Coalition fears a bill advantageous to large Cannabis investors will pass unknowingly.  $5,000. has been accumulated to date…If you can help, please call 316-558-0883-Debby Moore, Hemp Lady
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Pubdate: Tue, 27 Jan 2015   Source: Washington Times (DC)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/492   Author: Andrea Noble

DISTRICT MARIJUANA CITATIONS OFTEN IGNORED, TARGET POOREST RESIDENTS
D.C. police have written more than 250 tickets for marijuana
possession in the roughly six months since the District relaxed its
marijuana laws, but the vast majority of citations have simply been
ignored, an analysis by The Washington Times has found.

 From July 17 through Jan. 7, the Metropolitan Police Department
issued 251 tickets for marijuana possession, with 47 percent issued
to people in the department's Seventh District, which lies east of
the Anacostia River and includes some of the city's poorest neighborhoods.

An analysis of the adjudication of five months' worth of marijuana
tickets shows that violators are ignoring the penalties - with an
estimated 70 percent failing to pay the $25 fine. Such widespread
noncompliance was predicted early on by police, noting that the
decriminalization law doesn't provide any enforcement mechanism.

"When the proposed legislation was discussed in Council, MPD advised
that there was likely to be a low compliance rate with civil
violations for which an individual has no property interest or
privilege to protect - such as real property, a professional license
or a driver's license," said police spokeswoman Gwendolyn Crump.
"There is no follow-up mechanism for nontraffic civil violations,
such as the marijuana or littering tickets, as individuals are not
required to provide proof of identity when they receive a ticket."

The District's marijuana decriminalization, which went into effect
July 17, replaces criminal penalties for possession of an ounce or
less of marijuana with a civil violation and a $25 fine. Smoking
marijuana in public remains an arrestable offense.

The city's Office of Administrative Hearings provided details about
the adjudication of 225 of the 251 tickets - all of those issued
through Dec. 22.

An analysis of those 225 tickets shows that 88 tickets were still
considered open by the city (violators have 14 days to respond to
tickets). However, of the 137 remaining tickets, 96 tickets - or 70
percent of the closed tickets - have gone unpaid and are considered
outstanding, with the fine doubling to $50.

Violators have paid the fine in 29 cases, another six tickets were
dismissed, five were listed as "rejected," and one was challenged and
overturned, according to the Office of Administrative Hearings.

D.C. Council member David Grosso, a proponent of marijuana
legalization, would rather see the civil fines done away with
altogether. But he says the notion that the council has enacted laws
the city can't enforce is bothersome.

"I think government falls apart if you don't enforce the rules you
put in place," said Mr. Grosso, at-large independent. "If we're going
to put these kinds of penalties in place, then I think we need to put
something in place to enforce them."

The fate of a ballot initiative passed in November that legalizes the
possession, but not the sale, of marijuana remains uncertain as local
leaders and federal lawmakers argue over the legality of whether the
measure can take effect. Congress has since approved a budget bill
that includes language banning the city from spending money to loosen
its drug laws. The federal government still outlaws the use,
possession, production and sale of marijuana.

Ticket or arrest?

In the meantime, if decriminalization remains the new norm for law
enforcement, ticketing and arrest data show that the effects of the
new set of marijuana laws are not being felt evenly across the District.

Marijuana-related arrests are way down from previous years, with MPD
reporting 233 such arrests from July 17 through Jan. 7, compared to a
total of 5,759 marijuana arrests in 2011. But whether marijuana users
face arrest for public use or a ticket for possession varies
depending on where in town they are stopped.

The most civil fines for marijuana possession - 118 tickets - were
written in MPD's Seventh District.

For police to issue a ticket for marijuana possession, officers first
must observe someone with the drug. It's a scenario that most often
plays out when officers already have stopped a person for another
reason, according to police.

"Roughly half of the tickets are being issued when officers find the
marijuana in a search of an individual arrested for a different
offense," said Ms. Crump, the police spokeswoman.

Arrests for marijuana consumption in public, on the other hand, tend
to occur after police receive a complaint, she said.

Arrests for smoking marijuana happen most frequently in MPD's Third
District - which includes nighttime hot spots such as the U Street
corridor. From July 17 through Jan. 7, police made 58 out of a total
of 99 arrests for marijuana consumption in the Third District.

"These arrests are based on officer observation, which may be
preceded by a call for service for the issue," Ms. Crump said.

Metropolitan Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier said that even before
decriminalization took effect, police did not actively pursue many
marijuana possession charges.

"Officers for the last 20 years have avoided possession of marijuana
arrests because they've not been prosecuted for many, many years,"
Chief Lanier said Tuesday on NewsChannel 8's "NewsTalk with Bruce
Depuyt." "It was a waste of time for officers to make possession of
marijuana arrests."

A police 'tool'

For marijuana users, ticketing under decriminalization has been a
welcome alternative.

Police seem to be using the civil citations as a way to issue a
warning to those they find smoking in public, said Adam Eidinger,
head of the pro-marijuana legalization group the D.C. Cannabis Campaign.

"I've talked to three different people who were stopped for smoking
in public, and all three said they were given tickets," Mr. Eidinger
said. "I feel like [police] are using a lot of discretion in public use."

Who is being stopped for marijuana violations, and where they are
being stopped, are questions of great interest to local activists
seeking to ensure that the new laws are not being enforced in a biased manner.

The D.C. Council approved decriminalization as a way to end arrests
that had been affecting black residents disproportionately.

Seema Sadanandan, policy and advocacy director for the ACLU of the
Nation's Capital, said police tactics such as stop-and-frisk and
pretextual traffic stops are used more widely in some police
districts as a means to identify potential criminal activity.

"We suspect that these aggressive tactics produce the higher rates of
marijuana arrests in some areas of the District," Ms. Sadanandan
said. "If you stop enough people, a certain percentage in any
neighborhood is going to possess marijuana, and I think that is what
the high numbers of citations in certain police districts represent."

Data provided by the Office of Administrative Hearings does not list
the age or race of those who received civil citations.

A report by the Washington Lawyers' Committee found that in 2011,
about 56 percent of all the city's drug arrests occurred in three
wards - with 18 percent being made in Ward 8, which overlaps the
MPD's Seventh District.

"I think that the heavy concentration of citations in Ward 8 and
areas downtown are an indicator of high levels of police contact and
subsequent 'consent' searches in which people reveal their possession
of small amounts of marijuana," Ms. Sadanandan said. "These incidents
of marijuana possession are likely the tip of the iceberg in terms of
police contact and searches in the District's black communities."

Despite assurances by Chief Lanier that marijuana enforcement is not
a police priority, Mr. Grosso expressed concern that officers will
continue to use decriminalization as a means to stop and detain people.

"The thing I was always worried about with [decriminalization] is
that it's still a tool in the tool belt of police to get in
somebody's business on the street," he said. "I think the police will
use every tool that they have."
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Pubdate: Tue, 27 Jan 2015   Source: Wall Street Journal (US)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/487   Author: Devlin Barrett

U.S. SPIES ON MILLIONS OF CARS

DEA Uses License-Plate Readers to Build Database for Federal, Local Authorities

WASHINGTON - The Justice Department has been building a national
database to track in real time the movement of vehicles around the
U.S., a secret domestic intelligence-gathering program that scans and
stores hundreds of millions of records about motorists, according to
current and former officials and government documents.

The primary goal of the license-plate tracking program, run by the
Drug Enforcement Administration, is to seize cars, cash and other
assets to combat drug trafficking, according to one government
document. But the database's use has expanded to hunt for vehicles
associated with numerous other potential crimes, from kidnappings to
killings to rape suspects, say people familiar with the matter.

Officials have publicly said that they track vehicles near the border
with Mexico to help fight drug cartels. What hasn't been previously
disclosed is that the DEA has spent years working to expand the
database "throughout the United States," according to one email
reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.

Many state and local law-enforcement agencies are accessing the
database for a variety of investigations, according to people
familiar with the program, putting a wealth of information in the
hands of local officials who can track vehicles in real time on major roadways.

The database raises new questions about privacy and the scope of
government surveillance. The existence of the program and its
expansion were described in interviews with current and former
government officials, and in documents obtained by the American Civil
Liberties Union through a Freedom of Information Act request and
reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. It is unclear if any court
oversees or approves the intelligence-gathering.

A spokesman for Justice Department, which includes the DEA, said the
program complies with federal law. "It is not new that the DEA uses
the license-plate reader program to arrest criminals and stop the
flow of drugs in areas of high trafficking intensity," the spokesman said.

Sen. Patrick Leahy, senior Democrat on the Senate Judiciary
Committee, said the government's use of license-plate readers "raises
significant privacy concerns. The fact that this intrusive technology
is potentially being used to expand the reach of the government's
asset-forfeiture efforts is of even greater concern."

The senator called for "additional accountability" and said Americans
shouldn't have to fear " their locations and movements are constantly
being tracked and stored in a massive government database."

The DEA program collects data about vehicle movements, including
time, direction and location, from high-tech cameras placed
strategically on major highways. Many devices also record visual
images of drivers and passengers, which are sometimes clear enough
for investigators to confirm identities, according to DEA documents
and people familiar with the program.

The documents show that the DEA also uses license-plate readers
operated by state, local and federal law-enforcement agencies to feed
into its own network and create a far-reaching, constantly updating
database of electronic eyes scanning traffic on the roads to steer
police toward suspects.

The law-enforcement scanners are different from those used to collect tolls.

