cannabisnews.com: Alaska Becomes 3rd State with Legal Marijuana
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Alaska Becomes 3rd State with Legal Marijuana
Posted by CN Staff on February 23, 2015 at 19:29:57 PT
By The Associated Press
Source: Associated Press
Juneau, Alaska — Smoking, growing and possessing marijuana becomes legal in America’s wildest state Tuesday, thanks to a voter initiative aimed at clearing away 40 years of conflicting laws and court rulings.Making Alaska the third state to legalize recreational marijuana was the goal of a coalition including libertarians, rugged individualists and small-government Republicans who prize the privacy rights enshrined in the state’s constitution.
But when they voted 52-48 percent last November to legalize marijuana use by adults in private places, they left many of the details to lawmakers and regulators to sort out.Meanwhile, Alaska Native leaders worry that legalization will bring new temptations to communities already confronting high rates of drug and alcohol abuse, domestic violence and suicide.“When they start depending on smoking marijuana, I don’t know how far they’d go to get the funds they need to support it, to support themselves,” said Edward Nick, council member in Manokotak, a remote village of 400 that is predominantly Yup’ik Eskimo.Both alcohol and drug use are prohibited in Nick’s village 350 miles southwest of Anchorage, even inside the privacy of villagers’ homes.But Nick fears that the initiative, in combination with a 1975 state Supreme Court decision that legalized marijuana use inside homes — could open doors to drug abuse.Initiative backers promised Native leaders that communities could still have local control under certain conditions. Alaska law gives every community the option to regulate alcohol locally. From northern Barrow to Klawock, 1,291 miles away in southeast Alaska, 108 communities impose local limits on alcohol, and 33 of them ban it altogether.But the initiative did not provide clear opt-out language for tribal councils and other smaller communities, forcing each one to figure out how to proceed Tuesday.November’s initiative also bans smoking in public, but didn’t define what that means, and lawmakers left the question to the alcohol regulatory board, which planned to meet early Tuesday to discuss an emergency response.In Anchorage, Alaska’s largest city, officials tried and failed in December to ban a new commercial marijuana industry. But Police Chief Mark Mew said his officers will be strictly enforcing the public smoking ban. He even warned people against smoking on their porches if they live next to a park.Other officials are still discussing a proposed cultivation ban for the wild Kenai Peninsula. But far to the north, in North Pole, smoking outdoors on private property will be OK as long as it doesn’t create a nuisance, officials there said.While the 1975 court decision protected personal marijuana possession and a 1998 initiative legalized medicinal marijuana, state lawmakers twice criminalized any possession over the years, creating an odd legal limbo.As of Tuesday, adult Alaskans can not only keep and use pot, they can transport, grow it and give it away. A second phase, creating a regulated and taxed marijuana market, won’t start until 2016 at the earliest.And while possession is no longer a crime under state law, enjoying pot in public can bring a $100 fine.That’s fine with Dean Smith, a pot-smoker in Juneau who has friends in jail for marijuana offenses. “It’s going to stop a lot of people getting arrested for nonviolent crimes,” he said.The initiative’s backers warned pot enthusiasts to keep their cool.“Don’t do anything to give your neighbors reason to feel uneasy about this new law. We’re in the midst of an enormous social and legal shift,” organizers wrote in the Alaska Dispatch News, the state’s largest newspaper.Richard Ziegler, who had been promoting what he called “Idida-toke” in a nod to Alaska’s Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, reluctantly called off his party.There’s no such pullback for former television reporter Charlo Greene, now CEO of the Alaska Cannabis Club, which is having its grand opening on Tuesday in downtown Anchorage. She’s already pushing the limits, promising to give away weed to paying “medical marijuana” patients and other “club members.”Greene — who quit her job with a four-letter walkoff on live television last year to devote her efforts to passing the initiative — plans a celebratory toke at 4:20 p.m.Source: Associated Press (Wire) Published: February 23, 2015Copyright: 2015 The Associated PressCannabisNews -- Cannabis Archiveshttp://cannabisnews.com/news/list/cannabis.shtml
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Comment #11 posted by Oleg the Tumor on February 27, 2015 at 07:44:37 PT
Look What We Have Done.
“When they start depending on smoking marijuana, I don’t know how far they’d go to get the funds they need to support it, to support themselves,” said Edward Nick, council member in Manokotak, a remote village of 400 that is predominantly Yup’ik Eskimo.We have convinced Native Peoples to believe The White Man's Lie regarding a natural plant!If anyone should know anything about the flora and fauna of a given environment, it would be the native whose people have been there for years beyond memory. To be fair, the Eskimos probably don't see a lot of cannabis growing out of the permafrost.The Native American has been using cannabis for thousands of years. For councilmember Edward Nick to imply that cannabis would cause tribe members to become addicted simply shows how little Mr. Nick understands the plant in question.Maybe I am prejudiced, but I do expect Native Americans to understand a little more about botany then I do. But these people have been given nothing but lies since the very beginning, so maybe I shouldn't be surprised.
