A medical marijuana employment rights bill, which would protect hundreds of thousands of medical marijuana patients in California from employment discrimination, passed the State Senate today. AB2279 had already passed the State Assembly in May, which means the bill now heads to the Governor's desk. Advocates expect the bill to reach Schwarzenegger's desk in the next few weeks.
AB2279, introduced in February by Assemblymember Mark Leno (D-San Francisco) and co-authored by Assemblymembers Patty Berg (D-Eureka), Loni Hancock (D-Berkeley) and Lori Saldaña (D-San Diego), reverses a January California Supreme Court decision in the case Ross v. RagingWire. Support for the bill has been widespread, coming from labor, business, and health groups at the local and national level.
"Now that both houses of the California legislature have voted in favor of employment rights for medical marijuana patients, the onus is on Governor Schwarzenegger to do the right thing," said Joe Elford, Chief Counsel with Americans for Safe Access, the medical marijuana advocacy group that argued the case before the Court and a sponsor of the bill. "The Governor has a chance to include medical marijuana patients as productive members of society, thereby protecting the jobs of thousands of Californians with serious illnesses such as cancer and HIV/AIDS."
http://www.safeaccessnow.org/article.php?id=5559