By 2011, the DEA had about 100 cameras feeding into the database, the
documents show. On Interstate 95 in New Jersey, license-plate readers
feed data to the DEA - giving law-enforcement personnel around the
country the ability to search for a suspect vehicle on one of the
country's busiest highways. One undated internal document shows the
program also gathers data from license-plate readers in Florida and Georgia.

"Any database that collects detailed location information about
Americans not suspected of crimes raises very serious privacy
questions," said Jay Stanley, a senior policy analyst at the ACLU.
"It's unconscionable that technology with such far-reaching potential
would be deployed in such secrecy. People might disagree about
exactly how we should use such powerful surveillance technologies,
but it should be democratically decided, it shouldn't be done in secret."

License-plate readers are already used in the U.S. by companies to
collect debts and repossess vehicles, and by local police departments
to solve crimes.

In 2010, the DEA said in internal documents that the database aided
in the seizure of 98 kilograms of cocaine, 8,336 kilograms of
marijuana and the collection of $866,380. It also has been connected
to the Amber Alert system, to help authorities find abducted
children, according to people familiar with the program.

One email written in 2010 said the primary purpose of the program was
asset forfeiture""a controversial practice in which law-enforcement
agencies seize cars, cash and other valuables from suspected
criminals. The practice is increasingly coming under attack because
of instances when law-enforcement officers take such assets without
evidence of a crime.

The document said, "DEA has designed this program to assist with
locating, identifying, and seizing bulk currency, guns, and other
illicit contraband moving along the southwest border and throughout
the United States. With that said, we want to insure we can collect
and manage all the data and IT responsibilities that will come with
the work to insure the program meets its goals, of which asset
forfeiture is primary.'

A number of lawmakers have been planning to offer legislation to rein
in what they call abuses of asset-forfeiture laws. The Justice
Department recently announced it was ending its role in one type of
asset seizure, known as "adoptions," a process by which local
officials take property, then have the assets adopted and sold by the
federal government. Often, that allows the local agency to keep a
higher percentage of the money from the seizure. The policy change
doesn't affect the bulk of asset seizures in the U.S.

The national vehicle database program was launched in 2008 and opened
to participating state and local authorities a year later. The
initial focus was on tracking cars moving on or near the Southwest
border, in order to follow the movements of drugs and drug money,
according to officials and documents. Requests to search the database
are handled by the El Paso Intelligence Center in Texas, which is
known as EPIC in law enforcement circles. EPIC is staffed around the
clock to both take in and send out information about "hits" on
requested license plates.

The effort began in border states like Arizona, California, Nevada,
New Mexico and Texas, but the goal has always been expansion,
according to current and former federal officials and documents.
Officials wouldn't say how many other states are now feeding data
into the system, citing concerns that disclosing such information
could help criminals avoid detection.

The federal program hasn't always been embraced by states. At a 2012
hearing, Utah lawmakers balked when DEA officials sought to have
license-plate readers in the state feed into the database - one of
the few times the agency has provided even limited facts about the
program. That same year, a DEA official made a general reference to
the program at a congressional field hearing about the Southwest
border, saying it was built to monitor and target vehicles used to
transport bulk cash and other contraband.

Under questioning from Utah lawmakers, the agency said the program
began with an effort to track drug shipments on the Southwest border,
and the government wanted to add monitors on major drug-trafficking
routes like Utah's Interstate 15, in order to hunt a wide array of
criminals. That alarmed privacy advocates, who noted at the time that
the DEA's map of major drug routes included most of the national
highway system.

The agency has reduced the time it holds the data from two years to 3
months, according to a Justice Department spokesman.

The EPIC database allows any police agency that participates to
quickly search records of many states for information about a
vehicle. One May 2010 redacted email says: "Anyone can request
information from our [license-plate reader] program, federal, state,
or local, just need to be a vetted EPIC user."|"

The data are also shared with U.S. border officials, according to an
undated memorandum of understanding between the DEA and Customs and
Border Protection officials. That document shows the two agencies
specifically said that lawmakers might never specifically fund the
work, stating: "this in no way implies that Congress will appropriate
funds for such expenditures."

The disclosure of the DEA's license-plate reader database comes on
the heels of other revelations in recent months about the Justice
Department, as well as the agencies it runs, gathering data about
innocent Americans as it searches for criminals.

In November, The Wall Street Journal reported that the U.S. Marshals
Service flies planes carrying devices that mimic cellphone towers in
order to scan the identifying information of Americans' phones as it
searches for criminal suspects and fugitives. Justice Department
officials have said the program is legal.

Earlier this month, the DEA filed court documents indicating that for
more than a decade it had gathered the phone records of Americans
calling foreign countries, without judicial oversight, to sift
through that data looking for drug suspects. That program was canceled in 2013.
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Pubdate: Sat, 24 Jan 2015   Source: Wall Street Journal (US)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/487   Author: Mike Scardina

THE OTHER FEDS AND THE USE OF MARIJUANA

Elliott J. Millenson seems intent on starting a hunt for all the bad
that legal use of marijuana brings (Letters, Jan. 20). Perhaps the
CDC and FDA haven't put out any "reefer madness"  guidelines because
their long-term "compassionate use"  studies confirm a general lack
of harm from marijuana use.

Efforts to combat the obvious negative effects of alcohol and tobacco
use are all good programs, doing good work to minimize death and
destruction. Law enforcement may be champing at the bit to raise
awareness to the dangers of stoned driving, but prospective campaigns
lack a concrete example of horror comparable to MADD campaigns of the
past. Major brawls in the street at closing time, or line-ups of the
homeless to greet store openings seem to be missing from the
recreational and medical marijuana stores. Getting edibles switched
from medical to recreation dosages and continued protections for
children are important issues for our society going forward, but tax
revenue has proved significant and can be easily used to finance
efforts. Besides, issues like youth hunger, education and opportunity
deserve our attention, and perhaps those would be a better use for
the congressional hearings Mr. Millenson is so keen on seeing.

Current enforcement expenditures and federal witch hunts all cost
money. It may be a better use of taxpayer dollars to fund significant
and comprehensive research on the many health benefits of medical
marijuana and the commercial viability of large-scale hemp
production. It would be awesome if doctors had a clue why a green oil
helps many with epilepsy.

Mike Scardina, Director, Pull 1 From The Gun Project, Denver
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Pubdate: Wed, 28 Jan 2015   Source: Dallas Morning News (TX)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/117

BENEFITS OF CANNABIS
Bills Would Free Use of Extract to Control Seizures

Bills filed last week by two Republican state lawmakers might open a
door for Texans desperate for a therapy to control severe epilepsy.
The proposal would legalize use of a cannabis extract for treatment
of debilitating seizures, under a doctor's supervision.

The two bill authors, Sen. Kevin Eltife of Tyler and Rep. Stephanie
Klick of Fort Worth, deserve credit for sticking their necks out with
their proposal, an idea more commonly associated with Democrats. They
might leave themselves vulnerable to charges of going soft on use of
the marijuana plant, but that accusation would miss the point.

The lawmakers are focused on helping sufferers of "intractable
epilepsy"  - most of them children - who are subject to uncontrolled,
life-threatening seizures, sometimes hundreds a day. Modern medicine
has not come up with effective treatments for many of them. If the
lowly cannabis weed can help restore their health, the state of Texas
should get beyond the stigma and get out of the way.

The Eltife-Klick bills would permit extraction of oil from the
cannabis plant by a licensed producer and limit the content of the
chemical compound that's associated with marijuana euphoria. The
proposal would restrict authority to prescribe cannabis oil to
doctors who specialize in epilepsy or neurology. To be eligible, a
patient must have tried other therapies without success.

Eltife and Klick, who's a registered nurse, say they have backing
from "almost every epileptologist in the state."  A group of
physicians who specialize in epilepsy issued a statement citing
evidence that cannabis oil can help control seizures. That therapy
should at least be an alternative, they said, "for those who have run
out of options right now."

Ironically, one group working to reform Texas pot laws expressed
reservations. Because of tight regulation of chemicals taken from the
cannabis plant, the bills would discourage production in Texas,
according to Republicans Against Marijuana Prohibition. Instead, RAMP
advocates laws in Texas that would make the whole plant available to
treat a range of conditions and diseases.

This newspaper has supported availability of medical marijuana for
nearly 10 years. Dating to 1996, more than 20 states have approved
access to either the plant or its byproducts for medical reasons.
Research has documented potential benefits to treat pain and such
diseases as Alzheimer's, Crohn's and multiple sclerosis.

The Eltife-Klick bills represent a decidedly go-slow approach to
allowing access to the plant for health reasons. That may be the only
way to get it on the table in Austin for serious discussion. We hope
that leads to wider debate over the benefits of the cannabis plant
and whether individual Texans should be free to pursue them by
planting a few seeds in the garden.

In any event, making headway on this issue means confronting the
federal government's classification of the marijuana plant as,
essentially, a dangerous drug with no therapeutic value. Texans are
capable of making up their own minds on that. It's clear that we
don't always get the truth from Washington.

[sidebar]

CANNABIS THERAPY BILLS

SB 339 by Sen. Kevin Eltife, R-Tyler, and HB 892 by Rep. Stephanie
Klick, R-Fort Worth, would allow licensed extraction of oil from the
cannabis plant for treatment, under a doctor's care, for severe epilepsy.

Estimate on number of "intractable epilepsy"  sufferers in Texas: 149,000

"Not everyone with epilepsy should or would consider CBD as a
treatment option, and further research will be needed to better
understand the impact marijuana has on seizures. But CBD may be an
alternative for those who have run out of options right now."

