DETROIT — Steven Karapandza says his use of prescription
marijuana to help ease the pain of daily migraine headaches is none of his
boss’s business.
He never smokes pot on the job. He doesn’t come to work
high, and he gets his work done without fail, he said.
“In my mind, it’s like any other medication,” said
Karapandza, 28, a Sterling Heights, Mich., resident and cell phone repairman.
“You wouldn’t go up to your boss and tell him you’ve got a prescription
for Vicodin.”
Karapandza is among 5,108 Michiganders registered as medical
marijuana users since a new law passed last fall by voters took effect in
April.
Another 2,092 people have been approved as caregivers. About
1,100 applications have been denied under the law that permits marijuana
prescriptions for pain relief among people who are chronically and terminally
ill.
For employers, the issue is less clear-cut than the way
Karapandza sees it.
“It’s hard enough to run a business,” said Kurt
Sherwood, an attorney with Miller Canfield, a big Detroit-based law firm that
held a seminar last week addressing employment issues, including medical
marijuana. “I can see this creating a nightmare scenario.”
Employers are facing tough issues as they try to navigate
the state’s fledgling medical marijuana law, such as the difference between
“smoke” and “ingest.”
Or whether company policies on drug testing still apply in a
state where 63 percent of voters approved a new law last fall allowing medical
use of marijuana.
During an employment seminar hosted last week by the Miller
Canfield law firm in Troy, business owners heard they’re in limbo, at least for
now.
Since the law took effect in April, more than 7,200 people
have been registered either as users of medical marijuana or their caregivers.
So far, no employee or job applicant has filed a lawsuit saying he or she was
fired or denied a job because of a positive drug test.
“We check the filings every day,” said attorney
Kurt McCamman of Miller Canfield. “We just don’t know where Michigan is
headed.”
There are 13 states, including Michigan, that have approved
decriminalization of medical marijuana use. In the lawsuits filed by employees
fired for having positive drug tests — even though the employees were approved
as medical marijuana users — so far all have been decided in favor of the
employers.
Michigan’s law is confusing, McCamman said, with conflicting
language on whether a medical marijuana user is protected against disciplinary
action.
One section of the law says a registered user can’t be
“subject to arrest, prosecution or penalty in any manner or denied any
right or privilege including … disciplinary action by a business … for the
medical use of marijuana.”
Another portion of the law says “nothing in this act
shall be construed to require an employer to accommodate the ingestion of
marijuana in any workplace or any employee working while under the influence of
marijuana.”
A third section says no one can possess or use medical
marijuana on a school bus or on school grounds, but smoking pot is expressly
prohibited only on public transportation or in any public place. It’s unclear,
McCamman said, whether it’s OK for a certified user to eat, for example, marijuana-laced
brownies in a public place.
“Our advice is you need to continue to enforce your
regular rules because if you don’t you’re opening up a Pandora’s box,”
said Miller Canfield attorney Kurt Sherwood.
Clouding the issue even more is a decision last month by the
U.S. Justice Department not to pursue criminal charges against medical
marijuana producers and users in states where it’s legal.
“That’s a very significant retreat from federal
policy,” said Mark de Bernardo, executive director of the Institute for a
Drug Free Workplace. “Marijuana is a dangerous drug that detrimentally
affects the workplace. It has impacts on health care costs, productivity,
accidents and employee turnover.”
Gary Francisco, executive director of the Michigan Medical
Marijuana Project, which pushed for passage of the law last year, said he’s not
so concerned about the law’s implication in the workplace.
“Nobody is arguing that we should be impaired in the
workplace,” he said. “We’re more concerned about uneven enforcement
by police.”
Via McClatchy-Tribune News Service.
