Next Meetings     Notice of Proposed Rulemaking for changes to OAR chapter 333, Division 8 - Updating rules for Medical Marijuana pertaining to registration fees and adding new fee charges. The Oregon Health Authority, Public Health Division, Oregon Medical Marijuana Program is proposing to permanently amend administrative rules in chapter 333, division 8. The 2011 Legislative Assembly adopted a Public Health budget that requires an increase in fees charged to OMMP applicants as well as an additional fee for growers to generate revenue to fund other public health programs. The new fees will be implemented beginning October 1, 2011. The current administrative rule does not require a fee for the growers in order for an applicant or grower to obtain an OMMP registry identification card. The Oregon Medical Marijuana Act (OMMA) mandates the Authority to adopt a fee structure in rules. In order to comply with the OMMA and legislative direction, the OMMP must amend its rules to increase the application fee, the replacement card fee, add a grower fee, and also, to add definitions to clarify new terms and meanings for Authority, food stamps, grow site, and replacement registry identification card which are provisions in the rule that are not defined. If you wish to present oral testimony on the proposed changes, public hearings will be held as follows: September 16, 2011: 11:00 AM Jackson County Library Large Conference Room 205 South Central Ave Medford, OR 97501 September 19, 2011: 9:30 AM Portland State Office Building 800 NE Oregon St. Room 1B Portland, OR 97232 September 20, 2011: 11:00AM Deschutes County Administration Building Barnes Room 1300 NW Wall St Bend, OR 97701 Normally, you would just show up 15 minutes early and sign up to give oral testimony. Here are suggestions for providing oral testimony: - Be articulate, respectful, and only address the issues which are relevant to the OARs that are proposed for amendment. - Submit written testimony, along with your oral testimony. - While waiting in the audience, be quiet and respectful of the proceedings. Although we may legitimately feel angry about the fee increases, it is way too late to change this, so focusing on this is futile and possibly counter-productive. It would however, be highly productive to focus on the one crucial thing we can change: *** Make a respectful and articulate demand to include a sunset clause that will automatically revert the fee structure to its current state on July 1, 2013 or when the revenue for the 'other' programs has been generated, whichever comes first. Background: despite the strong recommendation by the Rules Advisory Committee and the ACMM to add a sunset clause, and despite the lack of need for the additional revenue after this biennium, and despite the lack of legislative direction to continue the fee increase after this biennium, the OHA has deliberately omitted a sunset clause from the proposed OAR amendment. Unless we include a sunset clause NOW, we may NEVER be able to lower fees because the OHA and the legislature will always see this extra revenue as a source of revenue for other programs, and will likely continue to increase OMMP fees in the future. I cannot overstate the importance of adding this sunset clause! Earlier this week activists had a meeting with the new OMMP Administrator, Jody Noon, to discuss adding this sunset clause. She made it clear that the OHA has not made a final decision about the sunset clause, and that testimony at the upcoming hearings will influence their decision about this. It's bad enough that our fees are increasing, but it would be far worse if our own OMMP decides to make those fee increases permanent. Our best opportunity to prevent this damage from becoming permanent, is if we all focus our testimony on the one thing we can change, without creating distractions about things we cannot change. Please keep this in mind for both testimony and protests. If you cannot be there in person, submitting written testimony is very important; see > here < for an example letter of testimony. You may file written comments before * 5:00 p.m. on September 22, 2011 * to: OHA, Public Health Division Brittany Sande, Administrative Rules Coordinator 800 NE Oregon Street, Suite 930 Portland, OR 97232 Or you can E-mail comments to: brittany.a.sande@state.or.us or send by fax to - (971) 673-1299 For more details, please see the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking Hearing, Statement of Need and Fiscal Impact, and the full text of the proposed rules at this website: here. If you have any questions or would prefer a hardcopy to be sent, please contact Tawana Nichols, Program Manager, Oregon Department of Human Services - Medical Marijuana Program at 971-673-1339, Or writing to 800 NE Oregon St., #260, Portland, OR 97232 For more info on Meetings, you can Contact the Program at 971.673-1234 or by visiting the OMMP website for Notice of Public Meetings at this website: here The List OMMP Meetings, Advisory Committee on Medical Marijuana (ACMM) meetings, and any others of interest. Adds, Changes or Deletes? (Heaven forbid) ... Post your Meeting Info, or Idea or even a new Category in the NotePad or e-Mail us.   Advisory Committee on Medical Marijuana (ACMM) meetings     Advisory Committee on Medical Marijuana (ACMM) meetings are organized and facilitated by the Oregon Medical Marijuana Program (OMMP). They typically happen quarterly, and in various ctites and towns around the state. To discuss or propose changes one can attend these public meetings hosted by the OMMP. Typically held at the Salem or Portland office - Portland State Office Building - 800 NE Oregon St., Portland OR 97232 - every 3 months. We’ll get copies of documents and stuff from the meetings - and post in our online library, print out and otherwise Keep you in the loop! - as we can(!) You can also keep up on Public Meeting Notices by ... Contacting: DHS/OMMP DHS Health Services OMMP - Oregon Medical Marijuana Program P.O. Box 14450 Portland, Oregon 97293 - 0450 Phone: (971) 673-1226, Fax: (971) 673-1278 web: http://oregon.gov/DHS/ph/ommp/ For the latest OMMP Contact information visit: http://oregon.gov/DHS/ph/ommp/contact_us.shtml Advisory Committee on Medical Marijuana (ACMM) meeting hosted by the OMMP. Last Quarterly meet was: Monday, June 18, 2007 from 10 am to 3 pm Portland State Office Building 800 NE Oregon Street, # Conference Room 1E Portland , Oregon 97232 We’ll get whatever documentation we can and post. Next Quarterly meet is: Sometime in September , 2007 And will probably be in Salem or Eugene , Oregon See: below for details, including any info we have, like proposed agenda, etc. We’ll get copies of documents and stuff from the meetings - and post in our online library, print out and otherwise Keep you in the loop! - as we can(!) You can also keep up on Public Meeting Notices by visiting the OMMP website at: http://oregon.gov/DHS/ph/ommp/ * Call the Program at 971.673-1234 for more info on OMMP hosted meetings. Also, see: http://oregon.gov/DHS/ph/ommp/acmm.shtml for more detail on the Advisory Committee on Medical Marijuana (ACMM).   previous Meetings     6/18/07 - Quarterly ACMM meet.  Advisory Committee on Medical Marijuana (ACMM) Quarterly Meeting, June 18, 2007 3/07 - Quarterly ACMM meet.  Advisory Committee on Medical Marijuana (ACMM) Quarterly Meeting, March, 2007 1/22/07 - Special ACMM meet.  Advisory Committee on Medical Marijuana (ACMM) Special Meeting, January 22, 2007 12/13/06 - Quarterly ACMM meet.  Advisory Committee on Medical Marijuana (ACMM) Quarterly Meeting, December 13, 2006 10/23/06 - Special ACMM meet.  Advisory Committee on Medical Marijuana (ACMM) Special Hearing Meeting, October 23, 2006 9/21/06 - Quarterly ACMM meet.  Advisory Committee on Medical Marijuana (ACMM) Quarterly Meeting, September 21, 2006 6/22/06 - Quarterly ACMM meet.  Advisory Committee on Medical Marijuana (ACMM) Quarterly Meeting, June 22, 2006 3/23/06 - Quarterly ACMM meet.  Advisory Committee on Medical Marijuana (ACMM) Quarterly Meeting, March 23, 2006