Politics More Cities Adopt Seattle’s Marijuana Reforms
posted by on November 10 at 11:47 AM
This Slog post was written by Dominic Holden.—DS
Since Seattle passed Initiative 75, which made marijuana possession the city’s lowest law enforcement priority back in 2003, other cities, including Oakland and West Hollywood, have adopted similar laws. On Tuesday voters in four other cities adopted Seattle’s progressive pot laws.
From Missoula County to St. Nick’s strongholds—Santa Barbara, Santa Monica and Santa Cruz—voters gave the thumbs up to four new laws like I-75 and became part of an urban movement born in Seattle.
Meanwhile, statewide attempts to reform pot weren’t so successful. Colorado’s Amendment 44, which would have removed penalties for possession, and Nevada’s Question 7, which would have regulated pot like alcohol, went up in smoke.
Pundit in a nutshell: State measures are being spoiled by rural voters, while cities are pushing the buggies of reform. Folks who lay off the dummy pipe might remember Urban Archipelago, The Stranger’s 2004 proclamation that spells out the inherent power for progress held in the womb of urbanized areas. The proliferation of I-75’s siblings confirms that cities hold the key constituents that drive pot reform. And measures like I-75 dodge the state/city conflict by de-prioritizing enforcement rather than actually changing the law.
Wait—if these city initiatives aren’t “actually changing the law” are they merely gestures, or do they keep stoners out of jail? In Seattle, arrests and prosecutions plummetted after I-75 passed, thanks in large part to the scrutinizing oversight of the Marijuana Policy Review Panel. But in other cities without accountability written into their initiative, police could easily tell voters to fuck off and keep arresting people anyway.
The ultimate test, though, is whether these local measures will lead to reforms on a state level.
Here’s how that would work: Drug warriors have long insisted that if pot were legalized or decriminalized or whatever, it would send the wrong message to the children and other crap. But if government-conducted studies, such as the one coming about I-75, shows it didn’t send the wrong message and kids weren’t getting hooked on chronic, then states will have the armor to rebut the claims of reefer madness and prove that reform works—look, right here in our own state—and decriminalize marijuana.
“None of the negative outcomes our opponents predicted will come true,” Angela Goodhope told The Missoulan after their measure passed Tuesday. “We know that for a fact,” she assured. Let’s hope Goodhope’s got good instincts.
The final verdict on I-75’s efficacy or fallout will come in January when Seattle’s pot panel issues its final report. And then—assuming the report is favorable—more initiatives like I-75 will plop their fuzzy green butts down on the ballots of cities surrounded by big red counties. Whether the trend will ultimately translate to statewide reforms remains to be seen.
God I hope so.
The "Sends the wrong message" line drives me COMPLETELY INSANE! It is completely removed from reality. The warriors simply will not accept the fact that the same # of people will smoke weed regardless of whether it is legal or not.
I caught a debate on CNN regarding the NV question 7, and the warrior actually said (paraphrasing), "the tax benefits will not make up for the societal costs." Societal cost!?!? What, people will be too mellow and easy going? Doritos demand will skyrocket? Please. Alcohol and tobacco are 1000 time more dangerous and addictive than weed, but no one is in a hurry to make them illegal.
Yeah, because Missoula County is so totally urban.
Pundit in a nutshell: State measures are being spoiled by rural voters, while cities are pushing the buggies of reform.
Um... no. Go here and scroll down to Question 7. In Las Vegas' comparitively liberal and urban Clark County, the measure failed 44-56 (%). Lyon County, whose major town I can't even remember, has 41-59, not that different, while Nye County, whose only real populated area is that bustling test-site town, Tonopah, polled 43-56. The 2nd biggest county, Washoe (they of Reno, NV), polled 47-53. The only places where you see a huge No vote are the tiniest of counties, which possibly haven't discovered color TV's yet.
So basically, you can't pin this on the rurals, when the splits are still pretty even and many of the big city voters shot this thing down as well.
Next thing you know, you'll want to permit gay marriages.
When Canada, Denmark, and all those other nations did that they ... um ... ok, their GDP increased and they improved their standings on world levels of comparison of socities.
Never mind.
The strangest part of this is the NV vote. You can lose your family's house on poker and go to a whore house for desert, but god forbid anyone smoke a joint!
WTF?!?
You're right - Missoula County is no metropolis, and Nevada's Question 7, an ambitious attempt at full legalization, was rejected in some urban-ish counties, too. But, in the past few years reforms have been passed by voters in Seattle, Denver, Oakland, Columbia, and the four cities mentioned in this post.
With the exception of a handful of advances for medical marijuana, states have had virtually no success passing marijuana reforms.
So while one could argue that rural voters aren't the only reason state measures fail, we can certainly thank progressive urban voters for much of the successful measures.
What's even funnier, Mike, is that prostitution is legally banned in Las Vegas' Clark County. You CAN go to a brothel from Vegas, but you have to drive 60 miles west to Pahrump in Nye County, where it's perfectly legal.
As you can see from this by county results map, all of the rural east, southeast etc voted against.
It was a two person campaign, so job well done in my book.
http://cfapp2.rockymountainnews.com/election/results/map.cfm?id=13051
URL would help
jonny
I worry that law enforcement will purposely act to make their fanatical predictions true and discredit the initiative/CRCP/myself. Of course there is money involved (claimed $200,000 would be lost) so maybe not.
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