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  Denver Ordinance Could Make Smell Of MJ Illegal
Posted by CN Staff on October 11, 2013 at 17:21:55 PT
By Matt Ferner, The Huffington Post 
Source: Huffington Post 

cannabis Denver -- A new city ordinance being considered in Denver could make the smell of marijuana, or even just the sight of someone smoking marijuana, illegal if it can smelled or seen by others.

Mayor Michael Hancock and some Denver City Council members want to pass the ordinance over fears that public pot consumption could become a problem in Mile High City after voters approved Amendment 64 last November. It legalized marijuana for recreational use by adults 21 and over, and retail marijuana shops will open their doors for the first time Jan. 1, 2014 in the city.

The text of the ordinance reads:

It shall be unlawful for any person to openly and publicly display or consume one ounce or less of marijuana.

The ordinance then defines the terms "openly" and "publicly":

The term "openly" means occurring or existing in a manner that is unconcealed, undisguised, or obvious, and is observable or perceptible through sight or smell to the public or to persons or neighboring properties.

The term "publicly" means: (a) occurring or existing in a public space as defined by C.R.S. 18-1-901, or (b) occurring or existing in a place or location to which members of the public have access, or (c) occurring or existing in a place, location or in such a manner that members of the public or persons on neighboring properties may observe or perceive it by sight or smell, including but not limited to vehicles on public streets or highways.

"Your activities should not pervade others' peace and ability to enjoy," Hancock told The Denver Post. "Marijuana is one of those elements that can be quite pervasive and invasive. I shouldn't have to smell your activities from your backyard."

Violations of the proposed rules, if passed, would carry fines of up to $999 or a year in jail, 7News reports.

But backers of A64 in Colorado say the proposed ordinance isn't just unconstitutional, it's hypocritical as the new rule is being considered during the same weekend as Denver celebrates another substance -- beer -- while the nation's largest celebration of beer, the Great American Beer Fest, takes place in the city.

“The hypocrisy of this proposal is astounding,” said Mason Tvert, communications director of Marijuana Policy Project and co-director of the Yes on 64 campaign. “As Denver wraps up Beer Week with the nation’s largest beer celebration, city officials are proposing a crackdown on adults’ legal, private use of a far less harmful substance. Mayor Hancock should explain why he thinks it is okay for him to publicly consume and even serve alcohol, but feels it should be a criminal offense for adults to use marijuana in their own homes.”

Colorado voters passed Amendment 64 last November making the limited sale, possession and growing of marijuana for recreational purposes legal for adults 21 and over. A64 states that adults can possess up to an ounce of pot, can grow as many as six marijuana plants at home (with only three flowering at any given time), but home-grown marijuana can only be for personal use and cannot be sold. However, adults can gift one another up to an ounce of pot.

Source: Huffington Post (NY)
Author: Matt Ferner, The Huffington Post
Published: October 10, 2013
Copyright: 2013 HuffingtonPost.com, LLC
Contact: scoop@huffingtonpost.com
Website: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/
URL: http://drugsense.org/url/pz7WcQeo

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Comment #13 posted by museman on October 16, 2013 at 10:09:23 PT
The Myway Highway
Is an expressway invented expressly for dumbed-down amerikan consumers.

Created to glorify selfishness.

Buy my thingy, and I'll shut up, but if you're not going to buy anything get out of my space -I pay taxes for it!

"All through the day, I me mine, I me mine, I me mine."

And I got sick of that way back in the 70's.

That highway is paved with bad intentions, but too many keep driving on it.

LEGALIZE FREEDOM

[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #12 posted by schmeff on October 16, 2013 at 09:55:41 PT
Comment #8
Ban the joint? I have read your comments here over time, Mexweed, and it is clear that you are some kind of overbearing evangelist for vaporizing technology. To each his own, I say, but your eagerness to have everyone do things YOUR way is really no different, philosophically, from the prohibitionists.

I, for one, am growing weary of your tireless preaching.

[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #11 posted by Hope on October 13, 2013 at 08:59:42 PT
The scent of fear.
"That cigarette you're smoking 'bout to scare me half to death."

To others it's a nice smell and can make one smile.

Speaking of smiling. I find I need to go back and reiterate, once again what a "Contact high" is. Arrgh.

You are with people that have used cannabis. It doesn't have to be in the air. You pick up on the vibe. You understand them and enjoy whatever you all are doing. And you feel the vibe... contact high.

Aaargh. The old proverbial "Contact high", does not mean actually getting high from being near the smell or the smoke. It means catching the vibe. That's clear isn't it? Lol!

It would have to be pretty dang dense and unrelenting... like a "Hot Boxing" or "Smoke Out" or whatever to actually get stoned. Smoke wafting through the air isn't going to get you actually high.... anymore than smelling a beer will give you a buzz.

Three Dog Night http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLQYkbzSz5s

[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #10 posted by boballen131313 on October 12, 2013 at 17:03:52 PT:

Dangerous Insidious Wafting
Coming from a small town in Montana and raised around the local pulp mill, I wonder where the indignation was when the wood industries were pumping the air full of toxic chemicals? Looking back from a time in the future, I am hoping that this kind of bogus legislation of fear will look as queer as it feels.

I would rather catch a whiff of good smoke than smell my neighbours putrid cooking, but I don't go into a twist because he uses too much curry powder!

Pass some good manners legislation, Denver. Jail for pot smoke? Please get real!!!

