Southern California Legal Growers

By Paul Armentano, AlterNet
Posted on October 28, 2009, Printed on October 28, 2009
http://www.alternet.org/story/143558/
The following is the testimony NORML Deputy Director Paul Armentano will deliver on Oct. 28 to the California Assembly Public Safety Committee's special hearing on "the legalization of marijuana: social, fiscal and legal implications for California." Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, D-San Francisco, sponsor of AB 390, The marijuana Control, Regulation and Education Act, is the chairman of the committee.
By any objective standard, marijuana prohibition is an abject failure.
Nationwide, U.S. law enforcement have arrested over 20 million American citizens for marijuana offenses since 1965, yet today marijuana is more prevalent than ever before, adolescents have easier access to marijuana than ever before, the drug is more potent than ever before, and there is more violence associated with the illegal marijuana trade than ever before.
Over 100 million Americans nationally have used marijuana despite prohibition, and 1 in 10 -- according to current government survey data -- use it regularly.
The criminal prohibition of marijuana has not dissuaded anyone from using marijuana or reduced its availability; however, the strict enforcement of this policy has adversely impacted the lives and careers of millions of people who simply elected to use a substance to relax that is objectively safer than alcohol.
NORML believes that the state of California ought to amend criminal prohibition and replace it with a system of legalization, taxation, regulation and education.
The case for legalization and regulation
Only through state government regulation will we be able to bring necessary controls to the commercial marijuana market. (Note: Nonretail cultivation for adult personal use would arguably not be subject to such regulations, just as the personal, noncommercial production by adults of beer is not governed by such restriction.) By enacting state and local legislation on the retail production and distribution of marijuana, state and local governments can effectively impose controls regarding:
• which citizens can legally produce marijuana;
• which citizens can legally distribute marijuana;
• which citizens can legally consume marijuana; and where, and under what circumstances such use is legally permitted.
By contrast, the criminal prohibition of marijuana -- the policy the state of California has in place now -- provides law enforcement and state regulators with no legitimate market controls. This absence of state and local government controls jeopardizes rather than promotes public safety.
For example:
• Prohibition abdicates the control of marijuana production and distribution to criminal entrepreneurs (i.e. drug cartels, street gangs, drug dealers who push additional illegal substances);
• Prohibition provides young people with unfettered access to marijuana (e.g., according to a 2009 Columbia University report, adolescents now have easier access to marijuana than they do alcohol);
• Prohibition promotes the use of marijuana in inappropriate and potentially dangerous settings (e.g., in automobiles, in public parks, in public restrooms, etc.)
• Prohibition promotes disrespect for the law and reinforces ethnic and generation divides between the public and law enforcement. (According to the FBI's Uniform Crime Report, 75 percent of all marijuana arrestees are under age 30; African Americans account for only 12 percent of marijuana users but make up 23 percent of all possession arrests).
marijuana is not a harmless substance -- no potentially mind-altering substance is. But this fact is precisely why its commercial production and distribution ought to be controlled and regulated in manner similar to the licensed distribution of alcohol and cigarettes -- two legal substances that cause far greater harm to the individual user, and to society as a whole, than cannabis ever could.
Taxing and regulating cannabis in a manner similar to alcohol will bring long-overdue state oversight to a commercial market that is presently unregulated, uncontrolled and all too often inundated by criminal entrepreneurs.
While this alternative may not entirely eliminate the black-market demand for cannabis, it would certainly be preferable to today's blanket, although thoroughly ineffective, expensive and impotent, criminal prohibition.
Voters nationwide, and in California in particular, support ending criminal marijuana prohibition. This past spring, 56 percent of California voters expressed support for taxing and regulating marijuana in a statewide Field poll.
Doing so would give greater control to state law enforcement officials and regulators by imposing proper state restrictions and regulations on this existing and widespread marijuana market.
I urge this committee to move forward with the enactment of sensible regulations for legalizing marijuana.
Paul Armentano is the deputy director of the National Organization for the Reform of marijuana Laws (NORML) and is the co-author of the book marijuana Is Safer: So Why Are We Driving People to Drink (2009, Chelsea Green).
© 2009 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/143558/

UPDATED THURSDAY 10/29/09 - NORML representatives will be speaking about
the 3 raids and arrests by LAPD on collectives yesterday (10/28/09) in the
San Fernando Valley as well as the raid by LAPD last week on Craig Rubin's
Temple 420.

