The Case for a Cannabis Collective

I've been covering the progress of the marijuana legalization initiative, which has apparently gotten me on a high-level marijuana policy list. From way over in Richland, WA, comes this letter from the Three Rivers Collective, which makes the case for collectives for cannabis cultivation. Many of you probably think that since Washington allows medical marijuana use, patients have unfettered access to prescribed medicine. Chet R. Biggerstaff writes in to correct that.

Chet R. Biggerstaff

The people of Washington State decided back in 1998 that certain patients should be able to use and access cannabis without the fear of arrest and persecution. We passed an initiative that gave patients a legal defense in court only as anything more at the time would not have passed.

What this was supposed to have done was stop the arrests of very ill patients and to allow them to use cannabis as their medicine as well as to have access to it. It further allowed the patient to grow their own medicine or have a caregiver grow it for them. The spirit of the law was to make sure patients could use, access, and grow (or have grown by a caregiver) their medicine without fear of arrest or discrimination, but that is not what we have achieved. What we have now are patients that can’t get their medicine, and patients that are scared of their local police and officials.

Patients are supposed to grow their own or have a caregiver grow it for them. This was a good idea initially but has had some "unexpected" issues. Most patients can't grow their own for a number of reasons like a place to do so, or are too sick to do so. So the powers that be say you can have someone grow it for you. Well, this sounds good on paper but it does not work in practice in the current environment.

What is happening to the patients that need a caregiver is either they can’t find anyone to do so for them without taking advantage or they are being ripped off by said caregivers. The vast majority of people I've come across that want to be caregivers are not doing so for the patients but for their pocketbooks. They say they will grow for the patient but then turn around and charge the patient either street prices or very close to street prices for something they should only be paying cost for (power, nutrients, etc) and then turn around and either use the "excess" themselves or sell it on the black market. 

A true story: We had a gentleman come in to a public meeting that wanted to become a patient. This person had no documented injury or illness and I explained that he did not qualify under Washington state law. He then asked for contact information on patients that needed a caregiver. He said that if he could not be a patient that he would be a caregiver for someone and that way get his "medicine" (recreational use) for himself and to make money on the side.

I explained to him that as he had stated he wanted medicine for himself and didn't qualify as a patient and that he had gone as far to say that he wanted to take advantage of the law to further his own ends (not in so many words), that I could not now or ever connect him with a patient as it was people like him that were causing so many problems for the actual patients.

Needless to say he then decided to wait till after the meeting to try to dissuade other patients from working with us because we would not help him. This is actually a quite common story and is repeated day in and day out all over the state. There is a severe lack of legitimate caregivers in Washington state that are out to actually help the patients rather than take advantage of them. 

The law that was passed back in 1998 was meant to provide access to medicine as well as protect patients from arrest and prosecution. What we have is local governments saying, "Sure, go ahead and go out of town (in the same state) to get your medicine...that's okay. You can even use it here locally in your home out of sight of the public. But, don’t even think about getting it locally or using it where you need to as we will arrest you."

The guidelines say a patient can have up to 15 plants and up to 24 oz. of usable medicine in their possession unless your doctor says you can have more. Our local (and many other areas of the state) authorities say that if your doctor says you can have more and you do have more, they will arrest you. They also say that we cannot put our plants together in a collective grow to help each other and that each patient needs to do so on their own.

Nowhere in the law does it say patients can’t put their plants together to help each other. It also doesn’t say we can. What our local officials are doing here is creating their own interpretation based on personal views/agendas rather than what the law actually says. It has always been my understanding that if something is not specifically illegal then it is legal until made illegal by developing a bill/law to do so.

Neither law enforcement nor our political leaders have done so, but continue to set a totally different standard for cannabis contrary to how laws are made in the USA. Why is it the powers that be can make a whole set of "special" rules for cannabis when no other law is based on this way of thinking? 

Our law's intent was to say it is okay for qualifying patients to use and access cannabis without the fear of arrest and prosecution. This also means that if we are allowed to use cannabis as medicine then the acquisition of said medicine has to be legal as well. You can’t have one without the other.

But what our local officials say is that we can grow it only. You can’t buy the seeds or clones to get started (it’s against the law) but you can grow it. You can use it as medicine but you can’t acquire it. How does this work? All this interpretation does is further law enforcements view that cannabis has no medical value and effectively bans growing by default.  You cannot allow access without allowing the process of procurement.

Further, our local officials (and many others from around the state) are trying to ban access to our medicine as they don't agree with its use as medicine. Last time I checked our local politicians were not doctors. They say you can use it but you can't buy, sell, or trade the seed or clone to get started so patients must break the law to grow their own if even they can.

How is this compassionate? How does this help patients get and use their life saving medicine? How can our local officials even think they are being true to the spirit of the law?

The fact is they have not and have no intention of allowing its use or procurement. They are correct that the law is silent on how a patient is supposed to obtain their medicine, clones, and seeds. The fact still remains that it is medicine and the patients need it. It does not matter how law enforcement or our political leaders feel personally about this.

They are supposed to listen to the will of the people and then work with the interested parties to develop something that will work in the current environment and to make changes as needed to conform to changes in the evolving laws. They are not supposed to make their own way of interpreting just this law nor are they supposed to try to undermine it because they don't personally agree. This is exactly what is happening. 

The patients, unfortunately, are the ones that have to do the hard work. They have to form groups to help each other despite threats from law enforcement. They have to purchase off the black/gray market to get their medicine as the powers that be will not allow us to take control of the supply. They feel much better about leaving the supply issue in the black market and to have patients forced to break the laws just to obtain their medicine.

If we cannot put our plants together and grow our own for our groups (collectives) then we have no chance of getting the price down. Right now we are forced to pay anywhere from $3,000-$4,500 per pound of medicine that we have no way of knowing anything about (how it was grown, what was used on it, is it clean or not, etc.).

Then there is the safety issue. Our local officials think it is far safer for each patient to grow at home with the possibility of robbery and violence. They think that it is easier to control this way but it makes absolutely no sense. How can securing hundreds or even thousands of locations be safer and easier than a few larger locations? Quite simply, it's not.

It is too bad that our officials cannot see through their reefer madness to see what they are actually doing to our state’s most vulnerable people. It is the patients and the general public that will have to move on this as our officials have made it quite clear that they will fight us around every bend.

All patients need to stand up and be counted. They need to form groups and become active in this fight. Yes, I know that we are in terrible pain and sickness but no one else is going to do it for us. If we want to have true legal access to our medicine we will have to do it ourselves.

You cannot allow access to medicine but not allow its procurement.