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Oregon Supreme Court to review appellate court ruling
The Associated Press | 9/16/2005

SALEM, Ore. – The Oregon Supreme Court says it will review an appellate court ruling that suggests employers make allowances for workers who use medical marijuana.
Robert Washburn, a former millwright at the Columbia Forest products plant at Klamath Falls, had a state-issued card allowing him to use marijuana to ease neck and muscle pain that disrupted his sleep. But the company, which prohibited workers from coming to the plant with controlled substances in their system, fired Washburn in 2001 after he failed several urine tests.

Washburn sued the company, claiming it should have made an allowance for his disability.

A circuit court dismissed the lawsuit, citing a provision in the state medical marijuana law that employers don't have to "accommodate the medical use of marijuana in the workplace."

The appeals court disagreed, saying the test results didn't establish that Washburn had used the drug at work. Moreover, the appeals court said the lower court should decide whether, under the circumstances of the case, Washburn's employer should have had to allow his medical marijuana use.

The Supreme Court is to hear arguments in the case on Nov. 7.

Business groups say employers are highly concerned over the prospect of having to tolerate workers who use drugs.

J.L. Wilson, Oregon director of the National Federation of Independent Business, said Wednesday that the appellate court's "absurd" ruling "clearly took away the ability of employers to manage workplace practices and keep people out of harm's way,"

But David Fidanque, executive director of the Oregon arm of the American Civil Liberties Union, said employers should have to make allowances for workers using marijuana legally to relieve medical problems.

"It's important for the law to understand that medical marijuana patients are disabled Oregonians who are entitled to accommodations like other disabled people," he said.

Businesses, however, fear the appeals court ruling opens the door for unreasonable requirements.

"I don't think even proponents of medical marijuana thought we would have to accommodate it in the workplace," said Lisa Trussell of Associated Oregon Industries, a major business lobbying group.

"An employee could take a break in some parking lot and smoke medical marijuana and come back to work, and unless I could prove impairment, I couldn't do anything about it," she said.

Ten other states also have medical marijuana laws. They are Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Montana, Nevada, Vermont and Washington state. Arizona has a law allowing medical marijuana, but no active program.

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Liberty4All

Business groups say employers are highly concerned over the prospect of having to tolerate workers who use drugs.

Workers who use drugs??? So does this mean that employers are concerned that a worker may have a beer after work? Or how about drinking coffee before work? The whole idea that marijuana is a "drug" while beer and coffee aren't is complete bullsh*t. If someone drinks a beer, do people call them drug users? If not, then why do people consider cannabis users drug users? This is a double standard that is based upon discrimination and oppression of cannabis users.

An employee could take a break in some parking lot and smoke medical marijuana and come back to work, and unless I could prove impairment, I couldn't do anything about it," she said.

Yes, and an employee could also take a break and have a few shots of whiskey as well. This would be far more detrimental to the worker's ability to do their job. Again, more discrimination against cannabis users.

CheebaMonkey

"I don't think even proponents of medical marijuana thought we would have to accommodate it in the workplace," said Lisa Trussell of Associated Oregon Industries, a major business lobbying group.

I'm sure they did. After all, people are allowed to use their prescription medicine during work, as long as it doesn't interfere with their job.

"An employee could take a break in some parking lot and smoke medical marijuana and come back to work, and unless I could prove impairment, I couldn't do anything about it," she said.

If they're not impaired, then what's the problem? Treat it like any other prescription medicine.

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Buzzby

The problem, from an employer's point of view, is proving impairment. I don't know about you, but when I smoke I perform tasks much more slowly than I do when I haven't smoked. I'm much more easily distracted. I make a lot more mistakes. I have short-term memory problems. These are things that would be difficult to prove as impairment but which would reduce an employee's efficiency. If I'm paying someone to do a job I expect a certain level of efficiency.

On the other side, many medical marijuana users have a high tolerance and smoking doesn't impair them very much at all.

It's not a simple problem. If someone is drinking on the job there is a simple test to show blood-alcohol level which correlates with an approximate level of impairment. There is no corresponding test that indicates a level of impairment with marijuana use.

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CheebaMonkey

You don't need sort of breathalyzer to determine if they're impaired or not. All you have to do is examine their work performance after they start taking their medicine.

There are plenty (thousands, perhaps?) of other prescription medicines that may impair someone, but aren't detectable in the way you mentioned. OTC medicines can even do this. Yet I don't see them clamoring about that.

All they're asking for is that the same standards be applied to MMJ users. Doesn't seem unreasonable to me.

 

CheebaMonkey

To add a little more, it seems that employees using prescription drugs are protected under Oregon law (I dunno about Schedule I drugs though). Marinol (a Schedule III drug) would be protected, so it really doesn't make any sense to tolerate Marinol but not marijuana.

That is, of course, if the law protects users of Schedule I drugs. I don't know if that's an issue or not.