Medical Marijuana Rough Story

Washington’s medical marijuana patients could see a significant alteration in the way they access their medicine, depending on the fate of a pair of bills working their way through the state legislature this year.

Recreational users might also see a big change – the new ability to grow for themselves – should one of the bills get signed into law.

Washington’s marijuana market, legalized by initiative for recreational use in 2012 and first operational on a bureaucratic level in 2014, has faced challenges involving the preexisting medical system, confederate local governments and continued competition from the state’s black and grey markets.

The two bills, one sponsored by Sen. Jeanne Kohl-Welles, D-Seattle, and the other by Sen. Ann Rivers, R-Clark County, seek to address all or some of these issues.  However, the approach each one takes differs significantly.

The state permitted the use of medical marijuana in 1998 through an initiative. However, the system remains largely unregulated and, when paired with the heavily-regulated state recreational operation, has birthed a “grey” market, where recreational users can easily acquire medical pot through unapproved means yet avoid prosecution through statewide legal protections.

One aspect – collective gardens – has specifically come under fire. The gardens allow up to ten medical users and/or their “designated providers” to pool resources and grow up to 45 plants and 72 ounces of useable marijuana. While none of the marijuana is supposed to go to anyone other than the patients, there is nothing in statute regulating them.

“I don’t think there’s any dispute that we have to do something about the unregulated, unlicensed, illicit in many cases, market out there for medical marijuana,” Kohl-Welles said in a public hearing on the bill. “And, unfortunately, in 2011 when the legislature stepped up to the plate and passed significant legislation to create a regulated, licensed producer, processor and retailer sales system for medical marijuana, there was a gubernatorial veto that left the collective gardens in it but took away all of the licensing system and we’ve been left with quite a mess.”

In a sense, both bills “merge” the two marketplaces and eliminate gardens.

Kohl-Welles’s bill, SB 5519, would require medical patients to get a health professional-approved waiver from the Department of Health to access medical pot. Medical marijuana would be approved for people with terminal or dilapidating medical conditions that are severe enough to interfere with the patient’s day-to-day ability to function.

Patients with waivers could purchase marijuana from recreational stores that have medical endorsements. Any purchase with a waiver would be exempt from sales and use taxes.

While gardens would be eliminated, patients would still be able to grow up to 15 plants for themselves or designate a provider to do it for them. The bill would also allow anyone over the age of 21, recreationally or medically, to grow up to six plants themselves. Selling any homegrown pot would be illegal, but growers would be allowed to share up to one ounce with another person.

Three other states – Oregon, Colorado and Alaska, and the District of Columbia – have legalized marijuana. All allow for home grows.

“There’s home growing all over everywhere,” Kohl-Welles said. “I mean we can’t kid ourselves to think that’s not happening. We allow it for patients with these authorizations which can be fraudulent… This would be much smaller, and it would be regulated.”

Kohl-Welles’s bill would also require any local government attempting to ban marijuana to put it up to a vote for the people in their district.​ Several city, town and county governments adopted local ordinances over the last year prohibiting marijuana businesses within their boundaries.

Rivers’s bill, SB 5052, would also require patients to get approval from a health professional, who would then enter the patient into a statewide medical marijuana database administered by the Department of Health.

“We are in a situation where patients have no idea what they are getting if they are purchasing it from a dispensary,” Rivers said in a public hearing on the bill. “We have two initiatives, and we have a responsibility to harmonize those while putting patient needs first.”

The bill reduces the number of plants a medical patient can grow from 15 to six. However, a health care professional can re-raise the allowed amount back up to 15 if they think it is necessary for the patient.

Medical patients would be allowed to carry three times the normal amount of marijuana, and they would purchase it from medically-approved stores without paying sales and use tax.

Rivers’s bill would allow patients or their designated providers to form up to four-person cooperative grows. The co-ops would have to be registered by the Liquor Control Board and would need to be at least 15 miles away from a marijuana retailer.

River’s bill passed in the Senate on February 13, by a vote of 36-11. It will have a public hearing in the House Health and Wellness Committee.

Kohl-Welles’s bill passed out of the Senate Commerce and Labor Committee on February 17 and was referred to Ways and Means.

Both senators attempted to pass sweeping medical marijuana legislation last year as well. After significant revisions were made to account for some of the concerns in the medical community, Rivers’s bill eventually passed in the Senate. However, it was gridlocked in the House after a partisan debate on recreational marijuana revenue sharing. No legislation was passed.