Pasco bans pot gardens; Kent may be next

Washington’s medical marijuana law is hazy at best. It
allows collective gardens but not businesses to distribute
pot.

The state law also violates federal law. It has left
cities to fend for themselves to find the best way to deal
with patients who say they need the drug.

Pasco banned collective gardens on Monday. Kent is
expected to do the same on Tuesday.

For 11 months, cities have been in a legal limbo. The
state law allowing collective gardens went into effect
last July. A lot of cities voted for temporary
moratoriums on medical marijuana businesses and gardens to
give them more time to figure out how to handle the new
law, and how to zone for them so operations wouldn’t be
near schools or parks.

Cities were expecting the Legislature to clarify the law
last session, but Olympia did nothing.

So some cities that have had moratoriums are now
considering outright bans on collective gardens. Others
are taking a look the other way attitude.

Dennis Higgins, the city council president in Kent, thinks
allowing collective gardens is the way to go, but he
believes the city will ban them at their meeting Tuesday.

“I wasn’t in favor of continuing to have to re-up on a
moratorium every six months, and if the majority of the
council was going to continue to be opposed to any sort of
a zoning ordinance at all […] they should put their
money where their mouth was and move to ban them, and
that’s what they’ve done,” Higgins said.

Bill Boyce is one of the four Kent council members
expected to vote in favor of the ban tonight.

“The federal law says you cannot distribute marijuana,” he
said. “Federal law, from what I understand, supersedes
state law.”

But several Washington cities don’t see it that way.
Seattle, Bellevue, and Spokane have voted on new zoning
laws to allow the gardens and even some medical marijuana
businesses to operate. Tacoma will consider a similar
idea this week.

Higgins doesn’t understand why his city is going with a
ban.

“Of all the cities in the state, why do we have to lead
this parade?” Higgins asked. “I don’t understand it.
Most other cities are taking a ‘live and let live’
approach, a wait and see approach.”

At least one of the gardens in Kent has said it will file
a lawsuit in King County Wednesday if the city imposes a
ban. This issue will eventually be figured out in court.

But voters will get the chance to weigh in on this in
November. I-502 would decriminalize marijuana possession
and allow the state to tax sales.