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from MPP.org MI: Draft medical marijuana rules need to be revised

On December 5, the Michigan Department of Community Health (MDCH) issued draft rules for Michigan's new medical marijuana law, Proposal 1. The draft rules go much further than the department's role under Proposal 1 and in several areas conflict with it. The MDCH has a comment period, and based on the comments will consider revising the rules. We need your help to make sure they do.

Please take the time to write and submit a comment urging the MDCH to bring the rules in line with the law. Be sure to be respectful and polite in your letters, which are due by 5:00 p.m. on January 9.

Proposal 1 tasked the MDCH with issuing state registry ID cards to qualifying patients, which will protect them from arrest. It gave the MDCH authority to issue rules about processing applications, adding additional qualifying conditions, and setting fees. But these draft rules go much further and seek to rewrite new and unreasonable requirements into the voter-enacted law. Here are some of the provisions of the draft rules that conflict with Proposal 1 and need to be revised:

    * The draft rules would require patients and caregivers to submit inventory reports on their marijuana cultivation each year. The law does not require any such records, and the department does not have the authority to require them. Inventory reports would be self-incriminating since they would document violations of federal law.
    * The draft rules indicate that all marijuana must be kept in an enclosed locked facility, when the law only requires that marijuana plants be stored in an enclosed, locked facility. There is no similar restriction for potentially deadly medications like prescription morphine, oxycontin, or methamphetamine.
    * The draft rules provide for monitoring, inspections, and reporting by the department that is not provided for in the act.
    * The draft rules seek to define a "public place" where marijuana cannot be used to include anywhere "visible to the public." This could include a front porch or the inside of a patient's house, if the patient is near the window.
    * Click here for a longer list of draft rules that need revision.

The MDCH will also be holding a public hearing on January 5 at 9:00 a.m. in Lansing. Please let me know at Karen@mpp.org if you are interested and able to attend. It is particularly important that qualifying patients, doctors, and attorneys speak out at the hearing. If you are able to attend, please remember to be respectful and polite and to dress appropriately for a government hearing.

Thank you for supporting the Marijuana Policy Project. Please pass this message on to other supporters of Proposal 1 so we can ensure that the law is implemented faithfully.

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Mr. Mitchell and other concerned parties,

I'm writing you today concerning the issue of Proposal 1, a bill recently passed and new law taken effect Dec. 4th. I'm very concerned that even though Michigan voter clearly want change, the draft rules conflict with the law passed and other laws and regulations for medicinal products of all types.

It is in everyone's interest that the law be faithfully implemented, and that patients are able to trust the department and obtain ID cards. We need to revise the rules so that they mirror Proposal 1.

Proposal 1 tasked the MDCH with issuing state registry ID cards to qualifying patients, which will protect them from arrest. It gave the MDCH authority to issue rules about processing applications, adding additional qualifying conditions, and setting fees. But these draft rules go much further and seek to rewrite new and unreasonable requirements into the voter-enacted law

Patients and caregivers cannot be required to submit inventory reports and be denied applications if they do not do so. Prop. 1 lists the only permissible reasons for denying an application; a failure to submit an inventory report is not one of them because the law does not require inventory reports. To submit an inventory report would be self incriminating against a federal law that while not changed yet, needs to be and will be eventually, because clearly voters want this as we are the 13th state to allow medical marijuana.


Caregivers also cannot be required to hand over marijuana to police if their patient has passed away and they do not have other patients. The law does not say that they are required to do so.

Inspections are not allowed according to Section 6(g) of Proposal 1, yet the draft rules reference inspections of enclosed, locked locations.

I am disappointed by how far the draft rules depart from Proposal 1. From the requirement that a minor's two physicians practice independently of one another to grow site registration to the purported disqualification of patients and caregivers for any drug conviction, they starkly contrast with the law that 63% of Michigan voters approved.

There is no restriction for potentially deadly medications like prescription morphine, oxycontin, or methamphetamine saying that it must be contained in a locked facility. Yet the draft rules indicate that all marijuana must be kept in one, when the law only requires that marijuana plants be stored in an enclosed, locked facility.

The draft rules seek to define a "public place" where marijuana cannot be used to include anywhere "visible to the public." This could include a front porch or the inside of a patient's house, if the patient is near the window.this means a patient cannot take their medicine inside of their house just because a curtain is open. Yet I, not a patient, can smoke a tobacco cigarette which kills about half a million americans every year (that's half a million more than medical marijuana or even the cannabis plant in general) and exhale the deadly carcinogenic smoke in the presence of a child in a public place without fearing arrest.

The task of writing rules to regulate the issuing of medical marijuana user ID cards, fees, caregiver cards, etc. has been forgotten, the MDCH has overstepped it's bounds. Instead of doing what the newly passed medical marihuana act, you seek to rewrite our law passed by us, THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN. We live in a democracy, where the people are supposed to vote on leaders and laws. It's not the MDCH's power to change the law except through the proper methods such as writing an amendment to a law and hoping it passes.

It is unfortunate that even after years of proof showing the medicinal benefits of marijuana the MDCH still fails to recognize marijuana's medicinal value. The people of the state that employs you, they're a different breed, they recognize the benefits and on november 4, 2008 passed proposal 1 by a 2/3's majority. Now please, we plead with you to make the rules just and not overstep your bounds when the draft undergoes a rveision.

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