State Sen. Diane Savino of Staten Island and Assemb. Richard Gottfried of Manhattan, both Democrats, are holding a news conference Tuesday in Albany to promote a bill they introduced last month that would allow doctors to prescribe marijuana to people suffering from certain “serious” conditions, including cancer, HIV/AIDS or multiple sclerosis.

Gottfried, who championed three medical marijuana bills that passed the Assembly in 2007, 2008 and 2012 but died in the Senate, said he believed this bill might be different.

“I’m optimistic this year partly because polling data continues to show a rising level of public support,” he said.

Polls by Quinnipiac University and Cornell University in 2010 showed that about two-thirds of New Yorkers favor allowing medical marijuana use. Eighteen states and the District of Columbia now have legalized medical marijuana — this although the federal government still lists it as a drug with the same abuse potential as heroin and LSD.

Gottfried, who chairs the Assembly health committee where the bill will be voted on Tuesday, said he expected it to pass in that house “in the next month or so.”

The state Senate bill is also in the health committee, chaired by Republican Sen. Kemp Hannon of Garden City, who hasn’t signaled how he views it.

Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo has in the past stated his opposition to legalizing medical marijuana. But Gottfried was hopeful the governor could be persuaded. “From informal discussions I’ve had with executive staff, I am hopeful that if a tightly drafted bill like this begins to move in the Senate, we can work with the executive to address any concerns they might have,” he said.

Savino said she believes the bill, patterned on ones passed in Connecticut, New Jersey and Colorado, answers concerns that pot could be prescribed to those who don’t need it or diverted for recreational use.

But opponents, including a group of addiction experts from Long Island, are preparing to meet with legislators Wednesday in Albany to argue the bill is still too lax.

“I think they have floated what they’re calling a tighter medical marijuana bill . . . when in fact, it’s the same old warmed-over stuff,” said Jeffrey Reynolds, executive director of the Long Island Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence.

Reynolds said he was troubled the bill lists individual conditions “that are very hard to diagnose” such as fibromyalgia and includes conditions such as post-traumatic stress disorder. He also worries that the state will be unable to properly monitor marijuana use.

The bill legalizes possession and use of up to 2.5 ounces of marijuana for patients with “severe debilitating” or “life-threatening” conditions who the doctor believes are “likely to receive therapeutic or palliative benefit” from its use.The bill says patients would have to register with the state, and businesses or organizations that wish to sell marijuana would also have to register and pay a tax of $250 for each pound. Manufacture could only take place in an indoor “secure” facilityunder the bill. ___

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Three of those doctors spoke at a press conference in Chicago, saying the drug can be a safer and more effective treatment than narcotics for patients with diseases such as cancer, Parkinson’s disease and HIV.

They were joined by Julie Falco, a 47-year-old who has multiple sclerosis. Falco rose from her wheelchair with help from a fellow supporter to share the story of how marijuana helped ease pain and other symptoms so debilitating that she considered suicide. The narcotics she was prescribed made her feel worse, the Chicago woman said.

“You could be going through something, and would you not want to have that option … Wouldn’t you want to try something instead of just going out without that option to have a better quality of life?” Falco said. “I beg you. Think about that.”

The Illinois House is expected to vote Wednesday on a bill that would create a medical marijuana pilot program. It would allow physicians who have an existing relationship with a patient to prescribe marijuana for certain conditions.

Patients would be limited to buying 2.5 ounces at a time from dispensaries licensed and regulated by the state. They would be prohibited from growing their own marijuana, and both patients and caregivers would have to undergo a background check.

The vote in the House is expected to be close. If it passes the legislation still must go to the Senate.

Gov. Pat Quinn said last week his staff members have been involved in drafting the bill but that he hasn’t made a final decision on whether he would sign it, saying “We’ll take a look at the final product.”

Rep. Lou Lang, D-Skokie, and other supporters have been trying to legalize medical marijuana for several years. A measure passed the Senate in 2009 but fell short in the House, where just six Republicans voted yes. No bill since then has made it to a floor vote in either chamber.

