SACRAMENTO – The California State legislature is making yet another push to pass medical cannabis guidelines this week. AB 604 by Assembly Member Tom Ammiano, like previous failed proposals, puts registration and enforcement under the purview of the State’s Department of Alcohol Beverage Control which patient advocates decry as the inappropriate agency to oversee medical cannabis. Patient advocates are also concerned about how the extensive registration program will affect the cost of medical cannabis.“Assembly Member Ammiano has not worked with local patients on the most critical issue, the cost of their healthcare,” states Shona Gochenaur, executive director of Axis of Love SF Community Center, a social service and advocate center for low-income and disabled medical cannabis patients in San Francisco. AB 604 mandates that all persons involved with medical cannabis register and pay annual fees to the State of California. This includes all growers, transporters, dispensary workers and those who make marijuana preparations such as brownies or hashish. “As the father of Healthy San Francisco, it's a very sad irony,” Gochenaur continues, “President Obama called for robust regulations, not unworkable laws that won’t fullfil the mandate of Proposition 215, the promise of affordable cannabis healthcare.”
The state “Seed to Sale” registration model is being pushed by federal authorities as the best solution to the state-federal conflict over medical marihuana until federal law removes cannabis from the Controlled Substances Act. Sacramento has estimated the program will cost the ABC around $3mil to set-up and enforce. “We heard testimony this week at the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee hearing from officials in Colorado as to why their seed-to-sale enforcement failed and they stated it was because it was too expensive,” states Degé Coutee, president of Patient Advocacy Network, a charitable organization based in Los Angeles providing education, advocacy and watchdog services for medical cannabis patients and providers. “Sacramento should not try to profit off of the sick,” states Coutee. “What Ammiano is proposing is appropriate for adult recreational use, not patients – It’s time for California to just legalize it.”
Patient advocates are calling upon concerned citizens to contact the California State Legislature and oppose AB 604. Rallies and events are being planned for Friday the 13th – the day anticipated the bill will be heard. Contact Shona Gochenaur at (415) 240-5247 or Degé Coutee at (323) 334-5282.
#####