Dear Senator Morrisette,

Thank you for your work on SB-772-2 to help improve Oregon’s Medical Marijuana Act. I understand how difficult it must be to discern fact from fiction, and create a bill that will protect patients and reduce the abuse of OMMA.

As you requested during the hearing, I have tried to provide useful suggestions on SB-772-2. I have also tried to incorporate the needs of patients with the issues Law enforcement raised during our conversation about HB-2693. I believe reasonable compromises have been found that both patients and law enforcement can support.

The following is not meant to be a list of every possible improvement to our program. I am simply trying to address some of the issues I believe will improve OMMA for patients. I am sure you will receive many other good ideas that can be crafted together into a good bill.

Thank you for your efforts to insure that patients are allowed to give their excess medication to other cardholders and transport medical marijuana between the patient and designated primary caregiver. But I’m not positive that removing the transfer of marijuana by a registry identification cardholder to another registry identification cardholder if no consideration is paid for the transfer from the definition of delivery will accomplish this goal.

Patients and caregivers must also be allowed to transport marijuana within the limits allowed under OMMA. Medical marijuana gardens are allowed to be at either the patient’s location or at the designated primary caregiver’s location, but our current law does not allow for the transportation of medical marijuana between locations.

ORS 475.316 is a list of offences that will limit a cardholder’s immunity from criminal laws involving Marijuana. The list includes:

Delivering marijuana, marijuana plants, marijuana clones or marijuana seedlings, for no consideration to a person who is in possession of a registry identification card is not listed as an offense that will limit a cardholder’s immunity.

It will be useful to add the following language to ORS 475.316 to clarify the law about a cardholder’s right to transport medical marijuana and give excess medical marijuana to other patients.

I strongly support defining seedlings and starts. Under current statutes there are no provisions for starting a garden. Patients must either take clones from another patient’s marijuana plants or grow the marijuana plants from seeds. In either case, plants do not become viable for several weeks. Until the clones develop a root structure they can easily die.

I also support putting a reasonable limit on the number of clones or seedlings that can be possessed. A limit of three (3) clones or seedlings per allowed plant would be a reasonable number that law enforcement could support.

Law enforcement, patients and designated primary caregivers need a handbook that explains the program in clear and simple language. Many patients have difficulty understanding Oregon’s Medical Marijuana Act. (OMMA). Many patients find themselves victimized because they don’t understand the law. Education would reduce much of the abuse within OMMP.

Most patients have little or no experience growing medical marijuana. Patients that turn to the illegal market for help with their gardens are often victimized. Criminals find that patients are easy targets. Illegal growers teaching patients how to grow is a recipe for abuse. With a little education and help, most patients and designated primary caregivers should be able to grow enough medical marijuana.

Patients need to be able to designate where their supply of medical marijuana is kept. The current statutes that require the patients supply of medicine remain at the garden site enables dishonest caregivers to easily divert a patient’s medicine. Some patients are mislead into believing they are only allowed one ounce of medicine a month while the dishonest caregiver keeps the lion share of what is produced. It is time we asked why are the designated primary caregiver’s, who have no medical need to own marijuana, required to keep the patient’s supply of medical marijuana?

It was the Oregon Medical Marijuana Program that requested that a patient’s doctors be informed if another doctor has previously diagnosed that a patient no longer needs marijuana, or that marijuana is contraindicated. Doctors should be able remove a patient from the program that they feel is not benefiting from medical marijuana.

I strongly agree with Craig Durbin and law enforcement that patients and caregivers that repeatedly violate the law and abuse OMMA should be removed from the program. I feel it should be the Oregon Medical Marijuana Program that decides what punishment will be reasonable depending on the offence. A cardholder getting caught smoking in public, or slightly over the allowed limit of plants should be treated differently than a cardholder who is caught selling marijuana.

Language for ORS 475.309

ADD (+) The Department of Human Services shall create an Oregon Medical Marijuana Act Registration Manual that clearly explains ORS 475.300 to 475.346 and rules adopted under ORS 475.300 to 475.346. (+) The manual could be modeled after the Oregon Drivers Manual.

