JUNE 2016
SANTA CLARITA VALLEY BUSINESS JOURNAL
5
SPECIAL REPORT
Californians’ Attitudes More Favorable Toward Marijuana Legalization By Jana Adkins SCVBJ Editor
M
arijuana. It’s the new frontier and companies are springing up quicker than the state can track them. Trade unions are beginning to organize workers, and celebrities are jumping into the burgeoning industry business through investments or startups. Whoopi Goldberg announced in March she was co-founding a medicinal marijuana business called Whoopi & Maya with products directed at women. Medical marijuana delivery services are becoming the Uber and Lyft of the ridesharing programs. In addition, although medical marijuana dispensaries are illegal in Santa Clarita, on the morning this story was written 17 deliveries were being made to locations throughout the city as were tracked on Weedmaps.com. And despite the efforts of Los Angeles City attorney Mike Feuer to stop delivery services, some doubt he’ll be successful, saying the city can’t even get its dispensaries under control. “The veil of local governments being able to control what’s taking place in their community is thin,” said former State Senator George C. Runner and now member of the state’s tax board. Legalizing marijuana for recreational use may become reality in California – one which might erase the boundary between cannabis use for medicinal purposes and casual users. It’s somewhat the modern day equivalent to prohibition of alcohol in the 1920s and 30s. That didn’t prove successful either. “This is much more complicated than prohibition was,” Runner said. “The federal government says it’s illegal and states are saying its legal. Marijuana is in a gray area. If something’s illegal, you’ll always have someone selling it illegally.”
The veil of local governments being able to control what’s taking place in their community is thin.”
– George Runner, former California State Senator and member of the State Board of Equalization
But the weed industry may come out of the shadows and into the legal framework once the state’s new rules for medical marijuana take effect, and if voters approve it for recreational use.
Attitudes A variety of polls show increasing reception by voters to legalizing marijuana for recreational use, and if polls are any indicator, the initiative to put those polls to the test may land on California’s Nov. 8 election ballot. Nationally, Gallup’s poll points to a 46-year high in tracking attitudes toward marijuana, with 58 percent of respondents favoring legalized marijuana. And it’s not just the young who are in favor. Surprisingly, Gallup found that Americans who are aged 65 through 79 – born between 1936 and 1950 – are more supportive of making marijuana legal in 2016. With Louisiana just having legalized medical marijuana, cannabis is now legal in 26 of the 50 U.S. states – despite the federal government’s ruling that it is still an illegal drug. Pennsylvania legalized a medical marijuana program in April. Now Californians are poised to vote on the issue of recreational use if at least 365,000 of the 600,000 signatures collected – well ahead of the July 5 deadline – are verified. And the polls show California residents are largely in favor of passing the initiative. U.S. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, a California Republican, spoke in favor of the Adult Use of Marijuana initiative in early May, invoking the words former President Ronald Reagan famously used to call for the dismantling of the Berlin Wall. “The walls of cannabis production and tyranny are coming down,” said Rohrabacher, who worked in the Reagan White House. “Join us in tearing down this wall.”
■ Owner Bob Leeds inspects small “clone” marijuana plants growing under lights at Sea of Green Farms, a recreational pot grower and processor in Seattle. A ballot proposal before Ohio voters this fall would be the first in the Midwest to take marijuana use and sales from illegal to legal for both personal and medical use in a single vote. AP Photo.
Demographics Today, 55 percent of likely voters think that marijuana should be legal, according to The Public Policy Institute of California. Support has increased 5 percent since 2010, the last time a similar initiative was on the ballot. And, for the first time, a majority of Californians age 55 and older think it should be legalized – an increase of 10 points since 2010. College graduates are more likely to support the initiative (60%), compared to those with some college (55%), according to the nonpartisan research team. When it comes to the sexes, men are still more likely to be in favor – 59 percent of men vs. 47 percent of women. The institute also reports that support for legalization is much higher among Democrats (63%) and independents (57%), but even Republican support for legalization has increased by 10 points since 2010 (44%). If polls are any indicator, legalizing casual use of marijuana seems to be gaining steam. If voters don’t approve it, can the momentum be stopped with so many states coming on board? Even the U.S. House of Representatives voted in May to approve the access to medical cannabis therapy for veterans receiving their healthcare through the Veterans Administration.
and older would be allowed to buy an ounce of marijuana and marijuana-infused produces (edibles). But it also makes it easier for police to crack down on illicit sales than it has been in two decades since the state first legalized medical marijuana. Smoking weed would remain off-limits in places where tobacco use already is prohibited. California’s ballot initiative also reportedly puts in place the strictest product quality and tracking system in the nation, with separate licenses required for growers, transporters and distributors. The efforts, supporters believe, would help to reduce the illicit market by moving an unregulated and multi-billiondollar industry out of the shadows and into a regulated mainstream. The state’s new regulatory framework is effective 2017. “Given the complexity of California’s market, achieving the people’s will and responsibly regulating marijuana will be a process that unfolds over many years, requiring a sustained attention to implementation,” Newsom said when the results of the Blue Ribbon Commission were released. ■ Lisa Leff and The Associated Press also contributed to this story.
Momentum California was the first state to legalize medical marijuana in 1996, but it is the last state on the west coast to approve it for recreational use. Recreational use of marijuana is now legal in Alaska, Washington and Oregon. A California Blue Ribbon commission set up in 2015 made 58 recommendations to regulate medical marijuana and essentially create a compatible system for recreational use. The state’s new Bureau of Medical Marijuana was launched and is tasked with building the infrastructure. Of the more than 52 bills pending in the state legislature, 26 of them relate directly to the marijuana trade, according to the Washington D.C.-based Marijuana Policy Project, which formed in 1995 to end prohibition against cannabis. And Gov. Jerry Brown recently signed legislation requiring that dispensaries and other marijuana-related businesses will have to obtain licenses from the state to operate. “You do not need to be pro-marijuana to be pro-legalization,” said California Lt. Governor Gavin Newsom, the father of four young children who hopes to be governor in 2018.
Out of the Shadows With California’s initiative, residents and visitors age 21
■ Customers buy products at the Harvest Medical Marijuana Dispensary in San Francisco for the annual 4/20 marijuana holiday. AP Photo.