Rep. Tom Demmer, R- Dixon, said he has sympathy for patients who are seeking a remedy for medical problems. But he said he’s worried about circumventing the Food and Drug Administration‘s approval process.

“If somebody came to the House and asked us to pass through a drug that hadn’t gone through FDA certification we wouldn’t act on that,” Demmer said.

Opponents also say they worry people who don’t need the drug will find a way to obtain it, and that the legislation would open the door to further legalization of marijuana, as has occurred in places like Colorado.

Dan Riffle, deputy director of government operations for the Marijuana Policy Project, countered that the legislation is more restrictive than medical marijuana laws that exist in 18 other states.

But the bigger obstacle for supporters may be the political risks attached to the legislation, regardless of how restrictive it is or the fact Democrats now hold more seats in both chambers than they did during previous votes.

While several Democratic House members said this week the physicians’ endorsement could win yes votes from undecided lawmakers, many said lawmakers who are on the fence may choose not to favor the bill out of fear that their potential challengers during the 2014 election could manipulate their vote. They said this vote could easily be misinterpreted to show lawmakers favoring the bill are endorsing all marijuana uses, not just its medical use.

Rep. Robert Pritchard, R- Hinckley, voted yes in 2011 and plans to do so again. He said while the latest bill has more safeguards than previous measures, he doesn’t believe it will get much more Republican support than it did before.

“Certainly, the Legislature is different from what it was a few years ago when we voted on this, and in many respects, my side of the aisle is more conservative, is more law and order,” Pritchard said.

More than 50,000 are expected to light up outdoors in Denver’s Civic Center Park on April 20 to celebrate marijuana legalization. Thousands more are headed here for the nation’s first open-to-all Cannabis Cup, April 20-21, a domestic version of an annual marijuana contest and celebration in Amsterdam. Expected guests at the Cannabis Cup, a ticketed event taking place inside the Denver Convention Center, include Snoop Lion, the new reggae- and marijuana-loving persona for the rapper better known as Snoop Dogg.

Marijuana activists from New York to San Francisco consider April 20 a day to celebrate the drug and push for broader legalization. The origins of the number “420” as a code for pot are murky, but the drug’s users have for decades marked the date 4/20 as a day to use pot together.

Marijuana remains illegal under federal law, and its sale without a doctor’s recommendation isn’t allowed yet in Colorado or Washington. Neither state allows open and public use of the drug. But authorities largely look the other way at public pot-smoking, especially at festivals and concerts, and entrepreneurs are finding creative ways to capitalize on new marijuana laws.

One of them is Matt Brown, co-owner of Denver’s new “My 420 Tours,” which gives traveling pot users everything but the drug. Brown has sold 160 tour packages to visiting pot smokers for the April 20 weekend. Prices start at $499, not including hotel or air.

The tour sends cannabis tour guides to pick up marijuana tourists at the airport in limousines, escort them to Cannabis Cup and other Denver-area marijuana celebrations and deposit them at a hotel where smoking — tobacco or reefer — is permitted on room patios.

Marijuana tourists on Brown’s tour can add extra days of touring medical marijuana dispensaries and commercial growing operations. A cannabis cooking class is another option. Five-day tours run from $649 to $849.

Brown, a medical marijuana patient who is new to the travel business, says his tours will enable sharing of pot but not selling it. Eighty percent of his clients are coming from outside Colorado — meaning it’s illegal for them to bring marijuana from home. And because commercial pot sales in Colorado don’t start until January, out-of-state visitors can’t yet buy pot at Colorado’s 500-plus dispensaries.

Despite the legal barriers, Brown said his tours quickly filled to capacity and he had to turn away would-be cannabis tourists. He’s hoping to book future pot-themed weekends if the April 20 weekend does well.

“People are fascinated by what’s happening here, and they want to see it up close,” Brown said. “We want to make sure people don’t come here, land at the airport, rent a car and drive around stoned all weekend.”

