Lawmaker wants to ban dry pot from medical stores
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OLYMPIA, Wash. --
Regulating the state's medical marijuana system could put Patrick Seifert's collective garden out of business.
"Give me regulations, give me a fee," said Seifert, who owns Olympia's "Rainier Xpress." "Just let me stay open!"
Seifert is concerned about a bill sponsored by Senator Ann Rivers, R-Clark County.
Rivers calls her bill the "Cannabis Patient Protection Act."
It
would require medical store owners to get licensed with the state's
Department of Health and all products would have to be tested.
"We need to make sure our patients are getting what they were promised," said Rivers.
Rivers
said she is also concerned about marijuana users trying to dodge taxes
associated with recreational pot sales at stores licensed under
Initiative 502.
That's one reason she wants to limit the products available at medical stores to edibles and liquids.
Her bill would bar medical locations from offering dry pot, the substance commonly smoked by patients and recreational users.
"Do
you smoke an aspirin? Do you smoke the hydrocodone that you get from
your physician for your pain?" asks Rivers. "Let's treat it like
medicine."
She said patients who want dry products should still be able to buy them, without paying sales taxes, at recreational locations.
Seifert estimates 80 percent of his patients buy dry pot, in some cases in addition to edibles or concentrated oils.
He
said eliminating dry products would likely close his collective garden
and he fears his patients would not be able to find effective strains of
medical marijuana at recreational locations.
Seifert said strains
of medical marijuana that cater to pain sufferers may not be available
at state licensed recreational stores.
"It's not going to be a priority of a 502 shop owner," said Seifert.
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