California Is Not Oregon: What Decriminalization Resolutions Actually Do, and the Two Laws That Actually Changed

Every few weeks someone tells me that psilocybin is decriminalized in California. It is not. Not in Oakland, not in Santa Cruz, not in San Francisco, not in Berkeley, not anywhere in the state.

I do not say that to be pedantic. I say it because the gap between what people believe about California law and what California law says is wide enough to put someone in a courtroom, and because two things did change in California recently — quietly, in 2025 — and almost nobody is talking about either of them.

What the statute actually says

California’s controlled substance schedules are in the Health and Safety Code. The hallucinogens sit in Schedule I at § 11054, subdivision (d):

Substance	Citation
DMT	§ 11054(d)(10)
Ibogaine	§ 11054(d)(11)
LSD	§ 11054(d)(12)
Mescaline	§ 11054(d)(14)
Peyote	§ 11054(d)(15)
Psilocybin	§ 11054(d)(18)
Psilocyn	§ 11054(d)(19)

Note the statute’s spelling — “psilocyn,” not psilocin. Small thing, but if you are drafting or searching, it matters.

Which offense statute applies is genuinely counterintuitive, and I see it gotten wrong regularly:

§ 11377(a) covers simple possession of most § 11054(d) hallucinogens — psilocybin, psilocyn, DMT, ibogaine, LSD — except paragraphs (13), (14), (15) and (20). It also reaches Schedule III non-narcotics, which is how ketamine possession gets charged.
§ 11350(a) expressly picks up § 11054(d)(14), (15) and (20). So mescaline and peyote possession are charged under § 11350, not § 11377.
§ 11379.2 is the ketamine-specific sale and possession-for-sale statute, keyed to § 11056(g). It is a wobbler (chargeable as a felony or misdemeanor).

A quirk worth knowing, and one that has actual defense value: MDMA is not listed anywhere in § 11054. What is listed, at § 11054(d)(6), is MDA — 3,4-methylenedioxy amphetamine — a different compound. MDMA has never been added by name. In People v. Davis (2013) 57 Cal.4th 353, the California Supreme Court held that evidence of MDMA’s chemical name alone was insufficient to sustain a conviction, and reversed for insufficient evidence. The prosecution has to affirmatively prove, by expert testimony or stipulation, that the substance contains a listed substance or satisfies the controlled substance analog definition at § 11401.

Ketamine, for its part, is Schedule III at § 11056(g), and a “dangerous drug” under Business & Professions Code § 4022. It is the only substance in this conversation with a lawful clinical pathway in California — and only when prescribed and administered by an appropriately licensed prescriber.

What the local resolutions actually do

Five California cities have adopted measures people describe as decriminalization. Every one of them is a non-binding resolution, not an ordinance. None of them repeals anything.

Oakland, June 4, 2019 — the broadest of the group. Directs that no city funds or resources be used to enforce criminal penalties for adult use and possession of entheogenic plants, makes related investigation and arrest “amongst the lowest law enforcement priority,” and urges the Alameda County District Attorney to cease prosecution. It does not address synthetics, commercial sale, minors, or impaired driving.
Santa Cruz, January 28, 2020 — no city resources for investigation or arrest of persons 21 and over solely for personal use and possession of entheogenic plants and fungi. Excludes commercial sale and distribution; anything involving minors remains investigable.
Arcata, October 2021 — Declares related enforcement “not a public safety priority,” and then expressly disclaims almost everything: it does not legalize under state or federal law, does not reach synthetics like LSD or MDMA, does not bar penalties for public disturbance, impaired driving, use around minors, or possession at schools, does not apply on the university’s property, and does not authorize commercial sale or manufacturing.
San Francisco, September 2022 — the weakest. Five of its six provisions merely urge — the Mayor to direct lobbyists, state and federal officers to support decriminalization, local law enforcement to deprioritize arrests. The only binding directive is to the clerk, to transmit copies.
Berkeley, July 11, 2023 — city policy “to de-emphasize the use of City funds and resources” for enforcement of possession for personal use, and for cultivation, processing and preparation. It excludes peyote and peyote-derived mescaline entirely, at the request of Native American organizations on sustainability and poaching grounds. It excludes all synthetics. And it excludes any transfer, distribution, or sharing — personal self-ingestion only.

Here is the legal architecture that matters. A city cannot amend the Health and Safety Code. State law occupies this field. The District Attorney is a county officer, not a city officer, and retains independent charging authority regardless of what a city council resolves. The Attorney General retains independent authority. And federal law is untouched by any of it.

So when someone tells me their retreat model is fine because it operates in Oakland, what they have is a city council’s stated funding preference, revocable at any council meeting, that binds no prosecutor. That is not a legal opinion you can build a business on. It is not a defense. And it is emphatically not a shield against a federal Controlled Substances Act theory.

The two reform bills that failed, and why the failures tell you something

SB 58 (Wiener, 2023) would have decriminalized personal possession of psilocybin, psilocyn, DMT and mescaline for adults 21 and over, with specific quantity limits. The enrolled version did not include ibogaine. It was vetoed October 7, 2023, and the veto was sustained on January 25, 2024.

