Health Care Issues

Mayor Ed Lee Finally Breaks Silence on Medical Marijuana

"If you get Ed Lee on record about medical marijuana," more than one well-connected San Francisco politico has told us, "you deserve a medal."Our best efforts were all deflected, including a situation when we physically blocked Mayor Lee's path to his hybrid Mayoralmobile and still did not win a com ... More >>

Medical Marijuana Dispensaries Stay Open Despite Federal Deadline

On the day the federal government wished HopeNet to close, the operators of San Francisco's oldest licensed and taxpaying medical marijuana dispensary prepared accordingly: They grilled hot dogs."We made about 220," said Catherine Smith, whose Ninth Street medical cannabis dispensary is one of the n ... More >>

Oaksterdam University Pledges to Re-open After Federal Raid on Marijuana Leader

What many saw as the inevitable hit Oaksterdam founder Richard Lee on Monday, when federal agents came knocking at the home and businesses of the man who has become the marijuana movement's de-facto figurehead.After Lee revived a moribund part of downtown Oakland with a school dedicated to the pot t ... More >>

Medical Marijuana Ban in Daly City Means More Business for S.F. Pot Clubs

​It's not often that a police department will recommend -- by name -- a medical marijuana delivery service.Yet the Daly City Police Department did just that this week, endorsing the Purple Dinosaur delivery service as a preferable alternative to permitted medical marijuana dispensaries in our neig ... More >>

Pot Grows on File: Bill to Force Medical Marijuana Users to Register with the State

​Whatever scent you may detect on street corners on a sunny day in the Mission, know this: Marijuana users aren't exactly out of the closet. The city's medical marijuana activist groups continue to struggle to organize and turn out supporters, who have proven less than eager to go public.Folks who ... More >>

UPDATED: Medical Marijuana Clubs No Longer Asked to Get Rid of Hash, Kief

(UPDATE 4:00 p.m.): The Department of Public Health has rescinded an earlier memo in which it suggested San Francisco's medical cannabis dispensaries not provide products made from concentrated cannabis, including hash and edibles, according to Stephanie Tucker, spokeswoman for the city's Medical Ca ... More >>

Medical Marijuana Crackdown Explained: Feds Are Saving the Children

​Melinda Haag finally gave us a reason. The United States Attorney for Northern California broke her media near-silence last week week, granting an extensive, exclusive interview to KQED in which Haag sought to explain the Justice Department's crackdown on medical marijuana.The reasons why Haag's ... More >>

Medical Marijuana Cancer Patient Booted from UCSF

​Angel Raich is busy dying. The famous marijuana activist -- who took the federal government to the Supreme Court of the United States for the right to use medical cannabis -- was, earlier this year diagnosed with an inoperable terminal brain tumor, a condition that causes frequent seizures as wel ... More >>

Wait Until 2014: Marijuana Legalization All But Dead in California

​Union Pulls Plug on Medical Reform, Other Ballot Measures Starved For Cash; Legislature, Ammiano Last Hope for Reform NowNobody likes to celebrate with a loss, but for the medical marijuana movement, 2010 and the historic defeat of semi-legalization measure Proposition 19 already look like the go ... More >>

San Francisco Might Have More Medical Marijuana Users Than Black People

​The medical marijuana movement and hyperbole often go hand-in-hand. It wasn't more than a few years ago that the office of George W. Bush's drug czar spread the rumor that there were more pot clubs in San Francisco than Starbucks coffee shops, a drum they banged loudly and proudly (and one that, ... More >>

Feds Dismiss Medical Marijuana Lawsuits Without Hearings "Because They Know They're Wrong"

​Medical Marijuana Fight May End Up At Supreme Court ... By The Time We Are All Really Old.San Francisco attorney Matthew Kumin was defeated this week, when his lawsuit that challenged the feds' recent crackdown on state-legal medical marijuana dispensaries was dismissed by a federal judge in Sacr ... More >>

Ammiano Bill to Allow Marijuana Businesses and Sales That Are Already Legal

Mr Fix-It​Call it an industry, call it a movement, call it a gigantic scam. Law enforcement and politicians can't agree what to call California's medical marijuana scene, except to say it exists in a legal gray area.And how. A dispensary operator in Vallejo was arrested last week -- twice -- becau ... More >>

Medical Marijuana Week: Protest President Obama, Mail Nancy Pelosi a Heart.

