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Indybay Feature

Medical Cannabis in Mountain View, Santa Clara Co.

by Area 420

-- Mountain View Reconsiders Quick Study of Medical Marijuana Next
Week,
Delays Item to October 11 City Council Meeting

-- City Hall Council Chambers, 500 Castro @ California, across from
Kaiser Hospital in Downtown Mountain View between El Camino and
Evelyn/Central Expwy.

-- The meeting begins at 6:30pm,
Mountain View Delays to October 11
ALERT: Finally, A Real Pot Doc in Santa Clara County?

9/18/05
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact Jim Lohse, 408 246-0052, EMAIL: jim [at] cannabiscups.com,
WEBSITE: http://www.area420.com

-- Mountain View Reconsiders Quick Study of Medical Marijuana Next
Week,
Delays Item to October 11 City Council Meeting

-- City Hall Council Chambers, 500 Castro @ California, across from
Kaiser Hospital in Downtown Mountain View between El Camino and
Evelyn/Central Expwy.

-- The meeting begins at 6:30pm, HOWEVER speakers and attendees are
encouraged to contact Area 420 at 408 509-7656 (Christine Flora) or
408 246-0052 (Jim Lohse).

Area 420's Jim Lohse says the actual speaking time may be
significantly past 7pm, "so if people work with us and plan ahead we
can alert them when to show." Lohse recalls a Santa Clara City
Council Meeting where, "due to bad planning on my part, all our
patients showed at 7pm. We then sat there for over three hours and
finally spoke after 10pm! Please call us ahead of the October 11
date!"

SEVENTH HEAVEN TRIES TO OPEN IN MOUNTAIN VIEW

Fourth-generation Mountain View resident Johnathon Lustig can hardly
contain himself. After months of trying, his issue is coming before
the Mountain View City Council. Lustig is planning to open a cannabis
club called Seventh Heaven, reflecting ordered, calm, safe
environment he hopes to create in Mountain View. Lustig is a cannabis
patient himself, and doesn't like traveling to San Francisco or the
East Bay for medicine.

Like many others, Lustig has been unsuccessful so far because
Mountain View's Planning Department has never dealt with the idea
head-on.

For nearly a year now, Mountain View Planning employees Christine
Lowe and Al Savay have promised that the marijuana dispensary issue
was headed to City Council ... someday. That someday is soon,
regardless of Mountain View's recent delay. After City Manager Duggan
announced the agenda item for September 20, his office later moved
the item to the October 11 meeting where it now sits.

A YEAR'S DELAY FOLLOWED BY "LIGHTNING SPEED"

"One week or three weeks are both lightning speed in government
time," counsels Jim Lohse of Cupertino. Lohse organizes the Area 420
patient group in Santa Clara County, most recently known for the Pot
Luck BBQ in Vasona Park (Los Gatos).

Lohse explains, "In my own experience over the last two years, I met
delay after delay and excuse after excuse when I talked to the
Mountain View Planning Department. Ms. Lowe pretended to be
interested in learning more about the issue, but when I wrote a long
report for her, at her request, I don't think she read it. She didn't
ask one question, and that's a good sign someone is not reading what
they're given to read."

MOUNTAIN VIEW SELLS BEER IN THE PARK, STILL WORRIES ABOUT CANNABIS
CLUB AND KIDS

What Lohse doesn't understand is why Mountain View is passing up the
$50,000 per month in revenue a club could generate. He concludes, "In
my report last December, I showed the city how to legitimately make
an extra million dollars per year, legally!

"How can they pass this up? I don't know. They sell alcohol in the
parks, but they claim to worry about kids and cannabis clubs. I just
don't get it. How can we educate kids about alcohol and then fail to
do the same about cannabis? We trust people with guns, SUV's and
booze. Why not cannabis?"

ALERT: FINALLY, A POC IN SANTA CLARA COUNTY?

Medicann (http://www.medicann.com, Dr. Talleyrand supervising) has stated
their intentions to open a new office in Santa Clara County.

Medicann is a rapidly growing chain of medical cannabis doctor's
clinics. They are not involved in distributing pot, just recommending
it's use to qualifying patients. Medicann is maturing, and has done a
great job reforming it's practices to mollify various complaining
factions.