(5) The department shall verify the information contained in an application submitted pursuant to this section and shall approve or deny an application within thirty days of receipt of the application. ADD (+) As part of the verification process, the department shall inform the applicant's attending physician if there has been a previous diagnosis by another attending physician that the applicant is no longer affected by a debilitating medical condition or that continued medical use of marijuana is contraindicated. +)

(a) The department may deny an application only for the following reasons:

(i) The applicant did not provide the information required pursuant to this section to establish his or her debilitating medical condition and to document his or her consultation with an attending physician regarding the medical use of marijuana in connection with such condition, as provided in subsections (2) and (3) of this section; or

(ii) The department determines that the information provided was falsified.

I strongly oppose adding another category of growers to the program. Patient’s that cannot grow for themselves, can assign a designated primary caregiver. I do not understand the need to add a third grower category. I believe adding this category would further remove patient from their garden and the ownership of their medicine.

I also oppose setting a limit of two patients at a location for a year round grow site and a limit of four patients on an annual grow site. These limits would exacerbate the problem patients have finding qualified designated primary caregivers. Giving the Oregon Medical Marijuana Program the authority to inspect large gardens would make more sense. What other pharmaceutical production facilities are not inspected and regulated?

I strongly support establishing regulatory authority within OMMP to create a caregiver certification program.

The Department of Human Services should be given the authority to inspect multiple patient gardens that have more than three patients registered at one location." The Department should be given the authority to arbitrate disputes between registry identification cardholders and their designated primary caregivers. Multiple patient caregivers that refuse an inspection or fail to correct problems could be removed from the program.

Caregivers that are growing for more than three patients should be required to demonstrate an understanding of our law. Caregivers who complete the certification program could be placed on a state referral list.

One of the most significant problems OMMA patients experience are bad caregivers that take possession of the medical marijuana gardens. Many patients do not understand their rights. Some patients are not even allowed to see their garden. They are told they can have a designated amount of medical marijuana a month, usually less than an ounce. The bad caregivers divert the rest of the medicine away from the program endangering the patient’s medicine supply and the garden.

Patients currently have nowhere to turn for help. Patients are told when they call the police that it is a "civil matter" and there is nothing they can do. Patients rarely get their medicine and plants back when they fire a dishonest caregiver.

The testimony from the hearing suggested most patients will need 48 ounces of medical marijuana a year, or four ounces a month. Patients can be taught how to grow plants that will yield at least three ounces of bud and several ounces of leaf

To allow for plants that die and other garden problems, a plant number of (21) plants, with a limit of three (3) ounces of medical marijuana per plant, would make the amount of marijuana allowed from an annual grow equal to the amount of marijuana that can be kept from a year round grow.

It takes at least four months to grow and harvest a medical marijuana plant. Patients that choose to grow year round would be able to harvest seven medical marijuana plants three times a year. Patients should be able to be taught how to grow medical marijuana plants that will produce three ounces of medical marijuana.

Allowing the patient to keep more of what is being grown will reduce the risk of marijuana being diverted from our program. If the patient is not allowed to keep the medicine, the medicine is going somewhere else.

For both Annual and year round grow sites, I believe it is vital that the harvested medical marijuana be under the control of the patient. The Patient should decide where their bank of medicine will be kept.

If the amount of medical marijuana a patient can keep is raised to a level that will allow patients to make it from one harvest to the next, the affirmative defense would no longer be necessary

Removing the "Affirmative Defense" clause from ORS 475.306 will establish set limits on the number of plants a patient can have and a set amount of marijuana that can be possessed.

(1) The Department of Human Services shall create and maintain a list of the persons to whom the department has issued registry identification cards pursuant to ORS 475.309 and the names of any designated primary caregivers. Except as provided in subsection (2) of this section, the list shall be confidential and not subject to public disclosure.

(2) Names and other identifying information from the list established pursuant to subsection (1) of this section may be released to:

(a) Authorized employees of the department as necessary to perform official duties of the department; and

(b) Authorized employees of state or local law enforcement agencies, only as necessary to verify that a person is a lawful possessor of a registry identification card or that a person is the designated primary caregiver of such a person. [1999 c.4 §12]

I hope the information I have provided is helpful. If there is anything else I can do, Please call me.

Jerry Wade

Secretary

Stormy Ray Cardholders’ Foundatio

www.stormyray.org 503-587-7434