Excerpt from statement of support for cannabidiol (CBD) therapy from
seven physicians from across Texas who specialize in epilepsy or
pediatric neurology
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Pubdate: Wed, 28 Jan 2015   Source: San Francisco Chronicle (CA)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/388   Author: Joe Garfoli

INVESTORS WITH HIGH HOPES
Ex-Techies Head for the Next Innovative Sector - Cannabis

Seibo Shen made a lot of money in tech - he was an early employee at
four startups that were acquired or went public. But for his latest
venture, he didn't just want to "add another zero to my bank account."

He wanted to rekindle that startup thrill while selling a product he
truly cared about.

So the 38-year-old San Franciscan raised $500,000 to get into the
cannabis business. Now, instead of working accounts for months to
sell software to businesses, Shen is hawking $650 marijuana
vaporizers for his new company, VapeXhale.

It's a lot quicker to close a deal these days.

"Instead of a 12-month sales cycle, it's the one-puff cycle," Shen
said, motioning at a glass vaporizer at his company's booth at a
cannabis-industry investor conference this week in San Francisco.
"After you try one puff, you're sold."

Fueled by many of the same reasons they got into tech, an increasing
number of Silicon Valley veterans are investing in the booming
cannabis market. As the tech market matures, the fledgling marijuana
industry offers a hint of the old startup days, where innovators can
write the rules as they go.

And just as techies have long mused, some believe their work will
change the world.

The tagline for the ArcView Group's high-worth pot investors'
conference underscored the mood: "Invest in the Next Great American Industry."

A year ago, ArcView, a marijuana data and analysis firm, held its
gathering in Las Vegas at the D, a hotel where a room goes for $24 on
a Wednesday night. This week, the two-day conference was at the
Fairmont, where U.S. presidents have regularly bunked.

Is California next?

There the savviest of investors tried to secure their place early in
what they believe will be a green gold rush. California voters will
likely have the chance to legalize recreational cannabis for adults
on the 2016 ballot, and early polls show strong support.

The marijuana market has boomed 74 percent over the past year to $2.7
billion, with California - where only medicinal pot is legal -
accounting for nearly half that, according to a report this week by
ArcView. If pot were legalized in California next year, ArcView
projects that "the entire industry could rapidly double in size."

Whiff of success

Inside the Fairmont, it wasn't hard to smell the opportunity. Kevin
McCarty, the fourth employee at the social network Yammer, was
seeking funding for Eaze, an on-demand weed delivery service dubbed
"the Uber for pot." Prowling the halls was Tom Bollich, a co-founder
of the video game titan Zynga whose new startup, Surna, sells
chilling systems used to grow marijuana.

Monday's keynote speaker was Justin Kan, the San Francisco
entrepreneur who recently sold his streaming video game service,
Twitch, to Amazon for $970 million. Now he wants to get into the
cannabis business, as he sees "a lot of parallels to the technology
industry" - like how you can get a lot of grief for being far ahead
of the curve.

Before Twitch took off, critics said watching other people play video
games was "a crazy idea," Kan told the crowd. "So I guess I'm a real
believer in crazy ideas."

Compared with your average tech startup, the cannabis business has
one huge advantage: There's no lack of demand. "People are breaking
the law to buy your product," Kan said.

Marijuana's questionable legal status has led to hesitance from
traditional Silicon Valley investors. Even though venture capitalists
are famous for taking risks, there is a reluctance to invest in
marijuana, which the federal government classifies as a Schedule 1
drug on par with heroin. Many venture capital firms have outright
prohibitions against investing in "sin" products like pornography,
alcohol, tobacco, firearms and illegal drugs.

And legal uncertainty remains: Medical marijuana is available in only
23 states and Washington, D.C., and recreational marijuana is legal
in only two states, Washington and Colorado.

When he was hunting for investors for his distilled cannabis company,
Ebbu, former video game industry executive Dooma Wendschuh said a
potential longtime tech investor "was so worried about the optics of
it that he wanted to form a separate LLC before he would do anything."

Wendschuh, who co-founded Sekretagent Productions, makers of the
popular "Assassin's Creed" series, feels no such reticence. When he
was considering selling his share in the game company, Wendschuh told
conference-goers, "It was not an easy choice. But the thing that
pushed me over the edge was the realization that nearly every truly
visceral moment in my adult life, everything that I am most proud of
. all involved some form of psychoactives."

Joint ventures

Slowly, the big tech investors are following him into the deep end.
This month, the Founders Fund, an investment firm started by PayPal
co-founder Peter Thiel, joined a $75 million round of funding in
Privateer Holdings, which has several marijuana company investments.

Some tech expats say you don't even have to break the law to cash in
on the boom.

Jessica Billingsley and Amy Poinsett turned their Web developing and
IT expertise into MJ Highway, which sells software to marijuana
businesses. Five years after they started, they have 25 employees and
more than 1,000 clients in 18 states.

"Our geek skills were very much in demand here," Billingsley said.

As big money moves into what for decades was underground economy,
ArcView Group President Steve DeAngelo urged the investors and
entrepreneurs to heed what he considers the longstanding values of
the pot world: inclusion, diversity and a respect for nature.

"Cannabis is a gift from the hippies, like yoga and personal
computers," he said.

When people look back at the early days of the marijuana business,
they should be able to say that "we didn't just create a new
industry, but we created a new kind of industry," DeAngelo said.
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
xxx
Pubdate: Wed, 28 Jan 2015   Source: East Bay Express (CA)
Column: Legalization Nation   Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1131
Author: David Downs   THE 2016 ELECTION IS CLOSER THAN YOU THINK
Plus, Why Voter Apathy Saved Reformers Hundreds of Thousands of Dollars.

California activists are hoping to reverse 97 years of cannabis
prohibition in the Golden State within the next 650 days. But that's
not very much time.

With a statewide vote to legalize marijuana likely to make the
November 2016 ballot, key deadlines are looming for writing and
filing a proposed law; collecting hundreds of thousands of
signatures; submitting those signatures to get on the ballot; and
then running a winning campaign.

Multiple reform groups will try to run this gantlet. History says
nearly all of them will fail. Here's how to best judge an
initiative's progress:

July 7, 2015

The California Secretary of State's Office suggests July 7th as the
last day to submit a measure to the state attorney general and
request an official title and summary. Hitting this deadline is a
sign of seriousness. It also means that reform groups have only about
160 days to draft a bill, poll voters about it, and refine the text
of what would be a historic law. If reformers fail to fully test
their ballot language during the next weeks and months, it's game
over before it even starts.

"It is very soon - that's part of my concern," said Dale Sky Jones,
chair of ReformCA, a broad coalition that has been growing since
Proposition 19 failed in 2010, and includes California NORML and the NAACP.

"We want to pass the most ambitious and possible law out there, but
one word in the title can mess up everything," said Jim Gonzalez,
political strategist for ReformCA.

August 1, 2015

We get the first real sense of campaign fundraising in August, when
electronic campaign finance reports become available for the
reporting period of January through June 31 (due by July 31). Leading
groups ReformCA, Marijuana Policy Project, Drug Policy Alliance, and
others must show fundraising momentum to pay for signatures, staff, and ads.

"Early money is like yeast - it makes the bread rise," said Jones.
"It is the most important money,"

A winning initiative campaign could cost a half a million dollars
just for paid signature gatherers (volunteers can't do it). It'll
cost another $10 million for full campaign operations and advertising
without major opposition. With opposition, the pricetag grows to $15
million to $20 million. Those are costs no single reform group can bear.

September 10, 2015

A well-oiled, on-time campaign should kick off its signature
gathering before Labor Day.

Campaigns have 180 days from the day Attorney General Kamala Harris
issues her title and summary to collect the necessary signatures.
Collecting signatures has never been easier, though, said Joe Trippi,
veteran campaign manager for Howard Dean and Jerry Brown, who is also
working with ReformCA.

The number of valid signatures needed to qualify an initiative is
equal to at least 8 percent of the total votes cast for governor in
the last gubernatorial election. Luckily for pot-law reformers, the
2014 California election had one of the lowest voter turnouts of all
time - the worst since 1978: Just 7.3 million - or 42.2 percent of
California's eligible voters - voted. In the 2010 governor's race, by
contrast, 10 million voters cast ballots.

That means activists have to get 585,407 valid signatures for the
2016 election, rather than of hundreds of thousands more. With
signatures costing about $1 each to gather, voter apathy in 2014 just
made pot legalization several hundred thousand dollars cheaper. "It's
ridiculous," Trippi said. "There's almost no barrier [to getting onto
the ballot]. I've been working in the state since 1975, and I've
never seen it like this."

March 8, 2016

A symbolic date for any serious campaign - This is the day the
secretary of state suggests having all signatures turned in. Counties
will validate a random sample of submitted names, and if the number
of estimated valid signatures is too low, counties will conduct a
lengthy "full check" of every signature. A "full check" adds weeks to
the process, potentially disqualifying a measure for the 2016 ballot.

The last possible day for late-running campaigns to file signatures is May 13.

June 27, 2016

The last possible day for county elections to verify and certify a
random sample or full check of signatures to the secretary of state.
After that, it's a multimillion-dollar sprint to Election Day.

August 1, 2016

Pivotal campaign finance reports for the first half of 2016 are
published online. A serious campaign needs to report millions of
dollars in donations at this point to demonstrate an ability to fight
off negative advertising during the fall.

