HOW WILL SAN FRANCISCO GROW ITS OWN?

Last November San Francisco voters, by an almost two-to-one margin, answered
"Yes" to the question asked in Proposition S: "Should the city explore the
possibility of growing and dispensing medical cannabis?"

Prop S represents a unique opportunity for the medical-marijuana movement to
define its goals and regain the initiative after seven years of being on the
political defensive. "Activists" from here to New York and Washington have
been hatching plans to implement the measure. (Yes, Virginia, there are
outside agitators, and they sometimes turn out to be liberals funded by
billionaires to usurp and constrain potentially radical movements.) The
good news is: no matter how many meetings they hold to craft their hidden
agenda, they probably cant control the decision-making process in San
Francisco. The Board of Supervisors, for all its faults, is more democratic
than your typical "movement" bureaucracy with its hidden leaders and
dangerously addictive funding sources.

Four Prop-S strategy sessions have been held to date by a group that
includes Judy Appel and Marsha Rosenbaum of the Drug Policy Alliance; Dale
Gieringer of NORML; Steph Sherer of Americans for Safe Access; and live, by
speaker phone from inside the Beltway, Bruce Mirken of the Marijuana Policy
Project. Mirken once told me that the MPP goal was "to make medical
marijuana 'respectable.' " Two weeks ago he was sent a copy of Tod
Mikuriya
article on Cannabis as a Substitute For Alcohol with a request that MPP help
publicize it. He replied that Mikuriya "is regarded even in some medical
marijuana circles as a somewhat dicey figure." Doctor Tod Mikuriya, 67, is
a gentleman and a scholar, one of the most dignified and above-board people
youll ever meet. Journalist Bruce Mirken, 40-something, left the West
Coast
a year ago while denying some creepy allegations. No need to repeat them;
Mirken says they were false and let hope he was telling the truth.
But...
Sometimes when you scratch a super-respectable, you find a real kinkster.

Harvey Feldman got to attend one of the DPA-MPP Prop-S meetings. Harvey, 73,
is a broken-down jock from Pittsburgh (point guard on his high school
basketball team), who has a PhD in social work from Brandeis and spent many
years in New York steering ******-using gang members into treatment. After
Prop 215 passed he organized support networks for Tenderloin residents who
were trying to substitute cannabis for hard drugs. Harvey and Leslie Thomas
Flachman (who helped manage Dennis Peron San Francisco CBC and then a
club
in the Mission called Flower Therapy, closed by its landlord after the
federal injunction in January 98) and Jason Browne (a grower who lives in
Red Bluff) have been the prime movers in a patients' union that has signed
up about 100 members in recent months.

Harvey Feldman: The DPA meeting was scheduled to precede a meeting to be
held that afternoon of the task force led by Wayne Justmann at San Francisco
City Hall. The DPA group wanted to get their ducks in a row, in advance.

CN: What are they pushing for? What their plan?

HF: They want to have a united political position that can be moved through.

CN: What do they envision? How do they see it working?

HF: They don't.

CN: You mean they dont have a plan?

HF: No, that's to be developed. They say there's no rush on this thing,
there's no time-line. It doesn't matter how long the process is, it's more
important that there be a process.

CN: Harvey, you're starting to talk like one of them. Maybe for them there's
no urgency, they're all making a living off this so-called movement. But
there's urgency for everybody who's paying $55 dollars an eighth. You just
got through saying that your membership is adamant about bringing the price
down and getting some assurance that the herb they're buying isn't moldy and
laced with pesticides.

HF: Yes, that's right... I couldn't understand why it was so important that
we come up with a unanimous view. I wondered: does somebody have something
up their sleeve? The union's been thinking a lot about Prop S, obviously. I
went down to Santa Cruz a few weeks ago to look at the WAMM model. That
might be a good one to adapt to San Francisco.

CN: What if the union comes up with a Prop S plan that the movement
bureaucrats don't like? Are you supposed to not push for it? Why should
there be just one plan? Why not push for every feasible approach? A
city-sponsored grow, outdoors, on city property. A grow on city property
near Hetch-Hetchy. In secured community gardens. Backyards, Downtown
rooftops. At the jail in San Bruno. Involve SLUG (the SF League of Urban
Gardeners). Contract with cultivators in Mendocino and Humboldt! The whole
point of Prop S was to defend our law against the federal crackdown, so the
more cultivation and distribution sites the better. "Let a thousand flowers
bloom!" And cultivation is only part of the equation. The Health
Department should make a lab available to test processed cannabis for mold
and pesticide, and to analyze the cannabinoid content. Then we can begin to
figure out which components of the plant are effective in treating which
conditions, and develop strains with the desirable qualities. It's all
do-able under Prop S!

HP: Will you join the union and work with us?

CN: I thought you'd never ask.


Wayne Whirl

We got an account of the March 6 meeting at City Hall from Wayne Justmann.
Wayne, as described here after Prop S passed, is a big amiable man in his
50s who comes from Dubque, Iowa. Got a teaching job in Cicero, Illinois,
where one of his student's parents was a high-ranking mobster. Left
teaching to become the mobster's bodyguard. Moved to L.A. in '87, got heavy
into coke and alcohol, contracted HIV. By the early 90s Wayne was
homeless in San Francisco. Dennis Peron cannabis club was his
salvation.
He became the greeter/bouncer. When Dennis was forced to close in early '98,
Wayne was among the many staffers at loose ends. Eventually he and three
others found a location on Divisadero and opened their own club. Wayne soon
organized a loose 'consortium' of club proprietors that met monthly at the
Diviz location. In 2000 he arranged for club proprietors and city officials
to meet regularly to discuss Prop-215-implementation problems. After the DEA
raided the 6th St. club in Feb. 2002, the group devised the response
embodied in Prop S: the City and County of San Francisco should stand up to
the feds (instead of easily-picked-off individuals).

