth of medical marijuana demand in the region, and local growers soon found the Mediterranean-esque climate to be more than adequate for growing their own crops. However, a newly proposed county-wide ordinance would put an outright ban on outdoor cultivation of cannabis.
As we’ve reported, the University of Arizona fired the lead researcher of a study that looked at the therapeutic benefits of cannabis for treating people with post-traumatic stress disorder. While no reasons were given, Dr. Sue Sisley says that she was fired for political reasons and not because of her performance.
And now she has filed an official appeal with the university, demanding that continue as assistant professor and assistant director of the Arizona Telemedicine Program. She has support, too. As we wrote earlier this week, an Iraq veteran posted an online petition at Change.org that has gathered more than 31,300 online signatures.
| Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal. |
Georgia Governor Nathan deal isn’t going to sit by and let a CBD-only medical cannabis bill he pushed this past session go to waste. Instead, the Republican says he is going to spearhead the effort to get clinical trial programs started.
Deal met with officials yesterday to kickstart the program.
The Massachusetts Department of Health are going after caregivers who are selling cannabis to more than one medical marijuana patient. According to officials, some 1,300 patients and 17 caregivers were sent letters last week gently reminding them that it is illegal under state law to do things like, say, post extra meds for sale on Cragislist.
But patients say that it is the only way they can legally access meds while the state drags their heels trying to get dispensaries up and open, likely not until the Fall.
Want to run Minnesota’s medical marijuana program? Sounds like it’d be an interesting gig, right? It also pays handsomely, with a salary in the range of $73,811 to $105,862. But before you start daydreaming about how many bags of Cheetos you could buy with that type of income, it should be noted that the job would be more about administration and analysis than cannabis, of course.
“This position will ensure proper direction and oversight is provided within a new division, the Office of Medical Cannabis (OMC), created within the Executive Office (EO) of the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH),” the job post notes. “The Director of the OMC will create and oversee this new program and will report directly to the Assistant Commissioner for Strategic Initiatives.”
Job responsibilities include strategic planning, budgeting, hiring, reviewing research and literature related to the field, and sampling the marijuana extracts to make sure they’re up to par. Okay, we’re just kidding about that last one. Check out more over at the Minneapolis City Pages.