"I say, 'Set up for success and prepare for the worst,'" said Sky
Jones. "If you're ready for a downpour, the worst that happens is you
have a rowboat for another day. I'm not going to be caught with just a poncho."
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
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Pubdate: Wed, 28 Jan 2015   Source: Colorado Springs Independent (CO)
Column: CannaBiz   Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1536
Author: Bryce Crawford    NATIONAL GROUP LOBBIES FOR POT, PEDIATRICIANS SUPPORT DECRIMINALIZATION AND MORE
New national voice

The mainstreaming of marijuana continues with the creation of the
National Cannabis Chamber of Commerce
(nationalcannabischamberofcommerce.com), a week-old organization that
will both lobby Washington and host your next industry
meet-and-greet, says Brenda Sandoval, the southern Colorado director of sales.

"Of course, we'll have dispensaries and growers, but we want to find
people that provide things for these people: car dealers, carpet
layers, roofers," she says. "Everything that these people might have
go wrong in their home or need, they're going to go the people that
are supporting their industry and putting that money into the community.

"And then, once a month, we will be having a business after-hours,
like normal chambers do, to grow different businesses within the
Colorado Springs area."

For now, the different levels of annual membership for those in the
cannabis industry cost $295, $2,500 and $5,000 and include weekly
newsletters and a monthly magazine. The Florida-based NCCC will also
be hosting expos in Colorado and Oregon, and expects to have 10,000
members in marijuana states by the end of the year.

It all sounds a bit like what one existing organization, the National
Cannabis Industry Association, is already doing. But Sandoval is
confident: "It's going to far surpass them, because of the people
that are behind it," she says. "We've got a lot of money behind it,
so we think it's going to be much bigger and much better." One of
those people is NCCC president Michael Miller, a Florida businessman
also owns the back-end dispensary system BioTrackTHC.

Schedule change

On Monday, the American Academy of Pediatrics issued a landmark
policy statement saying it thinks people under age 21 should not be
using marijuana; the plant itself should be decriminalized; and the
feds should reschedule the substance from Schedule I (heroin) to
Schedule II (meth).

AAP member Seth Ammerman talked to The Wall Street Journal about the
organization's thought process: "Unless scheduling changes,
[FDA-regulated research] won't happen," the Stanford University
professor of pediatrics said. "And there could be therapeutic
benefits. The AAP is not opposed to medical marijuana, per se, but we
feel it's important that this be explored within the [framework of
the] FDA process, where you have standardization."

You can read the full statement at tiny.cc/the3sx.

Learn the leaves

Hit the Cannabis Boot Camp at The Mining Exchange hotel (8 S. Nevada
Ave., mmjbusinessacademy.com) on Saturday, Jan. 31, for an all-day
seminar on starting your own company. Led by KC Stark, owner of
Studio A64, and attorney Charles Houghton, both with the MMJ Business
Academy, the event - which includes admission to bonus events on the
31st and Feb. 1 - will cost $299 per person.
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
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Pubdate: Wed, 28 Jan 2015   Source: Oregonian, The (Portland, OR)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/324   Author: Noelle Crombie
PEDIATRICIANS CALL ON FEDS TO RECLASSIFY POT

The American Academy of Pediatrics this week weighed in on the
classification of marijuana, urging the federal government to
reclassify the drug to facilitate research.

The organization released a policy statement on marijuana,
reaffirming its opposition to legalizing cannabis and expressing
concern about the drug's harmful affects on young people. But the
group also urged the government to move marijuana from its Schedule I
status, where it's grouped with heroin and LSD, to Schedule 2, also
considered dangerous but more accessible to researchers.

In the government's view, Schedule I drugs have a "high potential"
for abuse and offer no medicinal value. Generally, drugs with
Schedule I status are not open to research.

The Huffington Post reports:

The DEA is the federal agency that is primarily responsible for
regulating controlled substances like marijuana. But the Food and
Drug Administration, along with the National Institute on Drug Abuse,
provides the DEA with recommendations about the appropriate level of
restriction for various illicit substances.

The FDA is already engaged in a review of the medical evidence
surrounding the safety and effectiveness of marijuana. The evaluation
was initiated due to a request from the DEA, following a number of
citizens' petitions asking for a review. According to the Controlled
Substances Act, the government must consider eight factors when
deciding the schedule under which a substance should be classified.
These include its potential for abuse, the state of current
scientific knowledge about the substance and its psychic or
physiological dependence liability.

The FDA could not confirm to The Huffington Post how long the review
process takes, but expressed support for AAP's move.
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
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Pubdate: Thu, 29 Jan 2015   Source: Sacramento News & Review (CA)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/540   Author: Ngaio Bealum

A HIGH FOR DOWN LOW
What's this I hear about a cannabis-infused sex lube? Does it work?

Yes. It exists. The most popular brand, called Foria, is a mix of
coconut oil and cannabis. All of the reviews I have seen have been
positive, with most users reporting pleasant, tingly sensations in
their nether regions. Sounds like fun to me. I am a fan of mixing
weed and sex. Who doesn't like to do the smokey-pokey? It's a bit
pricey (the small bottle will set you back about 44 bones), but
whatever floats your man-in-the-boat. Have fun.

I heard the U.N. may take on recreational marijuana use. What do you
think about this? Good or bad thing? And would you be willing to
represent us at the U.N. for both recreational and medicinal cannabis
use? Thanks, man.

-Sheldon

You know, people mention that whole "we can't legalize weed because
it goes against various treaties the United States has with the U.N."
every so often. It's not really true. Most U.N. treaties have
loopholes about each country's constitutional process. Since we are a
federalist deal, different states legalizing marijuana doesn't really
violate any treaty or convention. And anyway, what's the U.N. going
to do? Invade us? Over weed? Your RWNJ uncle may think this will
happen, right after Obama declares himself emperor and takes away our
guns, but seriously. The U.N. can't stop us. We will have to address
this issue sooner or later. Rick Steves, travel aficionado and
cannabis expert (by the way, you can see him at the International
Cannabis Business Conference in San Francisco, February 15-16) had a
few words about international pot treaties in a recent interview for
the Smell the Truth blog: "That's what got me involved in this-the
international laws the U.S. has written that requires all countries
to lock up pot smokers or wage trade sanctions against everybody who
doesn't sign this treaty. It's huge, and a horrible way to be part of
the family of nations. It's embarrassing. That's going to be falling
apart like mad in the next couple of years.

"That's one of the reasons I'm so excited about California.
California is among the biggest economic units in the world. When
California goes, the U.S. is going to follow, I think."

He's right. If we keep legalizing weed in different states, the
entire U.S. government will have to come around and get these
treaties fixed. As to the second part of your question, I would love
to be a (ahem) high-ranking ambassador. I bet my state dinners would
be well attended.

I need a good, quick cannabis-infused dessert recipe.

-Pat Luck

Pound cake. Take a pound of butter, a pound of flour, a pound of
eggs, a pound of sugar and a pound of weed. Kidding about the
weed-make sure the butter is cannabis infused. Mix them together,
pour the batter into a greased and floured cake pan and bake it at
325 degrees for 1 hour and 30 minutes. Garnish with fruit. Yum.
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
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Pubdate: Thu, 29 Jan 2015   Source: Sacramento News & Review (CA)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/540    Author: David Downs

WILL A DIVIDED MARIJUANA COMMUNITY JEOPARDIZE CALIFORNIA'S LEGALIZATION EFFORT?
California Marijuana Legalization in 2016 Looks Anything but Certain

California marijuana legalization in 2016 looks anything but certain
after a major January meeting where leading activists showed how
divided they remain. The possibility of ending nearly a century of
cannabis prohibition within the next 650 or so days has increased
factionalism within the reform movement.

In a small hotel banquet room on the waterfront of Oakland's Jack
London Square, luminaries of pot-law reform rehashed grievances and
honed new disputes over future initiative language, as well as
campaign funding and control.

Contrary to headlines, the political reality is grim: a slim majority
supports legalization in a massive state of 38 million people.
Support is weakest among voters over 50, women, ethnic groups and in
rural areas. Legalization lost in 2010 with Proposition 19 and
reformers were so divided no measure appeared on ballots in either
2012 or 2014.

Keynote speaker and campaign consultant Bill Zimmerman outlined three
ways in which legalization can lose in 2016: if proponents demand too
much, divide into opposing factions or draw in heavily funded opposition.

The main friction points will be initiative language, specifically:
exactly who will control and profit from a legal market; taxes;
protections for medical-marijuana patients and dispensaries; the
right to grow at home and how much; and an age limit of 18 versus 21.

"Our belief about what is right has to be put aside in the interest
of what is possible," Zimmerman said. That tactical thinking
alienates many hard-core activists.

Assemblyman Bill Quirk made for an auspicious guest at the event. "I
am fully in support of legalization," he said. But Quirk was not
hopeful about action on the issue from the California Legislature.

"The Assembly is very conservative, at least on this issue," he said.

For example, former lawmaker Tom Ammiano's bill to regulate medical
marijuana failed, and "that was just to regulate medical marijuana,"
Quirk said. "The [California State] Sheriffs' [Association] opposed
it, and the [California] Police Chiefs [Association]. I think they
were reckless. We need good legislation, that was good legislation.
As soon as they opposed it, we just lost a lot of people in the
Assembly, including a lot of so-called 'progressive Democrats.'"

Meanwhile, another failed 2014 bill, by lawmaker Lou Correa, "was
basically an anti-medical marijuana bill," he said. "That passed the
Senate. And then we could not get the pro-medical marijuana
bill-which had very strict regulations-out of the Assembly, because
the sheriffs and the police chiefs didn't like it. So I'm not optimistic."

With a statewide vote to legalize marijuana likely on November 8,
2016, key deadlines are looming for writing and filing a proposed
law; collecting hundreds of thousands of signatures; turning in those
signatures to get on the ballot; and then running a winning campaign.

Multiple reform groups will try to run this gantlet. History says
nearly all of them will fail.