The tour group isn’t affiliated with the Cannabis Cup, sponsored by High Times Magazine, which has run similar events for medical marijuana in nine cities. The magazine’s editorial director, Dan Skye, says this month’s U.S. Cannabis Cup was timed for the April 20 weekend.

“4/20 is the national stoner holiday, for lack of a better word,” Skye said. “It gets bigger every year, and this year, after the legalization votes, it’s going to be absolutely huge.”

The magazine planned to award Snoop Lion with a “lifetime achievement” award at a Denver ceremony Friday. A Cypress Hill/Slightly Stoopid concert was planned Saturday at the iconic Red Rocks Amphitheater just west of Denver. Both events sold out weeks ago.

A few dozen miles northwest of Denver, the University of Colorado in Boulder will try to dampen pot celebrations on April 20. The campus once held the nation’s largest college 4/20 celebration, drawing an estimated 10,000 in 2010. The legendary smokeout was cited by Playboy magazine when it named Colorado the nation’s top party school in 2011.

After the Playboy mention, the university stepped up efforts to shut the celebration down. Campus officials last year roped off the site of the smokeout, Norlin Quadrangle, reducing the 4/20 crowd to a few hundred protesters. The school planned another shutdown Saturday.

Celebrations were planned in Washington state, too, though April 20 isn’t as broadly celebrated as Seattle’s annual Hempfest, which draws hundreds of thousands of people to a waterfront park every summer.

The April 20 celebrations in Washington included a Seattle party being put on by DOPE Magazine at an artist workspace and studio. About 1,500 were expected for glassblowing demonstrations, music, dancing and a bar where revelers can vaporize their pot, plus the judging for the “DOPE Cup” — an award for the best bud. There will be a smoking tent set up outside, along with food trucks to combat any cases of the munchies.

“It’s pretty monumental,” said DOPE editor in chief James Zachodni. “This is the first time in the U.S. there’s been a cannabis holiday with a legal aspect to it.”

Back in Colorado, longtime pot user Andrew Poarch says this year’s April 20 observations in Colorado have taken on epic significance. He’s joining dozens of friends to hire a bus from Colorado Springs to attend Denver’s Cannabis Cup.

“It’s going to be a lot bigger, a lot more people,” he predicted. “People are trying to outdo themselves because it’s a party and a celebration. We beat prohibition. It’s a pretty big deal.”

Courtesy: http://www.santafenewmexican.com/news/article_1cf77125-308b-5aad-afeb-c66c5f44aab5.html

Speaking to a pot industry group Tuesday night, liquor board Deputy Director Rick Garza said the state is looking at restructuring its timeline for implementing a recreational pot system.

The board had planned to stagger the licensing of producers, processors and retailers. In its initial timeline, the board would issue producer licenses in mid-August. Then it planned to issue processor licenses in early November and retailer licenses in mid-November. Under that schedule, state-regulated stores might open as early as December.

But Garza told local members of the National Cannabis Industry Association that board staff  believe it’s probably better to create all three licenses at the same time. “All three probably need to know what the market looks like” at the time they’re getting licensed, Garza said. The Liquor Control Board would be finalizing a new timeline soon, Garza said, and it “won’t change dramatically, maybe by a couple months.”

“We’re finalizing the timeline based on what we’ve learned  and bringing the consultants on board,” said board spokesman Brian Smith.  ”The published timeline has always been tentative.”

The state’s top pot consultant, Mark Kleiman, said two weeks ago that stores may not be open until the spring of 2014.

The decision is up to the three appointed board members, Garza stressed. Staff would be making their recommendation soon, he added.

“We want to do it right,” said board member Ruthann Kurose, who attended the Tuesday panel discussion at McCormick & Schmick’s on Seattle’s Lake Union.

Also at the event was Michael Sautman, who was the top horticulture expert on Kleiman’s consulting team. Steve Davenport, project manager for Kleiman’s BOTEC Analysis team, confirmed that Sautman was no longer part of the team.

Sautman declined to comment about his leaving the team. Davenport said Sautman wasn’t fired.

He had “some contractual issues with a previous employer,” Davenport said, adding he was reluctant to say more about Sautman except that BOTEC had another expert on its team, Matt Cohen of the Emerald Growers Association, to provide expertise.