Please attend if you can.
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Los Angeles NORML Letter Writing Party @ Bruce Margolin's Office, Sun Nov
1st, 9-11:30 AM


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NOTE: We are extending an invitation to ALL patient activist groups to
attend and participate. We are also asking all activist organizations to
please circulate this notice to your members as we need to put our
collective thoughts together and come up with a plan. Thank you.

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Los Angeles NORML will be hosting a "Letter Writing Party" get together on
Sunday morning November 1st at Bruce Margolin's Law office in West
Hollywood from 9-11:30 am.

We are asking people to give us an hour of their time, that's all. More
would be great.

The purpose of the meeting will be to discuss the current situation in Los
Angeles and also to write letters to Los Angeles city officials about the
medical marijuana ordinance that will then be hand delivered to each
council members office on Monday Nov 2nd.

Also letters will be written to state officials urging support of AB 390,
the Ammiano bill.

In talks with aides to council members it has become clear that we need to
start an old fashioned letter writing campaign. Many aides have told me to
"have your people write letters instead of yelling outside".

What we are told constantly is that politicians like to look at stacks of
letters from constituents and point to them and say "look at all these
letters I get about this". Apparently emails and phone calls have a much
less effect, they are tallied and quantified but letters are actually
read.

And the more letters we write the greater our impact will be.

This could be groundbreaking, getting all the local activist patients and
groups together to plan a unified action.


What: Los Angeles NORML Letter Writing Party

Date: Sunday November 1, 2009

Time: 9-11:30 Am

Where: Law Offices of Bruce Margolin
8749 Holloway
West Hollywood, Ca 90069

We look forward to seeing you Sunday Nov 1, 2009.

Yes we cannabis!

For more info, please contact Brett Stone at: <[email protected]>

ASA needs your help to stop Los Angeles City Attorney Carmen Trutanich from pushing an ordinance through the City Council that could effectively ban medical cannabis collectives in the city. On Monday, October 16, the Planning and Land Use Management (PLUM) Committee and Public Safety Committee will consider this badly flawed draft ordinance. Can you take a moment to call the committee members before that meeting and tell them to reject the City Attorney’s ordinance?
A simple phone call can make a big difference! Just call the committee members and say, “I am a medical cannabis supporter calling to ask the Councilmember to reject the draft medical cannabis ordinance prepared by City Attorney Carmen Trutanich.”
Ed Reyes-Chair (213)-473-7001
[email protected]
Dennis Zine (213)-473-7003
[email protected]
Jose Huizar (213)-473-7014
[email protected]
Tony Cardenas (213) -473-7006
[email protected]
Jan Perry (213)-473-7009
[email protected]
Greig Smith (213)-473-7012
[email protected]
Join us on Monday, November 16, to ask committee members in person to reject the ordinance, and adopt one that protects patients’ privacy and ensures that collectives can stay open. This is an important point in the process, because the draft ordinance may go to the full City Council for approval after this committee hearing.
What: Joint PLUM and Public Safety Committee meeting
When: 9:30 AM * Monday, November 16
Where: Room 350, City Hall, 200 N. Spring Street, Los Angeles, CA 90012
Public Transit Info: http://www.mta.net/riding_metro/default.htm
Arrive early to complete a public speaker’s card if you want to talk with the joint committee on Monday. You may have as little as one minute to speak. Keep your comments brief and on topic!
You can download a copy of the City Attorney’s draft ordinance:
http://safeaccessnow.org/downloads/four … LA_ord.pdf
You can see ASA’s suggested changes at:
http://www.safeaccessnow.org/downloads/ … LA_Ord.pdf
Don Duncan
ASA California Campaign Director
Americans for Safe Access (ASA) is the largest national member-based organization of patients, medical professionals, scientists and concerned citizens promoting safe and legal access to cannabis for therapeutic use and research.