WKYT Investigates | Marijuana sparks debate in Frankfort

By Miranda Combs

It's not a new topic, but it's getting a new push.

 

 

Two hotly debated bills are expected to be introduced this legislative session -- one that would legalize medical marijuana and another legalizing recreational use of the drug.

"I would love to get a vote on the floor this year either in the senate or the house," explained former US Congressman Mike Ward.

Ward lives in Louisville and is working to get medical marijuana passed this session. He's started a group called 'Legalize Kentucky Now' to provide an umbrella group to coordinate the activities of people who believe medical marijuana should be legal.

Twenty-three states in the US have legalized medical marijuana, and some lawmakers are hoping that trend will carry into Kentucky.

"It's about allowing people the opportunity to use something that millions are already legally doing... It's time to bring them out of the shadows," Ward said to WKYT's Miranda Combs.

Ward explained how his medical marijuana bill would work: "Somebody who has prescriptive powers will be able to evaluate the patient and say, 'This will help that patient.'

Eric Crawford is a quadriplegic. He broke his back 20 years ago and suffers from spasms and severe glaucoma. His doctors told him if he doesn't smoke marijuana, he will be blind in a year.

"I have to go out on the streets and look for it. And it's not safe. I need safe access. People like me need safe access. We're not criminals." Crawford met WKYT at the Capitol Annex. "I could move. But I'm not going to. I'm going to stay in this state and fight for my rights and the rest of the people's rights that deserve this medicine."

"Cannabis is medicine," explained Sen. Perry Clark. "It's silly to stop it."

Clark has introduced medical marijuana to fellow lawmakers for the past three years.

"And there was never any real movement on that," he recalls. So this year the senator from Louisville is taking a different approach by pre-filing a bill for recreational use of marijuana.

Clark hopes by introducing a bill asking for complete legalization of the drug, he can possibly get medical marijuana to pass. "The fallacy of the whole cannabis is it's a gateway drug. It will lead people to do those other things."

Sen. Whitney Westerfield out of Hopkinsville responded, "It is a gateway drug. And I'm not at all convinced that that's not the reality we have. And it bothers me and gives me great concern to make it any more accessible and available for abuse than it already is."

Westerfield said he's not inclined to hear a bill on recreational use of marijuana or medical use because, as a prosecutor in Hopkinsville, he saw negative effects of marijuana use.

"I believe some of those stories. But I have to balance that against the risk that I see, and as a former prosecutor I have seen first-hand the cases where some driver under the influence of marijuana has killed somebody. I've seen the damage to life that does," he said. "We have a bad enough problem with addiction. We don't need to contribute anymore."

"I don't want dope smokers all ove the streets," Crawford explained. "But I want our sick people to be safe inside their home.