THE STATE
NEW REGULATIONS KICK IN FOR DISPENSARIES
This month, 77 pages of new regulations from Colorado’s Medical Marijuana Enforcement Division (MMED) went into effect. These regulations outline everything from the type of locks to be installed on dispensaries’ doors to the kind of cable allowed for use on video monitoring equipment.
The new regulations are part of an effort to keep track of medical cannabis used by patients. The rules stem from the recently enacted Colorado Medical Marijuana Code.
COUNTY DROPS PROPOSED COMPASSIONATE RULES
Pitkin County commissioners have backed off rules regulating the local growth and sale of medicinal marijuana due to federal threats against bureaucrats administering compassionate use programs.
The county spent last year considering how to regulate the industry, but county attorney John Ely advised the commissioners not to adopt the ordinance or take any action on it because doing so would be construed as a crime and subject to prosecution under federal law. “I started to put on the brakes when I realized the ramifications for our staff,” Ely told Aspen Daily News. “No matter what the state may do, that conduct—the possession of marijuana with the intent to distribute or sell—is simply illegal.”
COLORADO DOCTOR’S CASE IS TOSSED OUT
Charges against Dr. Toribio Robert Mestas—who had been facing charges of forgery, attempt to influence a public servant, marijuana distribution and conspiracy to distribute marijuana after writing a recommendation to an undercover police officer—have been dropped. Arapahoe County District Judge Kurt Horton ruled that Mestas had complied with the requirements of the state’s constitutional amendment, passed in 1998, which allows for the medical use of cannabis.
“Colorado’s Amendment 20 simply allows for a physician to certify that a patient might benefit from the use of marijuana as a medical treatment,” Horton wrote, according to Denver Post, “and it is then left up to the patient whether to apply for a medical marijuana registry card.”
MORGAN COUNTY PROHIBITS DISPENSARIES AND GROWS
The Board of Morgan County Commissioners this month voted unanimously to prohibit medical marijuana dispensaries and growing facilities in unincorporated areas of the county. County officials had previously adopted MMJ regulations in case they were needed under Colorado law, but then quickly passed a moratorium on medical marijuana facilities.
While state regulations do include a provision that allows local governments to ban medical marijuana facilities, the county decided to use its own land-use regulations to create the ban, Morgan County Attorney George Monsson told Brush News-Tribune.
