A chef at Freedom Plaza, whose kitchen remained open today at noon, told us that his colleagues at McPherson Square weren't up on the particulars of running a kitchen. He said that he wasn't concerned about any inspections, because he had formerly worked as an executive chef and understood health and safety standards for kitchens.

DOH staffers will be reviewing the Occupy kitchens Thursday "to determine the exact condition of kitchen and will provide formal recommendations for improvement (if needed)," a department official wrote in an email to DCist.

Of course, as Freed notes, the DOH has no jurisdiction over Occupy D.C.—but neither did the District's building inspectors, and that didn't stop the U.S. Park Police from using D.C. codes as a reason to tear down the "people's Pentagon" protesters tried to build.

Vince Gray

A town hall hosted by the D.C. Patients' Cooperative last night was scheduled a month ago; the advocates that organized it had hoped that by the time the town hall occurred, the mayor would have signed off on regulations approved by the City Council in November 2010. Alas, no such action has happened, and the process to implement cannabis growth and distribution in the District is at an impasse until Gray gets around to acknowledging it.

D.C. Patients' Cooperative, a non-profit advocacy group, hopes to apply to run a dispensary. But, given the lack of approved legal infrastructure, last night's four-person panel couldn't give much beyond speculation of how some things, like access to cannabis for low-income patients, would actually function. Without the implementation of the regulations—and, thus, the implementation of a board to oversee the implementation of the regulations—advocates' hands are tied.

The Department of Health's Deputy Director, who drafted the medical marijuana statute, said "The next step is for each of the agencies that the mayor had delegated to implement the program to begin implementing the program. The Department of Health is doing their part, and the big bottleneck in the system is the mayor to appoint the panel that will accept applications for dispensaries and cultivation centers. It's out of the council's hands for now, which is what I represent, and it's really on the mayor to make the necessary appointments so the program can be implemented." ABRA director Fred Moosally and chairman Charles Brodsky were also in attendance.

Nonetheless, the group, which included D.C. Patients' Cooperative board members Nikolas Schiller and Adam Eidinger (who uses medical marijuana for his chronic arthritis) and Tony Bowles of the D.C. chapter of Americans for Safe Access, ably answered questions about what prospective patients, distributors, and growers might be able to expect if the regulations are approved.

A few highlights:

• Patients will only be allowed to obtain their cannabis from one dispensary, which will be noted on their prescription card. This way, no one can double-dip and pick up the allowed 2 ounces at more than one dispensary.
• "Cannabanoid profiles" break down what's in each strain of marijuana; notably, THC, the psychoactive agent that affects the brain, and CBD, which affects the rest of the body. Patients will, unquestionably, know more about what's in their marijuana than those that partake in the substance recreationally.
• Medical marijuana in D.C. will likely be some of the most expensive in the country. Cannabis will need to be grown here, not imported, and rents are high. Home cultivation, which might reduce some of the expense, is expressly not allowed.
• Patients do not need a clean record for a recommendation for medical marijuana; the recommendation is given by a doctor. Caregivers are allowed for patients who are not able to pick up their cannabis, but caregivers do need a record clear of drug convictions and felonies. Likewise, to work at a cultivation or dispensary, a record clear of drug convictions and felonies is required. (Yes, this means that you can have a history of violent crime or fraud and work at a dispensary or cultivation center.)
• DCist notes that "If and when the program gets off of the ground, a big problem yet to be resolved is where cultivators will get their seeds. Getting them from out-of-state would be illegal, after all, so what are the options? The Metropolitan Police Department, ventured one advocate. Seeds from seized plants could be used, he argued."

One audience member asked if what was being discussed could actually be happening if the mayor had signed the regulations last month, as advocates had hoped. "Yes," said Schiller.

At the point, there's nothing for the advocates—and prospective patients—to do but wait, though there is little indication as to when Gray will get things rolling. Moosally indicated that the executive approval might come in the next few weeks.

Photo by Flickr user Mike_fj40 using an Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic Creative Commons license

For those keeping track of the District's progress in the medical marijuana game, today is not the small milestone it appeared to be.

DCist reports that the medical marijuana rules released in November 2010 will go into effect... not today, but shortly: "It seems that while the rules should be taking effect today due to the timing of when they were submitted to the D.C. Council, they only become legally valid once published in the D.C. Register, which should happen next week."

