-please, repost--
Hi all,
This is a long message, but it will fill you in with the details of what is going on. Watch out for further bulletin posts with the latest information....
Unfortunately, this is not the only thing going on in the news this week.... so please, stay informed, get active, and SHARE the info.
~~~~~~~~
July 12th
Dear Community members,
As many of you know, over the last 48 hours, Americans For Safe Access has been forwarded numerous letters from the DEA to the landlords of Los Angeles medical cannabis dispensing collectives. The letters are all identical except for the specific information about the collectives and their landlords (such as names and addresses). We have received an initial 17 reports so far. However, the DEA claims to have sent the letters to more than 100 landlords.
The letters all say (in less words) that the DEA has identified that you control a property, at XXX address, where a "medical marijuana" dispensary, XXXX Caregivers, is operating. Federal law states that medical marijuana is illegal. Nothing in California law takes precedent over Federal Law, including Prop 215.
Federal Law also makes it a crime to knowingly lease to a property used to manufacture or distribute a controlled substance. Federal Law also allows the US government to seize the property if the landlord knows what is happening there.
This letter shall serve as notice that there is a dispensary on your property, and you have now been made aware of it. You are advised that
further violations of federal law will result in prosecution, imprisonment, fines, and forfeiture of assets (property seizure).
It is signed by the head agent of LA field division.
A few of the landlords have contacted the DEA, and the DEA confirmed that they sent the letters. They have all been postmarked Friday. The first call we got was Monday morning at 9 AM. We had heard of 3 by the end of
the day. We have now seen 17 letters, and heard reports as high as 25.
The shops have nothing in common. Some are new, some are old, some are big, and some are small. Many have had no neighbor issues at all. Some see less than 10 patients a day. From what we can tell there is not any specific correlation or connection between any of the collectives who have received them. It seems that the DEA used Weedtracker as the source.
This is a serious action taken by the DEA, and ASA is working non-stop to find every way we can to fight this. It will take the most calculated and thought-out response we have ever launched, and we are dedicating every resource we have to developing our short-term response and long-term plan.
In Solidarity,
Chris Fusco
LA County Field Coordinator
Americans for Safe Access
www.AmericansForSafeAccess.org
www.ASAaction.org
July 13th
Hello, ASA Members and Allies. I know many of you are worried about the recent DEA letters to landlords renting to medical cannabis collectives in Los Angeles. This is a serious threat and a real attack on safe access. I wish there were a simple answer to this new challenge, but there is not. I want everyone to know that collective operators in LA are committed to serving patients despite the risks and challenges. There will be safe access in our city!
Lawyers agree that landlords can not fight the asset forfeiture cases in court, as the US Attorney has the authority and jurisdiction to move forward. A legislative solution will take too long to be useful for the collectives and cooperatives targeted already, or for those will are likely to be targeted soon. We need a political fix for this problem in the immediate future.
There is a place for a public protest, especially one carefully crafted to generate grassroots support for a larger lobbying effort in Washington, DC. We need to think about who we intend to target with that protest and what we want them to do. The image and message will be crucial. Only a handful of people have direct influence over what is happening in LA right now. Unfortunately, most are in DC and insulated from grassroots pressure. I know community members are considering how to proceed now. Let’s all talk together and come up with a good plan.
We have to remember that this is a federal problem with a federal solution. ASA is the best vehicle we have now to effect a change in DC. ASA has the most effective communications team in the medical cannabis field. Last year, ASA was quoted in more than 3,000 print articles and an impressive number of broadcast stories. Our background work with editorial boards and influential journalists has helped turn the tide of media bias and public indifference on medical cannabis. ASA works in partnership with a prestigious public relations firm in DC to craft and place stories in high-profile media. Reflect on the media work around Gonzales vs. Raich, Dr. Abrams neuropathy study in February, or the DQA editorial in Science. All are good examples of effective media shaping subsequent coverage and public opinion.
We are working with the LA Times and other major media outlets to develop articles that will mitigate the inevitable impact this news will have on landlords statewide. Our story will also serve to maximize public sympathy for the patients, landlords, and operators. Chris Fusco is working non-stop this weekend with the staff in Oakland to set up key interviewees with strategic talking points. Getting our story in the mainstream press early will help frame how the media tells this story and shape public opinion. Effective media will also serve to underpin of direct lobbying efforts.