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Comment #10 posted by Hope on February 25, 2015 at 10:50:43 PT
A cup of coffee with Quinn the Eskimo.
Jumping for joy!What a great thing for them. What a great and wonderful thing. I'm so happy for them.High five, Quinn, Schmeff, and the GCW!
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Comment #9 posted by The GCW on February 24, 2015 at 16:53:45 PT
Is cannabis illegal in part cause it doesn't kill?
Tobacco 'kills two in three smokers'
By Michelle Roberts
Health editor, BBC News onlinehttp://www.bbc.com/news/health-31600118The death risk from smoking may be much higher than previously thought - tobacco kills up to two in every three smokers not one in every two, data from a large study suggests.
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Comment #8 posted by The GCW on February 24, 2015 at 15:42:40 PT
Confession time
I spend more than $120 per month on coffee beans.You know what caffeine is good for?Caffeine withdrawal. Zzzzz
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Comment #7 posted by schmeff on February 24, 2015 at 13:52:00 PT
Where there is common sense, there is Hope
Hope, I agree with your assessment that a cannabis habit should be no more costly than a coffee habit. In a free market I would expect coffee to be more dear than MJ. Up here in the Beaver State I can't grow my own coffee beans.Nick the Eskimo's concerns about rising crime as a result of dope fiends supporting their habits reminds me of a dark time in my youth. It was an era of low-paying jobs and times were pretty tight for me. When the price of avocados went up, I had to resort to robbing convenience stores to feed my guacamole habit. Nobody ever got hurt and I was lucky to never get caught. Before long I got a good job at the Walmart and could afford the green gold again.The moral is that in desperate times, people will do whatever it takes to get by. I'm guessing that in "a remote village of 400 that is predominantly Yup’ik Eskimo," things are pretty desperate, economics-wise. One might be driven to crime just to obtain food.I asked my friend Quinn the Eskimo, who is no stranger to the problems of drug and alcohol abuse among his people, what he thought about Ed Nick's concerns. He said it's no wonder folks turn to drugs and alcohol living a bare subsistence existence in the remote frozen tundra that is dreary and dark most of the year. There are few jobs or opportunities, and avocados are nearly fictitious. You get drunk just to feel less bleak and make the ladies prettier.
Much better to switch from booze to bong. Booze kills. Hard enough to move ahead as it is without a criminal record, which is removed now that weed is free. Quinn thinks now that weed is free in Alaska, weed should be cost free in Manokowtak to reduce drug and alcohol abuse.He used a lot fewer words, but that was the gist of it.You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn.
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Comment #6 posted by Hope on February 24, 2015 at 10:04:59 PT
Enjoy your restored rights, Alaska.
You can't just say "Fire one up for me" or "Smoke 'em if you got 'em" to cover this delightful restoration of human rights because cannabis isn't restricted to smoking. But wow. It's good to know that particular stalking horse that's trying to get the cannabis appreciating person... has been put in it's barn in another state of the country that has a lot of people wanting their freedom, their liberty, their rights back, in this matter of what they choose to consume. The persecution has been ungodly. Congratulations, Alaska. You are more than you were! I'm so happy for you.
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Comment #5 posted by Hope on February 24, 2015 at 09:54:08 PT
The fear is just laughable.
Grown people afraid of their own shadows. It's ridiculous. And that guy worried about pot smokers working and being able to support their habit. Aarrgh. He heard about those rock stars in the eighties with the two thousand dollar a day cocaine habits. Oh my gosh.I could be wrong and there are always exceptions to the rules and wildly excessive people among us... but I'd say most adults on average wouldn't have any more trouble paying for their cannabis than they do for their coffee.Gah. Gah, again.
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Comment #4 posted by runruff on February 24, 2015 at 09:11:04 PT
only on two occasions, mind you.
Politicians only remove their heads from that proverbial dark place, to count their votes and their money.What is wrong with many in Congress is they suffer from methane poisoning.
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Comment #3 posted by schmeff on February 24, 2015 at 08:28:49 PT
"Lawmakers"...aka Gutless Cowards
"November’s initiative also bans smoking in public, but didn’t define what that means, and lawmakers left the question to the alcohol regulatory board, which planned to meet early Tuesday to discuss an emergency response."So afraid of their own shadows that they're paralyzed into inaction until the day the law takes effect, then they convene to consider "emergency" measures. We all know how thoughtful and rational politicians are in an emergency. (I'm reminded of the thoughtful analysis accorded the Patriot Act.) Apparently, the Alaskan legislators have their heads so deeply buried in the sand (or up their asses) they never saw it coming.
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Comment #2 posted by Hope on February 23, 2015 at 21:18:17 PT
Sweet. Sweet. Sweet.
It would be cool to be one of the first thirteen.
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Comment #1 posted by FoM on February 23, 2015 at 19:30:39 PT
North To Alaska
Go north the rush is on!
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