The rules themselves are hardly liberal: The District will allow only five dispensaries and ten cultivation centers. (City Paper looked at one proposed center, to be run by a rabbi in Takoma, in August.) Patients will only be allowed to purchase two ounces a month. And whenever they take effect, it won't exactly signal the advent of a medical marijuana culture around these parts. Mayor Vince Gray still has to appoint a four-person board to oversee the operation and handling of related policy, and the Department of Health will undertake rules applying to patients and doctors.

DCist notes that "the glacial pace with which the program has progressed has been of some frustration to advocates, many of whom have found leases left hanging until they could be sure that the rules would take effect and have someone to govern their implementation." We wish upon NORML-ites and their compatriots a heavy does of patience; expect Gray's deliberateness to shine in this arena.

Photo by Neeta Lind via Flickr/Creative Commons Attribution 2.0

Oh, sure, patients and doctors would register with the Department of Health, but the growers and sellers would instead be subject to the city's Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC) Board and its administrative arm, the Alcoholic Beverage Regulation Administration (ABRA), just as if your neighborhood dispensary were a bar; call it a hash bar for the sick. It seemed an unusual approach, somewhat unique among the many other states regulating medical cannabis, but practical, as the existing ABC Board/ABRA apparatus has extensive experience vetting the venues that distribute a controlled substance to qualified consumers.

Supporters espousing marijuana's legitimacy as medicine, however, balked at the idea. In an Aug. 15 letter to the Post, Wayne Turner, sponsor of D.C.'s original 1998 medical marijuana ballot initiative, fumed, "Having the [Alcoholic Beverage Control] Board in charge bolsters the false accusation that D.C.'s medical marijuana effort is not about helping patients but is instead a 'stalking horse' for the legalization of recreational marijuana."

The controversy appears to have prompted a few tweaks to the city's pot planning. Revised rules published in the D.C. Register today bear no mention of the ABC Board or ABRA. The booze police, it seems, have been written out of the program entirely.

In fact, the word "alcohol" appears just once in the entire 87-page rulemaking:

5402.5             A registration application for a cultivation center or dispensary shall not be approved for any location that also sells alcoholic beverages.

In place of the liquor authorities, the mayor will appoint a new hearing board "to conduct registration, licensing, and enforcement proceedings involving cultivation centers and dispensaries."

Just like the ABC Board, it would seem. Only called something different. And with all new members—because what's the point of passing new laws if you can't build a whole new bureaucracy to go along with them?

5401.2 A four member panel shall be convened consisting of one representative from the Department [of Health], MPD, OAG, and a staff person designated by the Board to evaluate and score each application.

Photo by Coaster420/Creative Commons Attribution License

In a March 12, 2010 inspection, the club was told it had to make sure food its food wasn't being served with an unusual condiment: smashed mouse. "Remove all snap mousetraps from the premises," a health inspector ordered."These traps may create a splatter of the rodent that may contaminate food contact and non-food contact surfaces." The club had six critical violations, which it had corrected by a March 18 follow-up inspection.

UPDATE: NPC President Alan Bjerga says the club never had a rodent problem. "The traps you reference were in a box located in a storage area, not a food preparation area, and had not been used for several months," Bjerga writes City Desk. "The traps had been provided by our landlord as a preventative measure due to an infestation three floors below us related to a new tenant move-in. The traps were put aside in a box after having not caught anything. The inspector spotted the traps and asked that they be removed from the premises as seen on her report. The traps were removed on the spot during the inspection on March 12th. The removal was confirmed in the March 18th follow-up report. From reading the March 12th report, you can NOT infer that the club had a rodent problem."

Journos aren't the only elite Washington group to have to deal with a little grossness, though. A city health inspector had some bad things to say about the State Department's cafeteria on March 16. "Observed employee in the front service line without gloves during food prep wearing fingernail polish..." (Insert your own joke about hands-on diplomacy here.)

A new report [PDF] indicates that 14 percent of men who have sex with men (aka MSMs) test positive for HIV—"a rate five times higher than that of the entire city’s adults and adolescents."

Thus: "Based on these high rates, the Department of Health has updated its guidelines for DC men who have sex with men, recommending they get tested twice a year for HIV," according to a city release. The city has previously recommended that all citizens get tested yearly.