ASA Staff in DC is already calling Congressional leaders and coalition members to help us find some leverage with the Justice Department and the US Attorneys office. Because ASA is the only organization in Washington, DC, working exclusively on medical cannabis, we have seen doors open to us in the last two years that have been closed to organizations with broader drug policy agendas. Our lobbyists have become the go-to people on Capitol Hill and regarded as the most experienced in the field. Consider this: Dr. Barbara Roberts, former Senior Policy Analyst for the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), is now the President of ASA’ Medical and Scientific Advisory Board – and our lead lobbyist in Congress. Read her bio at www.safeaccessnow.org/article.php Dr. Roberts is the caliber of expert to which members of Congress are accustomed to listening.
Most importantly, Dr. Roberts and the rest of our DC team are ready to act on this issue right now. Some collectives are already being evicted and that means patients are already losing out. I know many of you support medical cannabis passionately. Please make a a commitment to help me support ASA’s federal program and stop this attack. You may have assumed that ASA has ample resources for this fight. That is not true. We raise our budget week by week. We have no million dollar donors or big grants. If you, as stakeholders in the medical cannabis movement, do not support ASA, then no one will.
Take a moment to reflect on what stopping this attack – and changing federal law – means to you. Then think about what that looks like financially for you. We need funding for this fight right now. You can donate online immediately at www.AmericansForSafeAccess.org/donate or send a check to ASA at 1322 Webster St., Suite 402, Oakland, CA 94612. Please do it today!
Thank you, again, for supporting ASA and medical cannabis!
Don't forget about the next ASA meeting...
Saturday, July 21 * 1 PM – LA ASA Meeting/Community Forum on DEA Attack
6210 Santa Monica Blvd., between Vine St. and El Centro, LA 90046
All medical cannabis advocates welcome * www.ASAaction.org
__________________
Don Duncan
Southern California Coordinator
Americans for Safe Access
www.AmericansForSafeAccess.org <www.americansforsafeaccess.org/>
Americans for Safe Access (ASA) is the largest national member-based organization of patients, medical professionals, scientists and concerned citizens promoting safe and legal access to cannabis for therapeutic use and research.
Join us today….www.AmericansforSafeAccessNow.org
Los Angeles Office
7211 Santa Monica Blvd., Suite 800
West Hollywood, CA 90046
P: 323-464-7719 F: 323-464-7355
Sunday, July 15th
Hello. Thanks to everyone for the great input and brain storming on asset forfeiture threats against property owners renting to medical cannabis collectives in Los Angeles. I hear that several local collectives are starting letter writing or call in campaigns targeting strategic representatives in Congress. Others have made special pledges to support the lobbying effort already underway in Washington, DC. We had a good meeting with operators, two property owners, and a former prosecutor from the US Attorney’s office on Saturday afternoon.
On Monday, ASA is convening a conference call with some of the top asset forfeiture specialists in the county to evaluate legal and political options for resistance. ASA’s legal team will be joined by representatives from the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and Forfeiture Endangers American Rights (FEAR), as well as two former US Attorneys and two lobbyists in Washington, DC, who are already working on asset forfeiture reform. ASA is also working to mobilize our new coalition of HIV/AIDS and other health care advocates to the defense of the targeted property owners. I will send a report after this unprecedented call.
I have heard that some advocates are planning a protest in Van Nuys on Tuesday morning. I do not know what strategic conversations organizers have had already, but would like to suggest some ideas for media images and messaging for participants. When planning a response like this, it is a good idea to consider who has the power to change what it is you do not like (or do what you want to happen). Then you can consider what tools you have to influence those people. If, for example, you want to pressure the City Council to amend the upcoming ICO to allow for existing collectives to relocate, protesting at a time and place when the council is in session (while lobbying the Council members from the inside) might be effective. If, however, you want to encourage a change in policy at the federal level, lobbying members on Congress directly is a better approach. We are going to explore this strategic approach in depth at the LA-ASA meeting on Saturday, July 21 (see www.ASAaction.org for info).