The California Secretary of State's Office suggests July 7 of this
year as the last day to submit a measure to the state attorney
general and request an official title and summary. Hitting this
deadline is a sign of seriousness. It also means that reform groups
have only about 160 days between now and July 7 to draft, poll, and
refine the text of what would be a historic law. If reformers fail to
fully test their ballot language during the next weeks and months,
it's game over before it even starts.

"It is very soon-that's part of my concern," said Dale Sky Jones,
chairwoman of ReformCA, a broad coalition that has been growing since
Proposition 19 failed in 2010, and includes California NORML and the NAACP.

"We want to pass the most ambitious and possible law out there, but
one word in the title can mess up everything," said Jim Gonzalez,
political strategist for ReformCA.

We get the first real sense of legalizers' war chest in August, when
electronic-campaign finance reports become available for the
reporting period of January through June 30 (due by July 31). Leading
groups such as ReformCA, Marijuana Policy Project, Drug Policy
Alliance and others must show fundraising momentum to pay for
signatures, staff and ads.

"Early money is like yeast-it makes the bread rise," Jones said. "It
is the most important money."

A winning initiative campaign could cost a half-a-million dollars
just to pay for professional signature gatherers (volunteers can't do
it). A campaign would then need another $10 million for full
operations and advertising without major opposition. With opposition,
the price tag grows to anywhere from $15 million to $20 million. And
those are costs that no single reform group can bear.

A well-oiled, on-time campaign should kick off its signature
gathering by Labor Day. Campaigns have 180 days from the day Attorney
General Kamala Harris issues her title and summary to collect the
necessary signatures. Collecting signatures has never been easier,
though, said Joe Trippi, veteran campaign manager for Howard Dean and
Jerry Brown, who is also working with ReformCA.

The number of valid signatures needed to qualify an initiative is
equal to at least 8 percent of the total votes cast for governor in
the last gubernatorial election. Luckily for pot-law reformers, the
2014 California election had one of the lowest voter turnouts of all
time-the worst since 1978: just 7.3 million-or 42.2 percent of
California's eligible voters-voted. In the 2010 governor's race, by
contrast, 10 million voters cast ballots.

That means activists have to get 585,407 valid signatures for the
2016 election, rather than of hundreds of thousands more. With
signatures costing about $1 each to gather, voter apathy in 2014 just
made pot legalization several hundred thousand dollars cheaper.

"It's ridiculous. There's almost no barrier [to getting onto the
ballot]," Trippi said. "I've been working in the state since 1975,
and I've never seen it like this."
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
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Pubdate: Thu, 29 Jan 2015   Source: North Coast Journal (Arcata, CA)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2833   Author: Grant Scott-Goforth

UP SPROUL CREEK
SoHum residents got their first taste of a new enforcement regimen
targeting the environmental impacts of marijuana grows last week.

It was hardly jackboots and black helicopters, according to State
Water Board enforcer Cris Carrigan, who developed the pilot
enforcement program with other state and local agencies (See "A Big
Stick," Oct. 23, 2014).

Representatives from Fish and Wildlife, the California Water Board,
the Humboldt County Sheriff's Office and a county code inspector
obtained administrative warrants for 14 properties in the Sproul
Creek watershed, and visited them over the course of three days.

Most property owners, Carrigan said, let the inspectors onto their
properties with consent. Others were served with the warrant, which
allowed inspectors to look for damage from grows. "Two people who
were just hanging around watching us asked us to come look at their
properties," Carrigan said. "I was just really pleased with the level
of engagement and cooperation of cannabis growers with inspectors."

No arrests were made, and no plants were chopped down - the focus,
Carrigan said, has to be on the water violations. Sheriff's deputies
were there to ensure the civilian inspectors were safe, he said.

The Sproul Creek watershed was targeted first because it's home to
five salmonid species, including Coho, and it dried up last year,
Carrigan said. Inspectors found a variety of problems, but the most
common issues were sediment discharge from unstable grading and
stream diversions that were unpermitted and unsafe for fish.

"Their properties ranged from kind of a mess to a pretty big mess to
almost in compliance," Carrigan said. "Some were in compliance by accident."

Carrigan said the agencies were encouraged by the openness of the
cannabis cultivators in the first week of inspections.

"Many of them are longtime property owners. They want their
properties to conserve good value - they're reasonably good stewards
of the land."

In 13 months, Arcata nearly paid off the cost of implementing the
city's high electricity use tax.

Through November, 2014, PG&E collected just over $500,000 for Arcata
through the tax, which was voted into effect by residents a couple
years ago and intended to reduce the number of residential marijuana grows.

Revenue from the tax fell short of projections, likely due to the
"green flight" that occurred after the tax passed but before it went
into effect. But enough residential meters are still sucking high
amounts of energy that it appears the city will begin to profit from
the tax soon.

Environmental Services Director Mark Andre says electricity use
appears to be down in the residential sector citywide - most
drastically among the meters affected by the tax.

"But other factors such as weather patterns play into energy use as
well so a couple years of data to [analyze] would be better before we
have confidence in the trends," Andre wrote in an email.

Two Eureka men pleaded guilty to growing marijuana and damaging
public land in the Shasta-Trinity National Forest before a federal
judge earlier this month.

Isidro Alcazar-Tapia, 25, and Arturo Alcazar-Tapia, 21, were arrested
in Eureka last August with 33 pounds of marijuana and cash. Law
enforcement linked the brothers to more than 20,000 plants in the Big
French Creek and Hobo Gulch areas of the national forest, according
to a press release, where they found "hundreds of holes dug in the
dirt containing soluble fertilizer, bags of trash, empty fertilizer
bags, propane tanks, and water lines diverting water from a stream."

The brothers each face a possible sentence of five to 40 years in
prison and up to a $5 million fine for conspiring to manufacture
marijuana; as well as fines and prison time for additional charges.
They are scheduled to be sentenced in April.
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
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Pubdate: Thu, 29 Jan 2015   Source: Boulder Weekly (CO)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/57   Author: Leland Rucker

WYOMING KEEPS CANNABIS POSSESSION CRIMINAL
Even if they don't support legalization, more and more states are
changing or considering changing marijuana possession laws from
criminal to ticket offenses.

But not all state legislators are ready to make that move. In a floor
vote last week, the Wyoming house killed Bill 49. Sponsor Jim Byrd, a
Cheyenne Democrat, wanted the state to turn cannabis possession cases
into civil offenses: Fine anybody with up to a half ounce $50 and
anybody with a half ounce to an ounce $100.

Currently, in Wyoming, a person caught with up to three ounces of pot
faces a misdemeanor conviction with a penalty of up to a year in jail
and a fine of $1,000. A third conviction can carry a five-year prison
sentence and a $5,000 fine.

Byrd reminded his colleagues that the state is filling courtrooms and
jails with young people on possession offenses while wasting the
state's money, he told his fellow legislators. It costs $10,000 to
prosecute each possession case, and even more to incarcerate
offenders. It was enough to convince the House Judiciary Committee to
pass the bill 7-2 to send to the full house.

In a floor vote last week, lawmakers voted 38-22 to kill the bill.
Another one that would have allowed medical marijuana for patients
suffering from long-term pain, glaucoma or migraines was voted down
at the same time. And lawmakers are now considering House Bill 187,
which would prohibit any new bills or discussion of marijuana policy
while the state spends $15,000 on a study of the drug's impacts on
the criminal justice system, public health and state revenue.

On a national level, on Jan. 8, the Industrial Hemp Farming Act of
2015 was introduced in the Senate as S. 134 by a coalition of
bipartisan senators, including Republicans Mitch McConnell and Rand
Paul and Democrats Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden. In the House, H.R. 525
was introduced by Republican Thomas Massie and our own Jared Polis,
who has been working on this issue for years. It has a staggering 47
co-sponsors.

The bills would build on the landmark legislation enacted in last
year's farm bill. Section 7606 of that act, the Legitimacy of
Industrial Hemp Research, made industrial hemp distinct from
marijuana and allows colleges and research facilities in states where
hemp is legal to begin research and pilot programs to develop hemp
varieties. Since hemp hasn't been grown in the U.S. for many decades,
new varieties and strains are desperately needed for production to resume.

"The federal ban on hemp has been a waste of taxpayer dollars that
ignores science, suppresses innovation and subverts the will of
states that have chosen to incorporate this versatile crop into their
economies," Polis said in a press release. "I am hopeful that
Congress will build on last year's progress on hemp research and
pilot programs by passing the Industrial Hemp Farming Act to allow
this historical American crop to once again thrive on our farmlands."

The Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2015 would simply amend the
Controlled Substances Act to exclude industrial hemp from marihuana
(yes, the government still officially spells it this way) and allow
production to begin again. America imports most of its hemp from
China and Canada and is the only industrialized nation that doesn't
allow hemp production.

Currently, three states - Kentucky, Colorado and Vermont - have begun
planting research hemp crops, and another 18 - California, Delaware,
Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Michigan, Missouri, Montana,
Nebraska, New York, North Dakota, Oregon, South Carolina, Tennessee,
Utah, Washington and West Virginia - can do so.

Here's how simple the amendment really is. Basically, it would change
a few words in the Controlled Substances Act. "Section 102 of the
Controlled Substances Act (21 U.S.C. 802) is amended - in paragraph
16 by adding at the end: 'The term marihuana does not include
industrial hemp,' and by adding at the end the following: 'The term
industrial hemp means the plant Cannabis sativa L. and any part of
such plant, whether growing or not, with a delta-9
tetrahydrocannabinol concentration of not more than 0.3 percent on a
dry weight basis.'

