Marijuana Blog

Medical marijuana shops in Oregon are opening their doors with state approval for the first time this week, but at least one may not be in business very long.

 

The Releaf Center, a dispensary located just outside Hermiston city limits, opened its doors Tuesday for the first time since Feb. 28. Owner Jim Ruhe said he shut the store down when the state's dispensary law went into effect March 1, and waited for the state to approve his facility registration. The shop, and many like it around the state, had previously existed in a sort of legal gray area, neither explicitly authorized nor banned under state law.

 

Releaf's state certificate came in the mail Monday afternoon, he said, and now hangs on the shop's wall.

 

But the store could be shuttered again soon, this time for more than a year, if the Umatilla County Commission enacts a moratorium on dispensaries when it meets next week.

 

"How do I look my patients in the eye and say, 'There's nothing I can do for you,'" Ruhe said. "It's a terrible feeling."

 

George Murdock, vice chairman of the Umatilla County board of commissioners, said the commission will consider the issue at its April 2 meeting, but "whatever way we go, it's going to be painful."

 

Murdock said it's the commissioners' job to uphold the law, but a conflict between the federal prohibition on marijuana and the state's law allowing registered facilities to sell the drug creates a "huge conundrum" for them. He said he didn't think the issue should be decided at the county level, but state law leaves it up to them.

 

Read more: http://www.oregonlive.com

Hawaii’s House Committee on Agriculture, and the state’s House Judiciary Committee, have both voted unanimously in favor of Senate Bill 2175, a proposal to establish a two-year research program to study the effectiveness of using hemp for remediation and biofuel. The measure has already passed the Senate unanimously.

 

If approved into law, Senate Bill 2175 would “authorize the dean of the college of tropical agriculture and human resources at the University of Hawaii to establish a two-year industrial hemp remediation and biofuel research program.” The dean would be permitted to “submit a final report to the legislature prior to the convening of the regular session of 2016.”

 

Remediation (also referred to as phytoremediation) is the environmentally-friendly science of using plants to remove toxins (such as metals, pesticides and crude oils) from the soil.

 

The proposal now heads to the full House, which is expected to give it approval soon. It will then go to the governor.

 

Source: http://www.theweedblog.com

Parents of Utah children with severe epilepsy are cheering a new state law that allows them to obtain a marijuana extract they say helps with seizures, but getting it involves navigating a thorny set of state and federal laws.

 

Utah's Republican Gov. Gary Herbert has already approved the law and held a signing ceremony for about 50 parents and children at the state Capitol on Tuesday afternoon.

 

The new law doesn't allow medical marijuana production in Utah but allows families meeting certain restrictions to obtain the extract from other states.

 

Similar legislation is pending in at least one other state, and Utah advocates hope more will follow.

 

The marijuana extract, which some believe helps with a severe form of epilepsy, is produced in nearby Colorado and is designed not to produce a high.

 

But Colorado experts say restrictions passed in that state to appease the federal government make it a murky process for Utah families to actually get marijuana-derived products, particularly as all state medical marijuana laws are illegal under federal law.

 

Utah Rep. Gage Froerer, a Republican from Huntsville who sponsored the new state law, said families are willing to take that risk to treat their children with the oil.

 

"They know very well that this may not protect them from the DEA if the federal prosecutors stepped in," Froerer told his colleagues earlier this month.

 

To gain support in conservative Utah, the push for the legislation focused on helping children suffering from a severe form of epilepsy and the law itself is tempered with restrictions.

 

The law takes effect on July 1 and expires in 2016. It's restricted to those with severe epilepsy for whom the regular treatments are not effective, and requires a neurologist's consent to obtain and use the extract.

 

The extract comes from a strain of marijuana called Charlotte's Web, named after the first child treated with it. The plant is low in THC, the hallucinogenic chemical in marijuana, and high in CBD, a chemical that may fight seizures.

 

Doctors and others have warned that there's no proof yet that the extract is effective at treating epilepsy or even safe, but for parents like Jennifer May of Pleasant Grove, the hope that he oil will give their kids a better quality of life is worth pursuing.

 

"It helps more than our kids. It will hopefully help other states," said May, whose 12-year-old son can suffer hundreds of seizures a day. "It will hopefully push things a little more on a federal level if they see that even the most conservative states want something done."