What you are seeing with Initiative 502 is an attempt to end medical marijuana in Washington. I have been running Green Hope Patient Network in Shoreline for over two years. We still don’t have safe access points for patients to get their medicine. Yes, there are some places in King County, but even they are holding their breath.

Now, this might sound good to legalize marijuana for those 21 years or older, with DUI provisions. For those who don’t understand cannabis, you can ingest it and the active ingredient, THC, can stay in your blood from a week to 30 days. The effects normally last around 1-2 hours.

If you vote this into law, everyone who uses medical cannabis (instead of pharmaceutical drugs) will not be able to drive for fear their blood will, not might, will, have more then 5 nanograms of THC.

Who is supporting this bill? Prosecutors and officers. Who is not supporting this? Doctors, lawyers, patients.

Until we can prove what amount of THC affects your driving skills we must vote no. Don’t let them scare us into making bad laws; there is a working model for dealing with driving while stoned. Field test. Tell everyone, patients with cancer, AIDS, chronic pain, and other conditions just want a normal life and that means being able to drive. Tell the state we don’t want it selling cannabis, we just got them out of the alcohol business!

Laura Healy

Green Hope Patient Network Shoreline