"Industrial hemp determination by States Section 201 of the
Controlled Substances Act (21 U.S.C. 811) is amended by adding at the
end the following: 'If a person grows or processes Cannabis sativa L.
for purposes of making industrial hemp in accordance with State law,
the Cannabis sativa L. shall be deemed to meet the concentration
limitation under section 102, unless the Attorney General determines
that the State law is not reasonably calculated to comply with section 102.'"

That's it. That's all it would take to get industrial hemp, which
should never have been on a list of controlled substances in the
first place, back in U.S. fields, where it once was and should be. A
couple of punctuation changes and a couple of sentences. (That's all
it would really take to amend the Controlled Substances Act to take
marihuana off its Schedule 1 designation, too.)

However, the first time I checked S. 134 on Govtrack.us, which allows
citizens to track the progress of bills, the Senate version, which is
in the Judicial Committee, was given an 11 percent chance of becoming
law. When I checked again, those odds were down to 5 percent.

You can hear Leland discuss his most recent column and Colorado
cannibis each Thursday morning on KGNU. http:// news.kgnu.org/weed
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
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Pubdate: Wed, 28 Jan 2015   Source: SF Weekly (CA)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/812   Author: Chris Roberts

The Drought Improved California's Outdoor Marijuana Harvest
BETTER OFF DRY
Summertime in Northern California is long, hot, and dry. The ideal
atmosphere for a float down the Russian River is also the perfect
climate for growing the things you'd want to bring along on that
river trip. Hops, good wine grapes, and world-class cannabis all
thrive in the heat.

As America finally cottons to the notion of cannabis as a legitimate
industry, growing marijuana is proving itself a viable career. The
average farmworker in America takes home a little more than $30,000 a
year. California fruit pickers and animal stewards make slightly more
money, but some farmworkers in the state can take home as much as
$41,800 annually. That's the average wage for a farmworker on a
marijuana patch, according to the Emerald Growers Association, a
trade group for outdoor farmers. And if you own the plot of land
where pot is grown, you can clear an average of about $100,000 a
year, according to a survey of 50 pot farmers in nine counties.

That's more than timber workers and more than enough to be considered
middle class.

Provided, of course, you can find the water.

The water question is every California farmer's problem. Even in wet
years, contention over the disbursement of water around the state
echoes in the halls of Congress. And amid the concern posed by the
ongoing drought (it's the driest it's been in California's history;
for the first time, no rain fell in San Francisco in January)
marijuana has become an environmental bogeyman.

Media from the mainstream to Mother Jones followed a narrative
presented by officials from the State Department of Fish and
Wildlife, which suggested cannabis farms are the reason several
streams in northern rural counties turned dry, thereby posing an
existential threat to yet another signature California delicacy: salmon.

Some shriller sources went further, positing that the drought would
harm the annual harvest of outdoor marijuana (branded "sun-grown" by
the merchants looking to move what's still cheaper and less in demand
than cannabis grown under lamps). LA Weekly warned us almost a year
ago that, if things held steady, prices would double.

As with most doomsday predictions, it didn't exactly come to
fruition. In fact, almost the opposite occurred: In the short-term,
the drought not only improved the outdoor harvest, local dispensary
buyers tell SF Weekly, but outdoor farmers are getting better prices per pound.

How can this be?

For starters, the harvest is smaller by as much as 20 percent,
according to Rick Pfrommer, the main buyer at Oakland's Harborside
Health Center, one of the busiest dispensaries in the state.

That's good for growers. A pound of sun-grown was fetching $1,800 in
August, when enterprising growers are bringing hauls of "light-dep"
to market (light-deprivation is the scientific method by which a pot
planter fools his crop into flowering and budding early, usually by
use of a tarp thrown over the plants to cut the use of sunlight).

By December, when the market is generally flooded with the recent
harvest and when prices dip as low as $1,200 or lower, pounds were
still going for $1,500. (At the dispensary counter, the cost of an
eighth held steady.)

And those solid prices were for consistently higher-quality stuff,
Pfrommer tells me recently. "Almost everyone I know grew smaller
plants this year because of water being so tight. And as a result,
they grew higher-quality herb."

In flush years, farmers tend to indulge in cannabis's ability to take
as much as seven gallons of water per day, per plant. "Cannabis can
take a lot of water," he says. "But when you over water, you cause the
cell walls to swell. You get bigger yields, and higher weight, but
the buds themselves aren't the same quality."

With only three gallons or so per plant, the buds are tighter and
denser, Pfrommer tells me, with "more resin content because it's not
a big, spread-out bud. ... They also have a much more robust flavor."

In other words, for conscientious growers, the drought could have
finally broken the bad habits "endemic" in outdoor cultivation:
overwatering and overfeeding.

It could also have put some crooks out of business.

I sat down recently with a serious industry player who made his name
growing cannabis outside. I asked him how badly the drought had
ravaged his plantings. He chuckled.

"I'm fine," he said. "I'm on a well."

This is significant. It wasn't taxpayers obeying plant counts that
drained Sproul and Salmon creeks dry. It was the outlaws - gangs of
Eastern European extraction, southeast Asians, or "Northern
California hillbillies" (not one person I talked to recently
complained about "Mexican cartels") shipping pounds out of state.

It's a theory, but it has some weight. If you are an honest citizen
and growing 25 plants on established property, you'll use
groundwater. True, there are plenty of homesteader-like farmers
growing on lonely hillsides far away from civilization while
attempting to obey the law. But if you're entirely reliant on water
pulled from a nearby stream, chances are you're a lawbreaker, my guy said.

2015 is shaping up to be another dry year. Nobody in agriculture is
praying for clear skies and a dry creek bed. But so far, the
apocalyptic drought has spelled disaster more for bad practices and
bad players in the marijuana industry.
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
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Pubdate: Fri, 30 Jan 2015   Source: Denver Post (CO)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/122   Author: Ricardo Baca

NEW RULE BOOK FOR "POT FOR BEGINNERS"
Industry Adjusts to New Packaging, Potency

Colorado's pot industry will face its first major regulatory shift of
2015 on Sunday when popular but controversial infused edibles will be
forced to comply with new packaging, labeling and potency
restrictions passed last year.

Under the new regulations, edibles sold recreationally must be
wrapped individually or demarked in increments of 10 or fewer
milligrams of activated THC, the major psychoactive ingredient in
marijuana. The state's recommended dose is 10 milligrams. Edibles
packaging, too, is changing as new, more child-resistant restrictions
go into effect.

Often considered pot for beginners, edibles make up roughly 45
percent of the legal cannabis marketplace in Colorado.

But the first year of legal sales was not without problems. The death
of a Wyoming college student who jumped from a Denver hotel balcony
after eating an infused cookie, a surge in the number of children
brought to emergency rooms for accidental marijuana ingestion and the
sheer popularity of edibles with tourists led to calls for tighter regulation.

The changes grew out of the findings of a work group that included
representatives from the state's Marijuana Enforcement Division, the
industry, parent groups, hospitals and law enforcement agencies. And
while the switch is costing pot businesses, the industry is speaking
out in favor of the regulations. Consumers stand to benefit, not just
from rules that should make consumption safer but in cut-rate prices
in the short term.

"In clearly marking what the dose is, hopefully that will lead to
more responsible use and public education," said John Lord, owner of
LivWell, which has nine pot shops in Colorado. "It keeps us safe, and
it provides uniformity for the product itself."

The Post requested comment this week on the new rules from the state
Marijuana Enforcement Division, but a spokeswoman said no one was
immediately available.

Playing it safe

An example of the shift is seen in Dixie Elixirs' popular infused
mints. The mints used to come loose in a tin, 10 mints at 10
milligrams each ( 100 milligrams total). Dixie's new mints come
packed individually in blister packs, similar to some pill and gum
packaging, 16 mints at 5milligrams apiece ( 80 milligrams total).

The reason behind the lower potency: Dixie is playing it safe, making
sure the now-individually wrapped edibles wouldn't surpass 10
milligrams apiece-hoping to cash in on the state's new incentives,
including less stringent testing, for low dose products. The new
mints as a package also are less likely to top the state's 100-
milligram limit. If a recreational edible tests for more than 100
milligrams of activated THC, its maker risks being forced to destroy
the entire batch.

"A lot of us are being conservative when we approach product
development," said Dixie marketing chief Joe Hodas. "Instead of
pushing the upper limit of a 100- milligram product, we'd rather put
out a 90milligram product."

Edibles company The Growing Kitchen already was focusing on low-
dosage edibles, so its preparation for the Feb. 1 deadline was mostly
on the packaging end, according to Cody Mayasich, a sales lead at the company.

"We started preparing for the child-resistant packaging in August, so
we're already sending out compliant packaging this week," said Susan
Armitage, an executive assistant at The Growing Kitchen. "We're very
excited for the change. We think it's good for the industry and for
safety reasons and corporate responsibility."

Other companies are phasing out infused edibles that couldn't work
under the new recreational regulations. Dixie's high-dosage
recreational 100- milligram Colorado Bar will become extinct as of
Feb. 1 - and that leaves Dixie needing to unload some of its soon-to
be noncompliant inventory.

"Because of these changes in packaging and serving size and potency,
a lot of our products are going to change," Hodas said. "The
dispensaries are hesitant to take new product because they won't be
able to sell high-dose products like our Colorado Bar, which is a
single serving item that has 100 milligrams, after the end of the month."

That's why Dixie is partnering with marijuana chains Euflora and
LivWell to offload its old product. Dixie's wholesale price to
Euflora was recently cut by 50 percent with the understanding that
the store would keep costs low for its customers, according to
Euflora owner Jamie Perino.

