Despite City Measure C passing in 1994, despite State Prop 215 passing in 1996, Despite a local medical marijuana ordinance passed in 2000, and besides a 9th circuit court decision that found that the drug laws are not meant to apply to medical uses for cannabis, no distribution center has been open in the City of Santa Cruz since 2000. Critics say the law is fatally flawed and must be reformed before any distribution centers can open. This article explains why.

It is 2004, eight years after the passage of Proposition 215, the Medical Marijuana Compassionate use Act. An elderly woman walks with a cane down near the levee. She carries cash with her. Her hip joint aches with every movement, her knees also pain her and both her ankles are swollen. She meets her connection and they both look furtively around before they exchange cash for a small plastic baggy of the only medication she has found that helps her to endure her pain without knocking her into a stuporous non-productive state.

Why can’t this woman go into a clinic or health care center and pick up her medication? Why must she sneak around furtively in some back alley getting questionable quality cannabis when the citizens of Santa Cruz voted overwhelmingly (73% in favor) of legalizing the use of medical marijuana?

How to Defend a Medical Marijuana Patient in California

[ Area 420 I Tax and Regulate I California NORML I Marijuana Policy Project ]