More scary stats: "More than 40% were unaware if they were HIV positive prior to the study....Nearly 75% of men testing positive were older and more men of color were positive....More than one-third did not know their last partner’s HIV status....Over 40% did not use condoms."

Also: "Contrary to some perceptions, younger men generally had safer sex behaviors; while older men got tested less and used condoms less and had more sex partners," says the report.

The good(ish) news is that surveys of MSMs in Baltimore, Los Angeles, Miami, New York and San Francisco showed infection rates of 25 percent or greater. And D.C.'s ahead of all those jurisdictions in testing rates. So there's that.

Witnesses report that Ricks was led out of the clinic in handcuffs that day.

According to court documents filed the day after the arrest, Ricks is accused of essentially double-billing the District government—getting paid by a contractor for the Child and Family Services Agency for mentoring kids during the same hours he was listing on his Department of Health timesheet. He is accused by authorities of doing this on no less than 116 occasions from October 2006 to February 2008.

Ricks allegedly billed the contractor, Culbreth & Culbreth, for $4,170 while he was supposed to be doing his day job, according to an investigator's affidavit. He was paid $12,739.71 in District wages for his clinic job during those hours.

This is not the first time the detox clinic has seen someone accused of double-dipping. In September 2007, the clinic's medical director, Charles Hall, was arrested for working at the Court Services and Offender Supervision Agency while on clinic time. Hall and his lawyer, Fred Cooke, are currently litigating the case in Superior Court.

A Petworth resident, Ricks has worked for the District since 1990. He earned at least $74,888 a year.

According to a city spokesperson, Ricks has been placed on administrative leave for the time being. His attorney, a public defender, refused to comment; phone calls to Ricks' home weren't answered, and LL was unable to leave a message.

The case was investigated by the city inspector general after receiving an anonymous tip. The District attorney general's office is prosecuting the matter. A court date has been scheduled for Sept. 28.

Is the District next?

LL is talking letter grades here, specifically as applied to the cleanliness of restaurants, markets, taverns, and other establishments slinging comestibles. Anyone who's been to L.A. has seen a big block "A," "B," or even "C" posted prominently outside all food-serving establishments. (You don't stay open with anything less than that.) The thinking goes that the public scrutiny forces restaurants to aim for a level of sanitation beyond the bare minimum.

Ward 3 Councilmember Mary Cheh says she's introducing a bill at tomorrow's legislative meeting that would implement an L.A.-style system here. In a press release, Cheh points to a "definitive study" that "13.1 percent decrease in the number of foodborne-disease hospitalizations in Los Angeles County in the year following the implementation of the program."

So is this a valuable consumer protection measure or creeping nannyism at a time when restaurateurs are facing economic hardship?

Orange County, Calif., recently decided it was the latter, and rejected a letter-grade system. Don't expect a warm reception from local restaurant owners—LL will update with any official reaction he can muster.

Sandy Ethridge, 59, was pronounced dead at Prince George's Hospital Center on the morning of Dec. 15. He had been admitted on Dec. 11 to the Addiction Prevention and Recovery Administration's detox facility on the D.C. General campus, according to sister Annie Holder.

Ethridge, a resident of Potomac Gardens in Capitol Hill, had been sent to detox under a court order, Holder says; he had been admitted to the facility several times before for treatment of drug and alcohol addictions. On Monday morning, according to an account related to Holder by a detective investigating the death, Ethridge was seen by a fellow patient using a needle and syringe to inject drugs in a facility bathroom. When patients were awakened for breakfast a few hours later, according to the account, he was discovered to be unconscious and unresponsive and was taken to the Maryland hospital.

"I said, 'Well, where did he get [the drugs] from?" Holder says.

An investigation into the cause of death is pending, according to the Maryland medical examiner's office. A call to the investigating detective today was not immediately returned.

If Ethridge was indeed determined to have died from a drug overdose, it raises serious questions about security at the APRA facility, which is charged with providing indigent District residents with inpatient addiction treatment. Facility policies require strictly controlled access to the facility and thorough searches of patients upon admittance.

Dr. Pierre Vigilance, head of the District's health department, declined to comment on the specifics of Ethridge's death. "The passing of any client is unfortunate. We take this situation very seriously, and we are in the process of carefully reviewing this matter. Out of respect for our client's privacy we are unable to provide details of his demise at this time."