Regardless of the strategic decision, I urge everyone to think very carefully about the images and messages their response to this crisis will send to the public and to Congress. Marijuana legalization advocates have used the spectacle of public smoking to garner media attention for decades. Sadly, this approach often backfires because media portrays the smokers in an inappropriate light. Editors at broadcast media tend to focus on the image of smoking publicly instead of the message of the protesters. Sensationalism sells ad space, after all. Adopting the public smoking strategy in a medical context is tricky. The public and elected officials are unlikely to be persuaded by a crowd of people smoking cannabis. If civil disobedience is part of a protesters strategy, I recommend an action that can not be so easily distorted or misunderstood. Blockades, public plantings, medicine give aways, and sit ins have been used effectively in the medical-only context.
There was also some talk at Saturday afternoon’s meeting about raising religious defense in light of the current crisis. I think there is sometimes confusion about churches and medical cannabis as a result of the extraordinary bravery shown by congregations in San Francisco, West Hollywood, and elsewhere in defense of patients targeted by federal enforcement. I hope that people of faith will rally to the support the medical cannabis community again, but we must be very clear about messaging. Cannabis is medicine, and that fact must always be at the core of our message. We do not need to substitute a religious defense for medical cannabis advocacy. Doing so sends the message that our goal is to legalize marijuana by whatever tactic we can, instead of protecting safe access for legitimate patients. I know many of us support marijuana law reform, but we must be careful that medical cannabis stands on its own merits and is never portrayed as means to an end. Do not underestimate the importance of this. We deal with blowback from the “bait and switch” issue at the ASA office all the time – especially in Congress.
Thanks, again, for your continued vigilance in the crisis time. I hope you will all participate in the LA-ASA meeting next Saturday (see www.ASAaction.org for info).
Remember, we still need your support for a federal solution to a federal problem – www.AmericansForSafeAccess.org/Donate
__________________
Don Duncan
Southern California Coordinator
Americans for Safe Access
www.AmericansForSafeAccess.org <www.americansforsafeaccess.org/>
Hi all,
This is a long message, but it will fill you in with the details of what is going on. Watch out for further bulletin posts with the latest information....
Unfortunately, this is not the only thing going on in the news this week.... so please, stay informed, get active, and SHARE the info.
~~~~~~~~
July 12th
Dear Community members,
As many of you know, over the last 48 hours, Americans For Safe Access has been forwarded numerous letters from the DEA to the landlords of Los Angeles medical cannabis dispensing collectives. The letters are all identical except for the specific information about the collectives and their landlords (such as names and addresses). We have received an initial 17 reports so far. However, the DEA claims to have sent the letters to more than 100 landlords.
The letters all say (in less words) that the DEA has identified that you control a property, at XXX address, where a "medical marijuana" dispensary, XXXX Caregivers, is operating. Federal law states that medical marijuana is illegal. Nothing in California law takes precedent over Federal Law, including Prop 215.
Federal Law also makes it a crime to knowingly lease to a property used to manufacture or distribute a controlled substance. Federal Law also allows the US government to seize the property if the landlord knows what is happening there.
This letter shall serve as notice that there is a dispensary on your property, and you have now been made aware of it. You are advised that
further violations of federal law will result in prosecution, imprisonment, fines, and forfeiture of assets (property seizure).
It is signed by the head agent of LA field division.
A few of the landlords have contacted the DEA, and the DEA confirmed that they sent the letters. They have all been postmarked Friday. The first call we got was Monday morning at 9 AM. We had heard of 3 by the end of
the day. We have now seen 17 letters, and heard reports as high as 25.
The shops have nothing in common. Some are new, some are old, some are big, and some are small. Many have had no neighbor issues at all. Some see less than 10 patients a day. From what we can tell there is not any specific correlation or connection between any of the collectives who have received them. It seems that the DEA used Weedtracker as the source.
This is a serious action taken by the DEA, and ASA is working non-stop to find every way we can to fight this. It will take the most calculated and thought-out response we have ever launched, and we are dedicating every resource we have to developing our short-term response and long-term plan.
