Sammamish City Council maintains city ban on medical marijuana gardens
September 14, 2011
By Caleb Heeringa
The Sammamish City Council elected to maintain an emergency moratorium on collective medical marijuana gardens in city limits.
The council had unanimously approved the emergency moratorium at their July 18 meeting and was required to hold a public hearing on the matter Sept. 9. No one testified.
The moratorium follows Gov. Chris Gregoire’s vetoing portions of a medical marijuana bill allowing as many as 10 patients to form a collective garden of as many 45 plants.
Gregoire said she feared that state and local employees could be held liable under federal drug laws.
The council elected to reaffirm the moratorium under the hope that legislators in Olympia or Washington, D.C. would sort out the conflicting law in the coming months.
“I’m in favor of the moratorium because I think we’re in an untenable position,” Councilwoman Nancy Whitten said.
The moratorium means that a medical marijuana patient in Sammamish would have to travel to another city – likely Seattle – to obtain the marijuana they are entitled to under Initiative 692, which passed in 1998.
Issaquah, Redmond and several other suburban cities have instituted similar moratoriums, though King County has taken a more hands-off approach while the matter is sorted out.
The county has no plans to shut down The Kind Alternative Medical Collective, a nonprofit collective in Preston.
Politicians aren’t the only confused ones.
“The law is so convoluted right now,” Sammamish Police Administrative Sgt. Jessica Sullivan said. “It’s so confusing from our perspective that it’s almost unenforceable.”
While Sullivan said she was not aware of anyone trying to form a collective in Sammamish, she echoed a concern voiced by Councilman Mark Cross at the council meeting – that a collective garden could become a law enforcement issue if it became a target for thieves.
“Because there’s still such a big black market for (marijuana) … people are going to go about obtaining it however they can,” she said.
Comments
2 Responses to “Sammamish City Council maintains city ban on medical marijuana gardens”
Got something to say?
Before you comment, please note:
- These comments are moderated.
- Comments should be relevant to the topic at hand and contribute to its discussion.
- Personal attacks and/or excessive profanity will not be tolerated and such comments will not be approved.
- This is not your personal chat room or forum, so please stay on topic.
[...] See a rest here: Sammamish City Council maintains city anathema upon healing pot … [...]
[...] Sammamish keeps garden ban: The Sammamish, Washington City Council voted to maintain its emergency ban on medical marijuana gardens on September 9th, in a hearing at which no one spoke up for or against the ban. The council cited concerns over the conflict between state and federal law, as well as the fear that gardens would become the targets of burglars and present other law enforcement problems. [...]