Wayne visibly enjoys electoral politics, the meetings and glad-handing and
staying on the good side of whoever you might need down the road. He has
lunched with Bill Fazio, the DA wannabe. Last week Wayne testified in a San
Francisco medical marijuana case, having been hired as an expert witness by
Fazio (who also represents SFPD Capt. Greg Corrales, an accused conspirator
in the Fajitagate case. Fazio calls Corrales "a hero among heroes." Dennis
Peron calls him "a thuggy narc who conspired with Dan Lungren to close my
club." Small world, SF.)

CN: Tell us about the March 6 meeting of the Prop S task force.

Wayne Justmann: We had representatives from the Health Department, Josh
Bamberger; the DA's office, Liz Aguilar-Tarchy; the City Attorney, Rich
Schoenfeld. The SFPD, Tim Hendricks and Martin Halloran. Bevin Dufty stepped
in and out (the Supervisor elected to the Castro-district seat vacated by
Mark Leno when he made his successful run for State Assembly). And
representing Mark Leno was Ana Damiani, from his San Francisco office. It's
going to be very useful to have that door open in Sacramento. Kevin Shelley
and Carol Migden were for us, but Mark is going to be actively for us! There
were also representatives from movement organizations: Judy Appel from Drug
Policy Alliance, Dale Gieringer from NORML, Mike Foley and Robyn Few from
ASA.

CN: So what got decided?

Wayne: Well, it was more of an information-sharing venue. Everybody stated
their support for making it work.

CN: That good. What happens next?

Wayne: Before Mark left he sent a resolution to the Rules and Audit
committee asking for the formation of a three-member select committee. Now
It's in [Board President] Matt Gonzales purview to choose the three
members. And they will make the concrete recommendations that the Board will
adopt or modify.

CN: Prop S seems totally open-ended, explore the possibility of the city
growing and dispensing. It doesnt even specify that the Health Department
be in charge.

Wayne: The only other wording that might be relevant, legally, is from the
measure that Mark, Matt, Tom and Sophie (Supervisors Leno, Gonzales, Ammiano
and Maxwell) introduced to get it on the ballot: "In light of the recent
Drug Enforcement Agency crackdown on local medical cannabis clubs, shall the
Board of Supervisors, in conjunction with the Mayor's Office, City
Attorney, District Attorney, and Department of Public Health, explore the
possibility of establishing a program whereby the city would grow medical
cannabis and distribute it to patients attempting to exercise their rights
under Proposition 215, California Compassionate Use Act of 1996."

We also talked about the possible need for standards, guidelines, practices
and procedures for the formation and operation of distribution sites. As of
now, in San Francisco, if someone wants to distribute medical cannabis, all
they have to do is find a property that is conducive, and by that I mean,
the landlord says it's fine, and then they just open up. There's no
hearings, no licensing. We need to tweak that system somewhat.

CN: Regulation could be a double-edged sword.

Wayne: Another topic of discussion was, the Drug Policy Alliance is going to
organize a community forum here in early May.

CN: I always said that not everything they did was bad.

Wayne: We also talked about the possibility of the city deputizing growers
and/or dispensers. And that was about it. We only had an hour's time-frame.

Not In My Name

Mikki Norris is a high-profile activist in the medical marijuana movement,
the co-author of "Shattered Lives: Portraits from America's Drug War."
Norris wrote a heartfelt op-ed piece in the March 5 Chronicle decrying the
US government's recent bust of bong-makers, Obviously there are many
reasons to decry this whacko crackdown. Unfortunately, the one Norris
emphasized was: it diverts resources from the War on Terror This is her
lead:

"As we prepare to go to war with Iraq and continue fighting terrorism at
home, it is appalling that the federal Drug Enforcement Administration has
chosen to step up the attacks on businesspeople by going after pipe- and
bong-makers and sellers. Where are the government priorities?"

Then she restates the theme: "Our country is on heightened terror alert
status as we head toward a foreign war that could bring even more serious
repercussions to our shores. How appropriate is it to use law enforcement
officers to seek out these artists, craftspeople and business
entrepreneurs?"

And again in her tag "Get Walters and Brown (The drug czar and acting DEA
administrator) real jobs fighting terror."

Mikki Norris is a decent person and I know that she doesnt want to see
any
Iraqi lives shattered. Nor does she truly think the so-called war on terror
is real and/or righteous. Her op-ed was a form of pandering to a mythical
respectable mainstream, a form of opportunism in which she's not alone. I
can still hear Steph and Dale chanting, "Bust Osama, not marijuana!"


"Sometimes, I get so low-down and disgusted. Cant help but wondering
what's happening to my companions?" Bob Dylan


Pubdate: Wed, 12 Mar 2003
Source: Anderson Valley Advertiser (CA)
Copyright: 2003 Anderson Valley Advertiser
Contact: ava@pacific.net
Author: Fred Gardner