Marijuana Laws and the Work Place–The Ongoing Saga

The Colorado Marijuana Law, allowing citizens pot for medical use, never did address certain issues.  The main issue that comes back to bite employers is how they should deal with employees who are under the influence of marijuana in the work place.  While the law prohibits actual pot smoking in the work place, for medical purposes or otherwise, it never did address the issue of people coming to work stoned.  I wrote about this earlier in an article entitled, Background Checks and Employees Using Medical Marijuana.

So what to do? Background checks reveal of course that the employee or job applicant has a legitimate permit for medical marijuana use.  Should this be the same as if he, say, had a prescription for other drugs?  Obviously, perspective changes when someone is working with Valium or Vicodin in his system, as long as that employee has a legitimate prescription.   Xanax and Prozac are also received in the workplace with less rancor than medical marijuana.  Yest, the aforementioned drugs can also alter the consciousness.  In fact, they are designed to alter the consciousness.

Oregon and Montana have shed some light on the subject by declaring through the courts that employees do not enjoy job protection under the current medical marijuana laws.  Rulings in  Washington State also indicate that any employee filing suit for loss of job because of medical marijuana would be coming up against a dead end.

According to the Grand Junction Free Press, more people have obtained medical marijuana cards.  Stands to reason.  Here in California it seems like almost mandated that everyone have a medical marijuana card.

I guess for the time being anyway, medical marijuana and employee job protection falls into a very gray area.   Hazy, in fact.  So what it comes down to is the discretion and particular concerns of each individual employer.  Some will not tolerate employees showing up to the job stone.  Some will keep and eye on them.   To make sure there are no performance issues or dangers in the workplace that the employee would cause to himself or fellow workers.  And some employers, depending on the job and the business, might not care at all.  In fact, in a good many cases, workers have been coming to work stoned for years.  Without or without a permit.

Which is why there is the need to conduct background checks, including drug tests, if you are concerned with drug use.  Perhaps it is best that it is up to the employer.  Employers know what they need from an employee and what they can live with and what they can live without.

Meanwhile, there is no smoking dope on the job.  Not even in the bathroom.  Not in your car.  Yeah, sure.