Pot smokers getting no love from Obama this Valentine's Day ​The week doesn't often begin on Friday. But then again, it's not often Medical Marijuana Week -- is it?Indeed not. And that Medical Marijuana Week coincides with Valentine's Day is no mistake: It was the Compassionate Use Act that got us ... More >>

Tea Party Warrior: Report Medical Marijuana Clubs to the IRS and Get Rich

​For Paul Chabot, the War on Drugs is personal indeed: Before he became a Navy man, a campus cop, and a former National Drug Control Policy staffer, he was in drug rehab for alcohol and marijuana addiction himself -- at the young age of 12, according to his online bio.In his latest tactical maneuv ... More >>

BREAKING: San Francisco Suspends Medical Marijuana Licensing Program Indefinitely

​San Francisco city officials indefinitely suspended the city's medical marijuana dispensary permitting program on Wednesday, according to the Department of Public Health.Pending permits had been on hold since December, after a ruling in a state appeals court case halted similar permitting program ... More >>

S.F. Begins Issuing Medical Marijuana Dispensary Permits Again

It's a go -- for now.​San Francisco has begun issuing medical marijuana dispensary licenses again, following a recent state Supreme court decision that will allow local pot dispensaries to do business -- for now. The city's Medical Cannabis Act permitting process had been on hold for several month ... More >>

Feds Force Another San Francisco Pot Club to Close

Times they did a-change.​Pressure from the Justice Department is forcing a fourth San Francisco pot club to close early next year, with a fifth closure expected soon thereafter.Market Street Cooperative -- one of the city's lowest-profile cannabis dispensaries, with a modest sign outside its 1884 ... More >>

Medical Marijuana Patients Opposing Federal Approval of ... Medical Marijuana

umpp.orgStanding Up Against... Medical Marijuana​Medical marijuana can be good for the brain. No less an authority than the federal government's Department of Health and Human Services says so: HHS awarded to a group of doctors in 2003 a patent titled "Cannabinoids as antioxidants and neuroprotect ... More >>

Is Medical Marijuana a Low Priority for Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, Gov. Jerry Brown?

Blindsided as he was during a "bloodbath" of a House Judicial Committee hearing, in which U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder was hung out to dry over the teeny-tiny issue of injecting American-made weaponry into the Mexican cartel wars, you could forgive the Justice Department head for mincing his wo ... More >>

Weed Wars: Watch a 5-Year Old Smoke Medical Marijuana Tonight

If it makes parents tolerable ... ​A few common schools of thought persist in the medical marijuana debate -- on one end, doubters point to young men at dispensaries and say that the drug is widely abused by people who are "not that sick." On the other hand, believers say that you don't need to be ... More >>

Pot Club Crackdown Continues, Judge Rejects Demands to Stop Feds

​A judge has ruled that she would not interfere with the feds' efforts to shut down medical marijuana dispensaries across California. Oakland U.S. District Court Judge Saundra Armstrong ruled on Monday that pot clubs failed to show that  the federal government was violating their rights by cr ... More >>

Medical Marijuana: Feds Move to Forfeit Marin Pot Club's Property

​The choice offered by the Justice Department was clear: Select California medical cannabis dispensaries needed to close up shop or have their properties seized and operators thrown in prison.This was the ultimatum issued in September by United States Attorney for Northern California Melinda Haag ... More >>

Marin Alliance For Medical Marijuana Dodges Federal Threat -- for Now

Praise Legalists​Second SF Dispensary Closes Under Federal PressureAn eviction notice was never so welcome.Last Wednesday, California's oldest storefront medical marijuana collective, Fairfax-based Marin Alliance for Medical Marijuana, received an eviction notice from its landlord -- which means t ... More >>

S.F. Pot Clubs Threatened by Government Crackdown Won't Sue

On defense​It was only a matter of time before the state's medical marijuana collectives went to the courts -- and the time was nigh Monday for Lynette Shaw of the Marin Alliance for Medical Marijuana to announce at a downtown San Francisco law firm that she's suing the feds. Her deadline to close ... More >>

