Up in smoke
Senate Bill 423 affects caregivers, patients
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On Nov. 2, 2004, 64 percent of Montana voters passed Initiative 148, the Montana Medical Marijuana Act, which created a statewide business that seemed to boom over the years. Last month that momentum was quelled by senate bill 423, which became law on May 14. The bill amended the state’s previous medical marijuana law.
According to medical marijuana providers in the area the new law, which goes into effect July 1, is forcing them to close their doors. The new law bans providers from charging patients and limits the number of patients to just three. It also puts more qualification limitations on patients. Caregivers must register and are subject to background checks and fingerprinting. Cardholders and providers may only possess four mature marijuana plants. The current law allows six plants.
“I’m disappointed in the whole legislature,” Joey Hettick, co-owner of Momma’s Medicine in Dixon, said. “I’m so angry. It’s all about money. It’s hard for me to watch television because I have to watch all those prescription drug commercials. There are a lot more overdoses on prescription drugs than marijuana.”
Hettick says the new law has been detrimental to her family and business. She has had to let four full-time employees go.
For Hettick, the issue has always been about choice. Also a medical marijuana patient, Hettick said she had never used marijuana until she became a caregiver. She became interested in the plant when she saw the positive effects it had on a friend who had cancer. She said she was even afraid of the stigma of selling and using marijuana when she first ventured into the industry.
“If we are going to do this, we have to stand up and be proud,” Hettick said she told her family. That was a year and a half ago, and now Hettick is worried about the financial and medical effects rather than the social ones.
She’s particularly concerned for her patients.
"I really spend time with my patients," Hettick said. "Now the old and the elderly will have to go find a drug dealer to get their medicine."
Hettick said that she often suggests that her patients use edibles, lotions, oils and or a vaporizer to eliminate health affects associated with smoking.
“To me it’s an alternative medicine,” Hettick said. “Prohibition does not work. We need to tax it and control it and figure out a better way because 423 is not the answer.”
“This is way beyond cannabis. They took away my job and thousands of others away also,” Sandi Lane of Plains said. Lane and her husband Ron were caregivers for four years.
According to Lane, in her rural community, work is hard to find and unemployment is high. Before they started their caregiver and delivery business, Ron Lane was a plumber who lost his job when the economy and the housing market crashed a few years ago. They invested everything into their caregiver business.
“Now we are back to worrying how we will pay our bills,” Lane said. “We lived simply. We earned a fair living for a fair service.”
The Lanes are closing down their business come the July 1 deadline. They do not like the idea of the government coming into their homes at any time or being fingerprinted. Sandi said she is also worried about her elderly patients. She said even though patients are allowed to grow their own plants under the new law, Sandi explained the growing process is time-consuming and costly. In addition, depending on where patients live, they might not be allowed to grow in their homes.
“I used to donate to my sickest and poorest patients,” Sandi said. “But I can’t do 100 percent donation.”
"Caregiving is caregiving," Republican Senator Carmine Mowbray of Polson said. Mowbray believes senate bill 423 honors the spirit of Initiative 148 by allowing caregivers to provide medical marijuana to patients but not sell it.
"When we talk about caregivers, that means free. This bill is true to the word caregiver," Mowbray said.
She believes that senate bill 423 is the best solution to what she called "widespread abuse."
The bill would slash the estimated 28,000 cardholders in Montana to just 2,000.
"There is no way we can pretend marijuana is not illegal," Mowbray said.
She agreed that senate bill 423 is not perfect but argued that prior to 2004 medical marijuana was not even an option for residents.
"How they (patients) obtain it (medical marijuana) presents a new challenge," Mowbray said. "I am sympathetic. I just ask them to be patient."
The Montana Cannabis Industry Association and others filed a lawsuit to block the implementation of the new law.
“The legislature is clearly out of touch with the voters,” Jim Gingery, executive director of the Montana Medical Grower’s Association, said. “Even if providers were able to give it away they wouldn’t be able to advertise where they are so patients could find them,” Gingery added to explain the new rules and regulations of senate bill 423.
“They (legislature) have destroyed the most innovative and successful business in history,” Gingery said.
Early this week Lewis and Clark County District Judge James Reynolds is expected to hear this challenge against the state’s new medical marijuana law. If Reynolds allows the injunction it will be up to the voters in 2012 to decide the fate of medical marijuana in Montana.