[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #9 posted by Hope on October 12, 2013 at 16:02:08 PT
Comment 4
Amen!

Oh my Lord... the injustice!

Oh my Lord.

It has been awful to see.

[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #8 posted by mexweed on October 12, 2013 at 14:10:09 PT:

Just ban the joint
Let's go part way: agree with Hancock that Side Stream Smoke (SSS), full of 5 times as much carbon monoxide as Mainstream, is an intrusion on others-- but let's encourage users to employ a vape pen or one-hitter (with both you inhale 100%).

[ Post Comment ]
 
Comment #7 posted by museman on October 12, 2013 at 12:35:12 PT
Sam
All too true.

As I have repeatedly stated; This is not "Legalization."

How can anyone really think it possible in a police state like the one we have seen flourish because of prohibition, the federal reserve, the NSA, and the final coup de gras on American Liberty; "The Patriot Act."?

People have been duped. In my opinion, the idea that we can have 'cannabis liberty' without establishing 'liberty and justice for all' is chartering a trip down de nile.

As long as people believe and continue to support the mechanisms and philosophies that engineer, or at least try to engineer all of our fate according to their intent of personal power, aggrandizement, and 'social superiority' -based on ones amount of property 'holdings' and their control of 'capital,' then the only 'change' we are really going to see is a worsening of what is already pretty damn bad.

We have allowed them to almost wreck our planet through various means of denial. We have allowed them to control the money, the energy, the land, the food, our choices in clothing, our choices in 'entertainment' -in fact anything we can come up with that give us power, they begin to 'legislate' away from us.

And who are they?

Unfortunately they are a minority who have successfully convinced most of the rest of us to capitulate through fear, threat, intimidation, social ostracism (based on the false values engineered by the elite) and materialistic temptation.

They have made the people of the world their personal resource.

And we outnumber them about 100 to 1. Yet every day I see thousands of people being corralled like cattle into a way of life and being that is not natural, is discomforting, and just plain wrong -by a mere handful of grim faced enforcers driving around in souped up cars, with weapons of mass destruction (they are definitely) strapped to their hips, and a gold plated tin badge giving them that 'authority' -or so everyone has been made to believe.

The solution, as I have said many times, is simple.

Take your own power, freedom, and resource back from the thieves. Stop giving it to the wrong things, people and deeds. Stop supporting this travesty of a 'government' and

SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL HUMAN



[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #6 posted by Sam Adams on October 12, 2013 at 09:30:08 PT
SEE what's happening
The govt. and ruling elite just want to be able to arrest anyone at any time. They love policing, guns, and political de-stablization.

Just look at what they've done to our entertainment and culture. Every blockbuster movie is a bloodbath of cruelty, torture and gory gun violence.

Most towns in my state have hundreds of pages of local laws, in addition to the thousands of pages of state and federal laws. Just about anything a man does after leaving the house is illegal, and most of the stuff you do inside the house as well.

[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #5 posted by The GCW on October 12, 2013 at 04:10:46 PT
Follow-up editorial
Denver pot restrictions go too far

http://www.denverpost.com/marijuana/ci_24292674/denver-pot-restrictions-go-too-far

[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #4 posted by runruff on October 12, 2013 at 00:24:16 PT
I'll tell you what stinks,
...you self righteous sons of bitches!

I met Gordo [Gordon Posey] in the pen. He was finshing up a 30 year sentence for smuggling hash. Child rapers and murders get less time. It was his only offense.

He spent 15 years in solitary confinement, four stories underground at Flourence Max. I do not know the whole storie on that one but he and others have said that they had this brand new underground facility and needed to fill it so many like Gordo were kept there on trumoed up charges.

If any one of these persneckity daisies spent any time at all underground, they would not complain about the oders on the air so long ant it smelled free!

[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #3 posted by museman on October 11, 2013 at 20:00:15 PT
whose liberties? Yours or mine?
"Your activities should not pervade others' peace and ability to enjoy,"

Yeah well watching the dumb amerikan consumer driving around in credit card lifestyles, and uptown haircuts nauseates me to the point I have to smoke cannabis to ease my stomach.

"I shouldn't have to smell your activities from your backyard."

Yeah and all the GMO bar b q sauce burning on your petroleum laced brickettes makes quite a carcinogenic mix, wafting through my air space.

Get real idiots!

LEGALIZE FREEDOM

[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #2 posted by The GCW on October 11, 2013 at 18:21:04 PT
Hancock is silly
Hancock doesn't want one neighbor to be forced to smell (awe shucks) some cannabis smoke.

But, He's ok with that neighbor putting a neighbor in a cage for the action of producing plant smoke which wonders in the wind.

Hancock puts a human in a cage for producing cannabis smoke which wonders into a neighbors yard, AND THAT WILL BE THE CRIME.

-0-

Words alone can not get across to prohibitionists how stupid and screwed up they are.

-0-

I don't see this getting traction.

-0-

Please VOTE on this POLL:

"Should Denver prohibit smoking marijuana on private property if it can be seen or smelled from a neighboring property"

Yes

No

http://www.denverpost.com/

[ Post Comment ]

 
Comment #1 posted by HempWorld on October 11, 2013 at 17:48:37 PT
What's That Smell... ?
Oh, it's cigarettes the only legal (really legal) smokes around, but they kill, even just bystanders... Oh well...

Might as well... go to h...

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