Cannabis task force chair goes to New Mexico
My former paper, the Santa Fe Reporter, has a story today on the International Drug Policy Reform Conference in Albuquerque, including a quote from Thomas Jefferson School of Law professor Alex Kreit, who was most recently the chair of the City of San Diego task force set up to come up with best practices for dispensaries.
Here’s Kreit:
“If only we had a system as clear as New Mexico [does], I think we’d be in great shape.”
A big part of me begs to differ. I did a lot of reporting on New Mexico’s flawed system. New Mexico can be considered a model because it’s the Department of Health that directly issues permits for dispensaries based on a very strict set of regulations. Yet, the state dragged-ass for more than two years. Several patients died before they were ever given the chance to obtain pot from a legal dispensary.
Furthermore, New Mexico limits the number of conditions treatable with cannabis to only certain grave illnesses. That makes the program more manageable, but it’s also a prime example of the government making decisions best left to your physician. Of course, in California, you can pick up a pot prescription for a wide variety of minor and major maladies, which means there are a heck of a lot more patients to serve. As a result, a New Mexico-style program in California would result in a shift back to the black market as patients wait and wait and wait for bureaucrats to wade through dispensary applications.
But give Kreit’s blog of the conference a read. The most recent post is titled: ‘”On the phone with this fat chick…where my IHOP.’”
Hey, thanks for the blog link and shout out. I just wanted to quickly clarify my quote from the New Mexico piece as I think it may have been taken slightly out of context (or, at least, was somewhat incomplete in conveying my opinion of the New Mexico system.) My positive comments on the system in New Mexico were really limited to the clarity of the state law/system. I think that this clarity has helped NM avoid a lot of the litigation that we’ve had to face in California as a result of Prop 215 (which was vague in many respects) and SB 420 (which is also vague and leaves a lot of issues to localities that I think would be more clearly and efficiently addressed by the state.) I agree with much of your critique of other issues about the NM system, however, and think that there are many aspects of the CA law which are better than the NM law.
Oh, and w/regard to the title of the blog post you reference, let me note for the record that the “On the phone…” title is a quote from a news story I linked to in that post and not my own remark.
Before reading Alex’s comment, I wondered why the blog post title seemed off key, so i read the post & realized that the title was a quote & was going to suggest putting it in double marks,
i.e. “‘ On the phone…IHOP.’”
OK, OK, I added double quotes.
“The difference between California and New Mexico is that California’s law is one page and New Mexico’s is 12 pages,” is how Jenison at the New Mexico Department of Health explained it to me.
But really, I think a bigger reason New Mexico has avoided litigation is that it’s all still so hypothetical.
And as far as whether it makes more sense for it to be handled on the state level. You could be right….but that’s easier to contemplate when you’re talking about a state whose population is smaller than San Diego County’s.
thank you for your excellent reporting and on the mark comments
Politicians are 10 years behind the times, when it comes to hemp use. People have been fighting for along time against pot prohibition with some movement going on now. Still too slow for those caught up in the jail system. Our freedoms have been trampled on by folks who know nothing about how beautiful cannabis can be for someones life. Keep up the good work.
Dave, it’s good to read an article from you in your new “digs”. You know full well how I feel about New Mexico’s promise (as envisioned in its authorizing legislation) and its woefully inadequate response to that promise to date.
In order to accomplish what the New Mexico legislation originally envisioned, we have introduced in the Tennessee legislature the Safe Access to Medical Cannabis Act, which will provie high-quality, safe and effective medical cannabis to eligible patients from participating pharmacies as soon as their physicians recommend it (without the need for a review board to approve access) for a cost of $60/ounce.
Of that amount, $30 will go to the state-licensed farmer, $10 will go to the distributor and pharmacist and $20 will go to the state to fully fund the program, with excess revenues going to indigent health careand substance abuse treatment. We envision this program bringing in $450 million annual gross income by the end of three years, and that’s if we only serve 15% of the current cannabis users in Tennessee. Our Safe Access program will be the most tightly-controlled program in the country. It will also be the most patient-friendly.
If anyone would like a copy of the legislation or the background position paper, please email me at tracevu@bellsouth.net . We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.