Medicann will fill a huge void. San Jose is the second largest city
in the state, and Santa Clara County has 1.6 million residents.
Currently the nearest quality pot doc is 35-50 miles away.

Except for the ill-fated Suffering Patients office, there has never
been a pot doc in Santa Clara County. While cancer and AIDS
specialists at big hospitals like Kaiser and Valley Med will
occasionally recommend therapeutic cannabis to their sickest
patients, most people can't or won't discuss marijuana with their
primary care doctors.

Just like those who go through a third party website for Viagara to
keep their primary docs from knowing what they're up to, medical
patients must travel to Santa Cruz or San Francisco to see a
consulting cannabis specialist.

Most all the pot docs out there will not provide primary care
services -- their goal is to work to their specialty and work in
conjunction with a patient's primary care treatment. Often a
consulting cannabis doctor wants to see the patient's medical
records, and won't work with patients who don't have primary care
doctors.

PRIVACY FOR VIAGARA PATIENTS, PRIVACY FOR MARIJUANA PATIENTS

For most marijuana-using patients in California, at this early stage
of acceptance, it's in their best interests to keep the word
'marijuana' out of their regular medical records. Many mainstream
doctors still see marijuana as a dangerous addictive drug on par with
ice and meth.

Cannabis specialists protect the privacy of those who follow state
law and choose cannabis as a therapy.
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Add Your Comments

Comments (Hide Comments)
by russell
What about the people who aren't physically sick but are sick emotionally, and use it every day as an outlet to their problems, are addicted, in denial about their addiction, and consequently wreak havoc in people's lives around them? Why does no one ever talk about that? I want cannabis and all things like this to be available to everyone, but if we are never allowed to talk about what can much more easily happen with cannabis as far as addiction, what are we really doing?

One can say everything is addictive - food, coffee, etc. And indeed, someone who has an addictive personality will find something to be addicted to. But cannabis has special properties that make awareness of the addiction more difficult because of the memory and emotion blunting effects. People addicted to food get fat and can see a weight on the scale. Whether or not they can deal with it, everyone can see it. Same with alcohol most of the time - you can smell it and it messes with your life enough to be known by people and there is a strong awareness in the culture, even if that's also abused at times. No one is encouraging high school kids to have open access to alcohol websites.

People addicted to cannabis can't understand why they can't get up in the morning and can't seem to hold down a job or relationship. They go deeper into whatever problems they have but think nothing is wrong. People often don't know they do it. They are fired from their jobs but think it's everyone else's fault who can't understand them. People addicted to crack and alcohol can often end up at rock bottom pretty quickly. People addicted to cannabis just dissapear from the world into their own head and pretty soon years have gone by. They can keep driving and keep just getting by, and that way they always have that escape to come home to every night or morning or whatever, and leave a trail of damaged lives behind them.

I support all this being free and available, but it needs to be all the way out in the open, not that only the 'good' aspects are ever talked about, and the people who go through hell because someone they love is addicted to cannabis, has lost a part of their life to it.

I will always support medical use. But medicating from the world takes people away from the world. And cannabis has special properties to do that, ones that are intricately bound to the good stuff for pain and nausea, etc. And with all the 'good' efforts, people emotionally addicted to cannabis have a truckful of reasons to say it's so good, while any reasons it may be bad, or even addictive, are chalked up to mythology and people 'against all drugs.'
Hi,

I sincerely appreciate your concerns. It's true, the discussion on addiction is not often heard with cannabis.

Of course, the main reason is that pot is not physically addictive.

Now, let me address one of your main points. i know several young people under 25 who first have tried some very strong prescription drugs for problems ranging from Turret's to ADD to Suicidal Depression.

These people all perform better on ANY drug than off ALL drugs. For someone with that limitation, it's no longer an issue of addiction, it's a question substance helps them perform the best with the most benign risk profle.

I think I'd rather be addicted to pot than pain, because pain will cause depression in the long run and then you'll have a real reason to smoke pot -- I can't tell you how many depression patients benefit from pot.

To wrap up, let me point out the real risks of medical marijuana, the way the law is done here in CA:

People who just want to smoke pot need to stay sick to continue to qualify.

While no one recovers from depression or AIDS, many chronic conditions relating to pain may be hard to recover from when the victim has a vested interest in staying sick enough to renew their note year after year.

Check out the contact info at Area 420's website -- see you in Mountain View October 11!
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