In Solidarity,
Chris Fusco
LA County Field Coordinator
Americans for Safe Access
www.AmericansForSafeAccess.org
www.ASAaction.org
July 13th
Hello, ASA Members and Allies. I know many of you are worried about the recent DEA letters to landlords renting to medical cannabis collectives in Los Angeles. This is a serious threat and a real attack on safe access. I wish there were a simple answer to this new challenge, but there is not. I want everyone to know that collective operators in LA are committed to serving patients despite the risks and challenges. There will be safe access in our city!
Lawyers agree that landlords can not fight the asset forfeiture cases in court, as the US Attorney has the authority and jurisdiction to move forward. A legislative solution will take too long to be useful for the collectives and cooperatives targeted already, or for those will are likely to be targeted soon. We need a political fix for this problem in the immediate future.
There is a place for a public protest, especially one carefully crafted to generate grassroots support for a larger lobbying effort in Washington, DC. We need to think about who we intend to target with that protest and what we want them to do. The image and message will be crucial. Only a handful of people have direct influence over what is happening in LA right now. Unfortunately, most are in DC and insulated from grassroots pressure. I know community members are considering how to proceed now. Let’s all talk together and come up with a good plan.
We have to remember that this is a federal problem with a federal solution. ASA is the best vehicle we have now to effect a change in DC. ASA has the most effective communications team in the medical cannabis field. Last year, ASA was quoted in more than 3,000 print articles and an impressive number of broadcast stories. Our background work with editorial boards and influential journalists has helped turn the tide of media bias and public indifference on medical cannabis. ASA works in partnership with a prestigious public relations firm in DC to craft and place stories in high-profile media. Reflect on the media work around Gonzales vs. Raich, Dr. Abrams neuropathy study in February, or the DQA editorial in Science. All are good examples of effective media shaping subsequent coverage and public opinion.
We are working with the LA Times and other major media outlets to develop articles that will mitigate the inevitable impact this news will have on landlords statewide. Our story will also serve to maximize public sympathy for the patients, landlords, and operators. Chris Fusco is working non-stop this weekend with the staff in Oakland to set up key interviewees with strategic talking points. Getting our story in the mainstream press early will help frame how the media tells this story and shape public opinion. Effective media will also serve to underpin of direct lobbying efforts.
ASA Staff in DC is already calling Congressional leaders and coalition members to help us find some leverage with the Justice Department and the US Attorneys office. Because ASA is the only organization in Washington, DC, working exclusively on medical cannabis, we have seen doors open to us in the last two years that have been closed to organizations with broader drug policy agendas. Our lobbyists have become the go-to people on Capitol Hill and regarded as the most experienced in the field. Consider this: Dr. Barbara Roberts, former Senior Policy Analyst for the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), is now the President of ASA’ Medical and Scientific Advisory Board – and our lead lobbyist in Congress. Read her bio at www.safeaccessnow.org/article.php Dr. Roberts is the caliber of expert to which members of Congress are accustomed to listening.
Most importantly, Dr. Roberts and the rest of our DC team are ready to act on this issue right now. Some collectives are already being evicted and that means patients are already losing out. I know many of you support medical cannabis passionately. Please make a a commitment to help me support ASA’s federal program and stop this attack. You may have assumed that ASA has ample resources for this fight. That is not true. We raise our budget week by week. We have no million dollar donors or big grants. If you, as stakeholders in the medical cannabis movement, do not support ASA, then no one will.
Take a moment to reflect on what stopping this attack – and changing federal law – means to you. Then think about what that looks like financially for you. We need funding for this fight right now. You can donate online immediately at www.AmericansForSafeAccess.org/donate or send a check to ASA at 1322 Webster St., Suite 402, Oakland, CA 94612. Please do it today!
Thank you, again, for supporting ASA and medical cannabis!
Don't forget about the next ASA meeting...
Saturday, July 21 * 1 PM – LA ASA Meeting/Community Forum on DEA Attack
6210 Santa Monica Blvd., between Vine St. and El Centro, LA 90046
All medical cannabis advocates welcome * www.ASAaction.org
__________________
Don Duncan
Southern California Coordinator
Americans for Safe Access
www.AmericansForSafeAccess.org <www.americansforsafeaccess.org/>
Americans for Safe Access (ASA) is the largest national member-based organization of patients, medical professionals, scientists and concerned citizens promoting safe and legal access to cannabis for therapeutic use and research.