Gavin Newsom, SF Supes Blast Feds' War on Medical Marijuana

Drug warrior in words only?​Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom shared a Los Angeles stage on Thursday with GOP presidential candidate Gary Johnson, the former governor of New Mexico who wants to end marijuana prohibition and free all nonviolent marijuana offenders from jail.While it's unlikely Newsom would sac ... More >>

Obama Dodges S.F. Protesters, Leaves Through Side Door

Flickr/Steve RhodesAaaaand, scene!​President Has Yet to Publicly Address Medical Marijuana CrackdownPresidential visits are a big deal, even in big cities like San Francisco: As president, George W. Bush never visited us. But after President Barack Obama's reception Tuesday -- where some prominent ... More >>

Obama's War on Weed: President Attacks Medical Marijuana

Obama's Medical Marijuana Crackdown: Two S.F. Pot Clubs to Close

And Divinity Tree, and Green Door Sacramento, and maybe Medithrive​Lombard Street is in the city's oft-posh Marina District, but that stretch of US-101 that leads from the Golden Gate Bridge down through Van Ness Avenue includes seedy motels as well as high-end boutiques. It might have also contai ... More >>

Is Nancy Pelosi Too Powerful for Pot?

Right Behind You​Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi -- who, despite no longer being House Speaker, is arguably still the most powerful resident of San Francisco -- is a very busy politician. Just this week, the highest-ranking woman in American political history had her fingers in everything from the Ch ... More >>

Feds Now Fight War on Medical Marijuana with Passive Aggressive Strategies

​Hard to believe it's been only two years since Attorney General Eric Holder shocked -- and relieved -- California's medical marijuana users when he said the federal government had no interest in prosecuting state-legal cannabis activities. The Bush Era was over -- no more doors kicked in by Kevla ... More >>

Unemployed Still? Cannabis Jobs Fair at Cow Palace This Weekend

​This being election season means it's also jobs season. Jobs are on the lips of every politician worth his or her soft money -- from Barack Obama's jobs plan to Mayor Ed Lee's own Wilsonesque 17-point jobs plan (in some ways eerily similar to the 17-point jobs plan offered in June by mayoral oppo ... More >>

Should San Francisco Ease Restrictions on Pot Clubs Near Schools?

The titty bars are fine; it's the pot club that a-fears us.​San Francisco's notorious land-use restrictions and zoning laws send neighbors to court over the construction of a porch, and they also mean that the city known as the birthplace of medical marijuana is tougher on pot clubs than most of t ... More >>

Senator Lou Correa, Author of Vetoed Medical Marijuana Restrictions Bill, Just Wanted to Help

The LiberalOCHere to help​Medical marijuana advocates celebrated Wednesday with Governor Jerry Brown's veto of SB 847. The brainchild of State Senator Lou Correa (D-Orange County), the bill would have made a 600-foot barrier between medical cannabis dispensaries and homes state law (except in citi ... More >>

Medical Marijuana Dispensary Owners Facing Criminal Charges for Operating a "Flower Shop"

Pretty flowers​The former owners of Wellness Solutions Group, a Pacifica medical cannabis dispensary ordered closed by city officials on Monday night, will face criminal charges for operating a business under false pretenses, police said Tuesday.The owners, Ruben Salvatierra of South City and Timo ... More >>

Marijuana Advocates Unsure if New State Law Is Good or Bad

Who's he helping?brokencountry.com​Earlier this summer, medical marijuana advocates sounded the legislative alarm over a bill penned by a Southern California assemblyman that gives local governments the right to ban medical cannabis dispensaries, as many a Bay Area burgh from Danville to Daly City ... More >>

Pot Legalization Measure Has Support of Mendocino Growers

Drug Policy AllianceThat's the idea​Can Protections for Medical Patients Help Succeed Where Proposition 19 Failed?Cannabis advocates promised they'd be back at the California ballot following marijuana legalization measure Proposition 19's historic failure in November 2010 (the measure received mo ... More >>