Randy Simmons, marijuana project director for the Liquor Control Board, said Sautman apparently had an agreement with another company that made his work for BOTEC a potential conflict. “The issue is between BOTEC and him,” Simmons said, not Sautman and the state.

Sautman expressed frustration about the situation in a meeting Monday with liquor board contracting officials, Simmons said. “I think he’s upset, thinking there’s nobody with his expertise in production,” Simmons said.

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Full menu available online! Oh, Don’t forget those $30 of free edibles with every delivery. Oh yes. Check out our full menu of strains and edibles at Speed Weed.com or call us any time at 888-860-8472 — Open until 3AM – 365 days a year! –Your friends at LA Speed Weed SpeedWeed.com 888-860-8472

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The Green Heart Collective has 3 cannabis care centers to serve it’s patients in Northern California!

We carry the very finest cannabis, hash, extractions, edible and topical products anywhere.

We invite you to meet our warm friendly staff come and see for yourself our wide variety of cannabis to choose from.

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how to become part of Green Ridge Collective Give us a call! (707) 631-4096. You can also join by going to www.greenridgeorganicfarms.com. Enter the site and click the join button on upper left. Download the forms, fill them out, sign and fax or email them back. We will then send you a username and password so you can place orders online as well as see our current inventory and donation “opportunities” (prices). If you are new to medical marijuana download our first-timers guide. check out our fabulous new MORSEL brand edibles! Edibles are, frankly, a bugaboo. They are either too strong or not strong enough. They take too long to act, then they act too long. Or else, they just make you feel “icky”. MORSELS are the first brand of edibles that get it right. Maybe it’s because MORSEL’s founder is a grower – he knows how to grow just for edibles. Maybe it’s because he’s a chemist and a chef – he knows how to properly decarboxylate THC for the right medicinal results. Maybe it’s because he’s his own best patient – he consumes his own edibles every day. Whatever the reason, MORSEL gets it right. If you like edibles, you’ll love MORSEL brand edibles. If you’ve never used edibles, now’s the time to check them out. 100% Vegan Friendly and 100% Gluten Free! Morsel’s Hearts of Hemp have a satisfying texture and a powerful effect. Hearts of Hemp contains 120mg of THC. That’s three full doses! Hearts of Hemp is crafted from: gluten free rolled oats, natural sugars, raw honey, golden flax meal, whole hemp hearts, whole hemp seeds, sesame seeds, sunflower seeds, chia seeds, cannabis-infused coconut oil. Awesome Morsels! Five great flavors to satisfy your palate: double chocolate chunk, soft ginger molasses, white chocolate pistachio, chunky peanut butterscotch and caramel cashew! One Morsel contains about 50mg THC. About Green Ridge Green Ridge Organic Farms is a brand new delivery service in Solano County. We were previously a group of friends who grew for each other and we are members of a small collective. If you have a real medical condition, we are your collective. If you appreciate straightforward talk, you’ll like us. And if you are fussy about the quality of your medication, we are right there with you. We really listen to our members and we help them tailor solutions that optimize their health and happiness. We are careful about how we grow our medicine and what we offer to you, because we use it ourselves. Our growers are craftsmen (and craftswomen). All our grows are small, boutique, operations – so our growers have time to attend to each plant and take extra care in preparing medication. Our bud is top-bud, meaning we don’t bother with the smaller buds below the canopy – it just doesn’t have the same mix of cannabinoids and tends to cause anxiety. We allow some of our strains to go to “late harvest” – especially our sativas. We find this allows better pain relief, energy and clarity of thought, without anxiety – even with strains that are famous for causing anxiety. Our corporate secretary and our CEO both operated USDA and FDA inspected food plants so they are fastidious about the cleanliness of our grows. This is important, since some of our members and friends have compromised immune systems. Give us a shout. We will treat you right. This page is Intended for California residents, 21 years of age or older, with a valid California ID and a valid doctor’s recommendation for Medical Marijuana.