The veto message is worth reading closely, because it is not a rejection of the underlying idea. The Governor wrote that he supports “new opportunities to address mental health through psychedelic medicines,” citing “[b]oth peer-reviewed science and powerful personal anecdotes.” His objection was sequencing: “this bill would decriminalize possession prior to these guidelines going into place, and I cannot sign it.” He asked for legislation with “regulated treatment guidelines — replete with dosing information, therapeutic guidelines, rules to prevent against exploitation during guided treatments, and medical clearance of no underlying psychoses.”

SB 1012 (Wiener, 2024) was the answer to that request. It would have created a Board of Regulated Psychedelic Facilitators and a Division of Regulated Psychedelic-Assisted Therapy, covering DMT, mescaline, MDMA, psilocybin and psilocyn, for adults 21 and over, at approved locations under supervised administration only. No take-home, no retail. It contemplated regulations by January 1, 2026 and facilitator applications from April 1, 2026.

It was held in Senate Appropriations under submission on May 16, 2024. Killed on the suspense file. It never reached the Senate floor.

A companion effort, AB 941 (Waldron), would have convened a state workgroup to recommend a therapeutic framework. It passed the Assembly 58–0 and then died when its Senate Health hearing was canceled at the author’s request on July 1, 2024.

Multiple ballot initiative efforts in 2023 and 2024 failed to qualify for want of signatures, and no psychedelics measure appears among the certified 2026 California ballot measures.

So the reform record in California is three vetoed or dead bills and three failed initiatives. Nothing has replaced them.

The two laws that did change, which almost nobody mentions

Now the part I actually wanted to write.

AB 1103 — the research pathway

AB 1103 (Ward), Chapter 571 of the Statutes of 2025, signed October 10, 2025, passed the Assembly 75–0 and the Senate 39–0, with a 79–0 concurrence vote, and took effect January 1, 2026.

It creates an expedited review pathway at the Research Advisory Panel of California for Schedule I and II research applications that already carry independent peer review — from NIH, the Department of Defense, the National Science Foundation, the Heffter Research Institute, or a comparable institutional group with prior research or grant review experience — plus IRB or IACUC approval. Panel members assigned to expedited review (two or more) may approve without a full panel vote, and are not treated as a “state body” under the Bagley-Keene Open Meeting Act for that purpose. The bill amends Government Code §§ 11121.1 and 11126 and Health & Safety Code §§ 11213, 11480, 11480.5 and 11481, and adds §§ 11480.1 and 11480.3. It sunsets January 1, 2028.

The Senate Judiciary analysis frames it explicitly around psychedelic clinical trials. If you are a California institution or sponsor trying to run a Schedule I study, this is the single most useful thing the Legislature has done in this space — and it has a two-year clock on it.

SB 351 — corporate practice of medicine, codified

SB 351, Chapter 409 of the Statutes of 2025, signed October 6, 2025, effective January 1, 2026, adds Division 1.7 (commencing with § 1190) to the Health and Safety Code.

It codifies California’s corporate practice of medicine doctrine — previously living mostly in Business & Professions Code § 2400, case law and Medical Board guidance — and points it at private equity and hedge fund involvement in physician and dental practices. A lay entity may not control hiring and firing on clinical competency, coding and billing, medical equipment selection, patient records, diagnostic testing decisions, referrals, patient volume, or provider hours. It voids post-termination noncompete clauses and clauses barring a provider from disparaging or commenting on patient care and ethical or professional concerns. Enforcement runs through the Attorney General, and offending provisions are void and unenforceable as against public policy.

For anyone operating a ketamine clinic through a management services organization structure — which is most of them — this has been a live compliance obligation for nine months.

If your MSO agreement was papered before 2026, it was drafted against a different statute than the one now in force.

Where this leaves a California operator or clinician

Plainly: there is no lawful psilocybin, MDMA, ibogaine, DMT or mescaline service model in California today. There is no facilitator licensure, because SB 1012 died. And there is no board guidance for therapists. Neither the Board of Psychology nor the Board of Behavioral Sciences has published a position statement on psychedelic-assisted therapy; the closest thing on the record is a BBS bill analysis of AB 941 from April 2024, in which the Board recorded its position as “none.” That silence is itself worth knowing, because it means a licensee has no safe harbor to point to.

For a licensed clinician, the exposure runs through general provisions rather than psychedelic-specific ones. For psychologists, Business & Professions Code § 2960 supplies the hooks: conviction of a substantially related crime (subd. (a)), gross negligence in practice (subd. (j)), violations of the chapter (subd. (k)), and aiding or abetting the unlawful practice of psychology (subd. (l)). A criminal conviction under § 11377 or § 11350 is a licensure problem, not just a criminal one.

Ketamine remains the only lawful clinical pathway — and that is the subject of next week’s post, because the ketamine side of this field is having a much harder year than most people running clinics seem to realize.

Deja A. Correia, Esq. | The Correia Law Firm | San Diego, California

This post is general information about publicly available California law. It is not legal advice, it does not create an attorney-client relationship, and it is not a substitute for advice about your specific situation. If you are facing a criminal charge or a licensing matter, talk to a lawyer about your facts.