President Obama Fumbles and Punts Medical Marijuana Question on Campaign Trail

He forgot what the question was ​For all his Kennedyesque "uhs" and "ahs," President Barack Obama is nonetheless generally regarded as an accomplished public speaker, able to expound extemporaneously on a plethora of topics. But on the campaign trail in Minnesota on Monday -- during what former Ma ... More >>

Board of Supervisors Seem Afraid to Address Medical Marijuana

Supervisors won't acknowledge the green leaf in the room ​Urban planning in San Francisco is a very big deal -- and so is the city's Planning Commission, the appointed officials who call the shots on urban design. So what does one of the city's more important entities need to do to get some respec ... More >>

Does Your Woman Have Bad PMS? Tell Her to Smoke Some Weed

Let's roll you a joint, madam​Recently, we wrote about a study which claimed that a majority of medical marijuana users in California are probably white men. Not included in the study was how many of those men were acquiring marijuana to placate their wife or girlfriend to cure the myriad of "wome ... More >>

Will Kamala Harris Burn the Medical Marijuana Advocates Who Campaigned for Her?

One and the same ... when it comes to pot​While marijuana legalization dominated the news, unity was in short supply last fall during the election season among medical cannabis patients and advocates.It may be hard for nonsmokers to grasp, but Proposition 19 splintered the medical cannabis communi ... More >>

Is David Chiu Medical Marijuana's New Best Friend?

Photo by Greg DewarPedaling for pot​A funny thing happened to Board of Supervisors President David Chiu last night, while making his evening round of speeches.Somebody asked him for pot."You got the compassion? Who's got weed?" asked an attendee of yesterday's monthly dinner/medical cannabis givea ... More >>

Most Medical Marijuana Patients Are White, Educated, and Employed, Study Says

Just your average stoner​A Californian with a job, an education, and every opportunity this society can afford him (minus perfect health).Meet your typical medical marijuana patient.A study conducted by a sociology professor at the University of California at Santa Cruz has some interesting revela ... More >>

Rolling Paper: Looking at the Current State of Safe Access

Dave Schwartz, "Hero" of Nevada's Pot Movement, to Take Over Michela Alioto-Pier's Mayoral Campaign

Luke ThomasMichela's marijuana man​The days when "gambling" with marijuana on a Las Vegas' Strip could result in lifetime imprisonment are long gone. Reefer now mixes with roulette in the nation's Sin City -- where, it should be noted, one has never needed a medical recommendation to use prostitut ... More >>

S.F. Medical Marijuana Dispensaries Generate Only 11 Complaints Over Five Years

That all you got?​Pot clubs. They're boring. You go in, you buy some pot, you leave. For all the clamor with which a new medical cannabis dispensary's opening receives from jumpy John Q Public, with a few notable exceptions, most we see these days resemble dentists' offices, not dens of iniquity ( ... More >>

Grass Roots Is First S.F. Medical Cannabis Dispensary to Join Union

Look for the union label​San Francisco is known as a union town and a city rich with medical cannabis dispensaries. It was only a matter of time before the two intersected. A year after United Food and Commercial Workers began organizing medical cannabis operations in Oakland and Marin County, Gra ... More >>

Justice Department "Clarifies" Stance on Medical Marijuana: It's Illegal And They Will Arrest You

They gonna getcha​President Barack Obama's stance on medical cannabis has been a wee nebulous: as candidate, Obama said the drug war was a failure and that doctors prescribing pot as a treatment was "appropriate"; as president, Obama's Justice Department said chasing after pot growers and users wa ... More >>

Medical Cannabis Movement Becoming Less Gay

Chris RobertsHot. But gay unfriendly?​Like Sarah Palin recounting the tale of Paul Revere's ride to warn the British (of their own impending arrival), we Americans often have a fuzzy grasp of our history. This extends to the medical cannabis movement, which was birthed in San Francisco in the 1980 ... More >>

Leland Yee Promises to Fight for Medical Marijuana, Except When He's Opposing It

Leland Yee REALLY wants to be mayor, even if it means supporting and not supporting medical marijuana​State Sen. Leland Yee will stand up for medical cannabis. Even against his own interests and against the cannabis-opposed Chinese community of San Francisco, the mayoral candidate is your man, he ... More >>