"I'm running a bunch of ads in magazines and newspapers advertising
blowout sales, trying to get stuff moving," said Perino, who owns
shops in Denver and Aurora. "I'd rather run out and have shelves
empty than have a bunch of product on the shelves that needs to be destroyed."

Cut-rate deals

Euflora's normal price on a Dixie Elixir infused drink with 70
milligrams of activated THC: $ 22.50. Her current price on the almost
non-compliant Dixie drinks until she closes shop on Jan. 31: $ 7. And
she's not alone. "We are doing 40 percent off all recreational
edibles at all of our recreational stores until Feb. 1 so we can
offload all the product," said Brian Keegan, director of retail
operations for LivWell.

The temporary price cuts are substantial, especially when you
consider that the cost of a recreational eighth of marijuana at 12
prominent Colorado pot shops dropped only by 9 percent from January
2014 to December 2014, according to Denver Post data.

Some stores are pushing 30 percent to 40 percent discounts through
the end of January, while others are offering deals in which
customers can buy one and get another for a penny.

These regulations are only the beginning. The work group that helped
create them in 2014 never reached a place of full agreement.

At one point, Colorado health officials proposed a ban on most forms
of edible marijuana, and the industry fought back immediately.

"Even though I would have shaped it a little bit differently," said
Dixie's Hodas, "this is a necessary step in the growth process for
the industry. We all agreed: ' We have an issue here. Let's head it
off at the pass and make some changes.' And most would agree that
most of the changes we're making are positive for here and the rest
of the country."

[sidebar]

Changes for pot-infused edibles

Starting Sunday, marijuana-infused edibles face new state-mandated regulations:

Packaging: Each standardized serving, which, according to the state,
is 10 milligrams of activated THC, must be demarked "in a way that
enables a reasonable person to intuitively determine how much of the
product constitutes a single serving of active THC."

Labeling: There will be more explicit warnings and thorough
information on labels, including warning statements such as "This
product is unlawful outside the State of Colorado" and "The
intoxicating effects of this product may be delayed by two or more hours."

Potency: The Marijuana Enforcement Division is providing incentives
for companies to produce 10 milligram products by putting greater
burdens on manufacturers of products between 10 and 100 milligrams.

The changes mean many edibles companies are being more conservative
with dosing sizes.
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
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Pubdate: Fri, 30 Jan 2015   Source: Denver Post (CO)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/122   Author: David Migoya

ORE. LAWMAKER: DID FDIC END BANKING DEAL?
A congressman is demanding to know what role a federal banking
regulator had in the quick withdrawal of Oregon-based MBank's offer
to take on Colorado-based marijuana businesses.

U. S. Rep. Earl Blumenauer, D- Oregon, said he was "disheartened" to
read a Denver Post story that described MBank's decision to pull out
only a week after it had announced it would bank legal pot businesses
in Colorado.

"The article alluded to pressure from the Federal Deposit Insurance
Corporation as a factor in MBank's decision," Blumenauer wrote FDIC
Chairman Martin Gruenberg onThursday. "If this is true, it raises
serious questions about the application of federal financial oversight."

He said he wants the FDIC to "develop workable guidance" for
financial institutions to be able to work with marijuana related businesses.

At issue is MBank's decision to work openly with marijuana
businesses, a process it began in September with medical pot
dispensaries and is now expanding to recreational-use stores.

Some saw the announcement as brazen because regulators often
pressured banks to keep quiet about working with legal marijuana businesses.

"Everyone acknowledges the insanity and unfairness of requiring legal
businesses to pay their taxes with shopping bags full of $ 20 bills,"
Blumenauer wrote, noting that he saw MBank's move as a glimmer of success.

No bank in Colorado openly works with the marijuana industry, and pot
businesses often keep their banking relationships secret.

The Fourth Corner Credit Union has a state charter to cater
specifically to the industry but is waiting for a master account from
the Federal Reserve System to operate.

Blumenauer listed five questions for which he wanted answers,
including whether the FDIC would issue working guidelines to banks
wanting to work with marijuana businesses and whether the FDIC
influenced MBank's decision to back out of Colorado.

"Financial institutions need confidence that they can provide banking
services to legitimate marijuana businesses without threat that their
regulators will penalize them, threaten their deposit insurance,
increase their capital requirements or force them to close accounts
or stop providing services," Blumenauer wrote.

MBank CEO Jef Baker declined to comment about Blumenauer's letter Thursday.

Blumenauer represents the district in which MBank is located, just
outside of Portland, Ore.

The U. S. Department of Justice last February issued guidelines that
would allow banks to work with legal marijuana stores but without
giving wholesale assurances against prosecution, which has kept many
institutions from stepping into the market.

MBank pulled out of Colorado after FDIC regulators, who had given
"tacit approval" to the plan previously, backed away and said the
move was simply too risky, people familiar with the decision said.

"The allegations in The Denver Post that the FDIC appears to be
governing by informal fiat runs counter to these steps taken by the
administration to date," Blumenauer wrote.

Oregon voters recently approved recreational marijuana sales. Its
northern neighbor, Washington, began legal recreational sales in
July, seven months after Colorado.

Blumenauer has partnered with U. S. Rep. Jared Polis, D- Boulder, in
offering federal legislation to remove marijuana from the U. S. Drug
Enforcement Agency's list of controlled substances and facilitate a
federal tax on its sales.

It's not the first time U. S. lawmakers have squared off with a
federal agency over its position regarding marijuana and banking.

In May, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network-or FinCEN, an arm of
the Justice Department - had to answer questions about its guidelines
for banks to work with the pot industry.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, DCalif., and Sen. Chuck Grassley, R- Iowa,
said the move appeared to usurp federal laws that keep the possession
and sale of marijuana illegal even though 23 states and the District
of Columbia have legalized its sale in some form.

FinCEN said it did not encourage the practice but merely offered
guidelines to ensure the business relationship was transparent.
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
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Pubdate: Fri, 30 Jan 2015   Source: Press Democrat, The (Santa Rosa, CA)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/348   Author: Glenda Anderson

LEGALITY OF UKIAH TRIBAL POT OPERATION QUESTIONED
Mendocino County law enforcement officials are investigating the
legality of a proposed large-scale indoor medical marijuana growing
operation on tribal land outside of Ukiah, casting a cloud of doubt
over the future of the unprecedented venture.

Mendocino County's sheriff and district attorney are seeking details
about the proposal, revealed earlier this month, by the Pinoleville
Pomo Nation and Kansas-based FoxBarry Farms to build an estimated
2.5-acre indoor pot production facility just north of Ukiah.

FoxBarry officials said Wednesday they are scheduled to meet with the
sheriff and district attorney as well as local marijuana growers to
discuss the $10 million, 110,000 square foot plantation plan.

"We are fully committed to being in full compliance with local
ordinances," FoxBarry president Barry Brautman said in an emailed
response to questions about the potential hitch in his plans.

FoxBarry earlier said he expects to grow thousands of plants
year-round in greenhouses on the rancheria.

Sheriff Tom Allman said he's not convinced the operation would be
legal. He's spoken with officials at the U.S. Attorney's Office who
said they have not been asked for or given permission for such an
operation. The U.S. Attorney's Office has declined to comment on the issue.

But federal authorities in the past have quashed other large-scale,
off-reservation cannabis cultivation operations.

Allman said that any operation that wouldn't be permitted
off-reservation is unlikely to be allowed on Indian land.

Allman's queries have triggered an investigation by District Attorney
David Eyster, spokesman Mike Geniella said. Eyster has requested
details about the plans from the tribe and FoxBarry, Geniella said.
Eyster will not be commenting on the plan until his review is
concluded, he added.

The proposed tribal growing operation is believed to be the first of
its kind. It's the first of three such operations planned in
California by FoxBarry, a sign of marijuana's growing attraction as a
business venture. FoxBarry, which also invests in tribal casinos and
gas stations, has declined to reveal the locations of the other
proposed marijuana operations.

As proposed, FoxBarry Farms will fund and operate the tribal
facility, which will be a nonprofit. The operation will be growing
award-winning brand-name pot developed by United Cannabis, a
marijuana research and development company.

The marijuana will be sold only to California medical marijuana
patients through dispensaries, in keeping with state law, Brautman
said. There currently are no plans for a dispensary on site, he said.

Construction of the facility, which will employ between 50 and 100
people, is slated to begin in February, Brautman said.
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
xxx
Pubdate: Sat, 31 Jan 2015   Source: Denver Post (CO)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/122   Author: Kristen Wyatt, The Associated Press

BILL ADDS POT TO LIST OF BANS
Welfare, Food Stamps Could Not Be Used to Buy Marijuana.

Welfare money or food stamps for marijuana? It's an urban legend that
won't go away in Colorado, and state lawmakers this year are poised
to pass a law clarifying that public benefit cards can't be used at
dispensary ATMs.

A bill facing its first hearing next week in the state Senate would
add marijuana businesses and strip clubs to the list of Colorado
businesses where electronic benefit transfer cards-called EBTs -
can't be used to withdraw cash. Liquor stores, casinos and gun shops
already have such limitations.

Republican Sen. Vicki Marble said marijuana dispensaries need to be
added to avoid possible federal intervention if there's evidence of
public benefits being spent on pot.

"We stand to lose a lot if we don't show we are trying" to prevent
tax money for pot, Marble said.

"The growers here put in a lot of time and effort. A raid would be
absolutely devastating to our state."

Marble's bill failed last year amid concerns that because pot shops
are concentrated in poor neighborhoods, dispensary ATMs may be the
closest source of cash for people without a bank.