Join us today….www.AmericansforSafeAccessNow.org
Los Angeles Office
7211 Santa Monica Blvd., Suite 800
West Hollywood, CA 90046
P: 323-464-7719 F: 323-464-7355
Sunday, July 15th
Hello. Thanks to everyone for the great input and brain storming on asset forfeiture threats against property owners renting to medical cannabis collectives in Los Angeles. I hear that several local collectives are starting letter writing or call in campaigns targeting strategic representatives in Congress. Others have made special pledges to support the lobbying effort already underway in Washington, DC. We had a good meeting with operators, two property owners, and a former prosecutor from the US Attorney’s office on Saturday afternoon.
On Monday, ASA is convening a conference call with some of the top asset forfeiture specialists in the county to evaluate legal and political options for resistance. ASA’s legal team will be joined by representatives from the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and Forfeiture Endangers American Rights (FEAR), as well as two former US Attorneys and two lobbyists in Washington, DC, who are already working on asset forfeiture reform. ASA is also working to mobilize our new coalition of HIV/AIDS and other health care advocates to the defense of the targeted property owners. I will send a report after this unprecedented call.
I have heard that some advocates are planning a protest in Van Nuys on Tuesday morning. I do not know what strategic conversations organizers have had already, but would like to suggest some ideas for media images and messaging for participants. When planning a response like this, it is a good idea to consider who has the power to change what it is you do not like (or do what you want to happen). Then you can consider what tools you have to influence those people. If, for example, you want to pressure the City Council to amend the upcoming ICO to allow for existing collectives to relocate, protesting at a time and place when the council is in session (while lobbying the Council members from the inside) might be effective. If, however, you want to encourage a change in policy at the federal level, lobbying members on Congress directly is a better approach. We are going to explore this strategic approach in depth at the LA-ASA meeting on Saturday, July 21 (see www.ASAaction.org for info).
Regardless of the strategic decision, I urge everyone to think very carefully about the images and messages their response to this crisis will send to the public and to Congress. Marijuana legalization advocates have used the spectacle of public smoking to garner media attention for decades. Sadly, this approach often backfires because media portrays the smokers in an inappropriate light. Editors at broadcast media tend to focus on the image of smoking publicly instead of the message of the protesters. Sensationalism sells ad space, after all. Adopting the public smoking strategy in a medical context is tricky. The public and elected officials are unlikely to be persuaded by a crowd of people smoking cannabis. If civil disobedience is part of a protesters strategy, I recommend an action that can not be so easily distorted or misunderstood. Blockades, public plantings, medicine give aways, and sit ins have been used effectively in the medical-only context.
There was also some talk at Saturday afternoon’s meeting about raising religious defense in light of the current crisis. I think there is sometimes confusion about churches and medical cannabis as a result of the extraordinary bravery shown by congregations in San Francisco, West Hollywood, and elsewhere in defense of patients targeted by federal enforcement. I hope that people of faith will rally to the support the medical cannabis community again, but we must be very clear about messaging. Cannabis is medicine, and that fact must always be at the core of our message. We do not need to substitute a religious defense for medical cannabis advocacy. Doing so sends the message that our goal is to legalize marijuana by whatever tactic we can, instead of protecting safe access for legitimate patients. I know many of us support marijuana law reform, but we must be careful that medical cannabis stands on its own merits and is never portrayed as means to an end. Do not underestimate the importance of this. We deal with blowback from the “bait and switch” issue at the ASA office all the time – especially in Congress.
Thanks, again, for your continued vigilance in the crisis time. I hope you will all participate in the LA-ASA meeting next Saturday (see www.ASAaction.org for info).
Remember, we still need your support for a federal solution to a federal problem – www.AmericansForSafeAccess.org/Donate
__________________
Don Duncan
Southern California Coordinator
Americans for Safe Access
www.AmericansForSafeAccess.org <www.americansforsafeaccess.org/>
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