This year, Democrats say they support the idea. They say that adding
dispensaries to the list may help prevent federal intervention.

U. S. Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., last year suggested a new federal
law banning the use of EBT cards at dispensaries. Currently, there is
no national standard on public benefit cards at dispensaries.

In Washington state, a 2012 law blocks businesses that ban those
under 18 - including strip clubs, bars and now-licensed pot shops -
from letting people use EBTs to withdraw money.
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
xxx
Pubdate: Mon, 02 Feb 2015   Source: Washington Times (DC)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/492   Author: Valerie Richardson

AG NOMINEE'S MARIJUANA STANCE MAKES COLORADO SWEAT
Lynch Veering Away From the Obama No-Big-Deal Rhetoric

DENVER - Nobody in the Colorado marijuana industry is panicking, but
those involved are sweating a little over the hard line taken by
Loretta Lynch, President Obama's pick to be the next attorney
general, on legalization during this week's Senate confirmation hearing.

"Quite a few of my members were expressing concern and nervousness,"
said Michael Elliott, executive director of the Colorado Marijuana
Industry Group. "But I'm not sure we could have expected much more
than we just heard. Even the president, who came out saying that
marijuana is no more dangerous as alcohol, is also on the record as
being against legalization."

States that have legalized or are considering legalizing recreational
marijuana use butted heads continually with Attorney General Eric H.
Holder Jr., who refused to relax stricter federal laws against pot
use. Judging from this week's performance, the fight won't end when
Mr. Holder leaves.

A federal prosecutor in New York, Ms. Lynch told the Senate Committee
on the Judiciary she disagreed with the president's no-big-deal take
on pot, saying, "I certainly don't hold that view and don't agree
with that view of marijuana as a substance."

"I think the president was speaking from his personal experience and
personal opinion, neither of which I'm able to share," Ms. Lynch
said. "But I can tell you that not only do I not support the
legalization of marijuana, it is not the position of the Department
of Justice currently to support the legalization. Nor would it be the
position should I become confirmed as attorney general."

Her stance buoyed legalization foes such as Kevin Sabet, president of
Smart Approaches to Marijuana, who said in a statement, "We are
breathing a sigh of relief."

"For her to come out so adamantly against legalization is extremely
encouraging," said Mr. Sabet, a former official in the White House
drug czar's office. "It will give our efforts a shot in the arm."

Marijuana advocates downplayed her responses, pointing out that she
was testifying before the Republican-controlled Senate Judiciary
Committee and that its chairman, Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, opposes
recent state moves to legalize recreational marijuana.

In fact, the day before Wednesday's hearing, Mr. Grassley took to the
Senate floor to condemn the Obama administration's decision to allow
states that have legalized recreational pot for adults to proceed
within certain parameters with regulated retail markets. Federal laws
banning pot, he said, should trump state statutes.

Colorado and Washington launched retail marijuana markets last year,
while voters in Alaska and Oregon passed ballot measures in November
allowing recreational pot use and sales for adults 21 and over. The
District of Columbia has approved adult pot use but not sales.

"We can only hope she was telling some lawmakers what they need to
hear in order to get through the confirmation process," Mr. Tvert
said in an email. "It would be shocking if she is actually unaware
that marijuana is far less harmful than alcohol."

The Department of Justice issued a guidance in 2013 that essentially
allows states to proceed with adult marijuana use and sales while
warning that prosecutors would still enforce eight priorities,
including keeping marijuana away from children and avoiding pot
diversion to other states.

Tom Angell, who heads Marijuana Majority, said in an email that Ms.
Lynch also appeared to indicate that she would follow the Justice
Department guidance.

"While it'd be ideal to have an attorney general who agrees with the
majority of Americans that it is time to end marijuana prohibition,
we really don't need federal officials to personally support
legalization," Mr. Angell. "We only need them to respect the will of
voters who have implemented legalization in their own states."

"As long as they don't spend resources trying to overturn those duly
enacted laws, I'm much less concerned about the personal views of
Justice Department personnel," Mr. Angell said.

Any federal crackdown on retail marijuana would hit Colorado hardest.
The state's recreational and medical marijuana businesses did an
estimated $760 million in sales in 2014, and that number could hit $1
billion this year, Mr. Elliott said.

"It doesn't make a lot of sense for that office to ignore drug
cartels and organized criminal enterprises to go after these
state-licensed businesses which are heavily controlled," Mr. Elliott
said. "It's a waste of resources, particularly when this first year
of legal marijuana sales has gone very well, with some exceptions.
This is widely seen as a successful program."
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
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Pubdate: Tue, 03 Feb 2015   Source: Denver Post (CO)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/122   Author: Kristen Wyatt, Associated Press

POT USE DOUBLES CRASH RISK
Colorado Publishes Review of Marijuana Health Research

Colorado released a sweeping report Monday about marijuana and health
- everything from pot's effect on drivers to asthma, cancer rates and
birth defects.

The 188- page report doesn't include new research on marijuana.
Instead, it's a review of what its authors call limited existing studies.

The report looks at studies showing that risk of a motor vehicle
crash doubles among drivers with recent marijuana use, and that heavy
use of marijuana is associated with impaired memory.

Other highlights from the report:

In adults, heavy use of marijuana is associated with impaired memory,
persisting a week or more after quitting.

Maternal use of marijuana during pregnancy is associated with
negative effects on exposed offspring, including decreased academic
ability, cognitive function and attention.

Regular marijuana use by adolescents and young adults is strongly
associated with developing psychotic symptoms and disorders such as
schizophrenia in adulthood.

The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment review was
ordered by state lawmakers. A panel of doctors met for several months
to compile the survey, which was delivered to lawmakers last week.

The report also lays out areas where there is limited evidence, or
where research is lacking.

For example, the report found insufficient evidence to say how long
after smoking pot a person is impaired. Other areas of scanty research:

Doctors noted there is little available research on the health
effects of edible or concentrated marijuana.

Marijuana smoke contains "many of the same cancer-causing chemicals
as tobacco smoke." But doctors noted there is "limited" or "mixed"
evidence to suggest pot smoking is associated with greater risk of
lung cancer or other respiratory health effects.

The doctors suggested additional education about the health effects
of marijuana and asked for increased public-health surveys about how
people use pot.

Researchers noted that because marijuana use was illegal nationwide
until 1996 - when California voters approved the first medical uses
for pot-research is extremely limited. Marijuana research has
historically looked for adverse effects, not possible health benefits.

"This legal fact introduces both funding bias and publication bias
into the body of literature related to marijuana use," authors noted.

Last year, Colorado funded eight studies to examine possible health
benefits of marijuana, including treatment for seizures, Parkinson's
disease and post-traumatic stress disorder. Those studies, totaling
about $ 8 million, may not have results for several years.
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
xxx
Pubdate: Tue, 03 Feb 2015   Source: Washington Post (DC)
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/491   Author: Aaron C. Davis

PRESIDENT'S BUDGET CLEARS PATH FOR LEGAL POT SALES
Proposal Ends Congress's Restriction on Setting Up Regulations in the City

President Obama's $4 trillion budget would do a lot of things, but
one of the most controversial may turn out to be allowing legal sales
of marijuana in the nation's capital.

D.C. voters overwhelmingly approved a ballot measure last year to
follow Colorado and Washington state in legalizing pot for recreational use.

But in December, outgoing Democrats and incoming Republican leaders
in Congress moved to halt the measure. Under a broad budget deal,
they prevented the District's mayor and council from spending any
money to work out the specifics of how pot would be sold, which the
ballot measure left up to local politicians to decide.

The congressional interference left in limbo the fate of the entire
legalization measure, which was approved by seven in 10 D.C. voters.

Obama's budget, however, would remove the congressional restriction,
allowing D.C. leaders to spend the city's tax money to develop a
regulatory scheme - and a system for taxing pot sales. If allowed by
Congress, that could let pot stores open in the nation's capital as
early as the end of the year.

The tiny two-word change - tucked on Page 1,248 of Obama's budget -
was first noticed on Monday by Tom Angell, chairman of the Marijuana Majority.

"It's great to see the president taking this subtle but important
action to clear the way for the District to sensibly regulate
marijuana," Angell told The Washington Post. "Now it remains to be
seen whether leaders in Congress will stand with the majority of the
American people or if they'll do everything they can to protect
failed prohibition policies."

D.C. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson last month challenged Congress
to either block the ballot measure or let it stand, saying that by
March the city would begin treating the ballot measure as law - that
would effectively legalize possession without any legal way to
purchase the drug.

Mendelson sent the ballot measure - known as Initiative 71 - to
Capitol Hill, starting the clock ticking on a 30-day review that
Congress has used just three times in 40 years to quash a local D.C. law.

House conservatives played down Mendelson's challenge, saying they
didn't need to act because the city's marijuana measure was suspended
already through the December budget deal. Rep. Andy Harris (R-Md.)
has warned that the District will be in violation of Congress if it
moves forward.

D.C.'s new mayor, Muriel E. Bowser, has also said she worries that
legalizing the drug without any legal means for purchasing it could
lead to open-air drug markets. But she has said she would rather move
forward with the risky step than stand in the way of the will of city
voters, as Congress has done.

Initiative 71 would allow residents and visitors ages 21 and older to
legally possess as much as two ounces of marijuana and would allow
residents to grow up to three mature marijuana plants each at home.

Obama's budget will have to pass through committees in both
congressional chambers stacked with conservatives. It would be
relatively easy for Harris, a member of the House Appropriations
Committee, to again amend Obama's budget in committee and strip out
the allowance for D.C. to legalize marijuana.
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom
xxx