George Rebane
[This is the linked transcript of my regular KVMR commentary broadcast on 18 March 2016.]
Legalization of marijuana is making progress by fits and starts across the nation. I want to talk about how those fits and starts are taking place here in Nevada County where marijuana or MJ has long been the county’s leading albeit illegal cash crop. The country’s MJ laws are a mess, with the feds totally outlawing the weed along with its commercial relatives like hemp. And the states (California) have their own laws that permit various methods of production and types of consumption which specify how everything from recreational marijuana or RMJ to medical marijuana or MMJ can be used. Then come the counties making their own rules about growing and consuming RMJ and MMJ, rules that somehow have to dovetail, sidestep, or totally ignore what higher jurisdictions already have in place, or are planning for the near term. As I said, it is a mess, and one that is entirely created by government.
Most of us know that our Board of Supervisors have put Measure W on the June ballot. Its passage promises to supersede the emergency MJ ordinance now in place, and legalize limited indoor MMJ grows to provide the plant for medicinal uses. The anti-MJ folks, led by Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM), are promoting Measure W since it not only outlaws outdoor grows, but all “commercial cultivation and other commercial cannabis activities”, and permits only limited indoor growing of MMJ “for medicinal purposes”.
SAM argues that any large scale MMJ grows will provide profitable product for RMJ use and will continue the nuisance aspects of the marijuana culture that is evident in the county. Additionally such grows impede the county’s economic development as told by our sheriff.
The anti-W people are organized under Americans for Safe Access (ASA) which promotes MMJ cultivation and use. They argue that W is totally inadequate for local supply of the types and quantities of the plant to satisfy the needs of local patients. They discount the impact of MMJ leakage to RMJ, stating that such uses are already illegal and law enforcement should just continue to deal with it.
It is evident to most that neither side knows the actual dimensions of the problem they are trying to solve. Their arguments can be reduced to pro-W people asking ‘Why should neighborhoods suffer?’, and the anti-W folks countering with ‘Why should kids suffer?’ And so they both go on generating heat without shedding much light on the debate.
Stepping back, it is easy to see that all social issues become reasonable concerns only when we know the numbers that define their scope, size, locales, and impacted populations. Without defining parameters, debates about such issues never go beyond the anecdotal, the emotional, and the demagoguery that serve other agendas. Nevada County’s marijuana debate is a poster child that confirms this. Absent the numbers, the inevitable result is more bad laws, regulations, and ordinances.
To date we know neither the scope nor extent of the neighborhood problem save that there have been neighbors’ complaints about bad smells and increases in unsavory traffic. And the ‘smoke free zone’ in Nevada City is a farce that any visitor can smell as they walk the city’s streets and see smokers tucked away in doorways and other shielded places.
And the medical problem is known only by anecdotal accounts of this child or that sufferer whose life has been spared or made tolerable by the steady consumption of an exotic marijuana concoction produced locally in someone’s garage or house. These are the ‘medicines’ which ASA claims the county tries to deny the ill and afflicted. But we voters have no idea how many people will then suffer or die if they can’t get such locally produced ‘product’.
Until both sides bring voters some reasonable estimates of the scope of the problems they describe, Measure W will be one more exercise of public emotions playing out in the voting booth. The result will not satisfy anyone or acknowledge the country’s changing sentiment toward drugs, and the new laws that will regulate and tax their production and use.
My name is Rebane, and I also expand on this and related themes on Rebane’s Ruminations where the transcript of this commentary is posted with relevant links, and where such issues are debated extensively. However my views are not necessarily shared by KVMR. Thank you for listening.
[19mar16 update] We saw our friend and RR reader RL ‘Bob’ Crabb’s regular Saturday contribution in this morning’s Union, and immediately decided to filch it for an appropriate addendum to the above commentary. Thanks Bob.
[24mar16 update] In the 24mar16 Union Bob Miller of Grass Valley writes ‘Both sides of marijuana debate have explaining to do’ wherein he takes to task MMJ proponents like Ms Patricia Smith who opposes Measure W, and the Board of Supervisors who promote it. It is a well written piece that I happen to wholly agree with, especially when he also calls on our county leaders to lead. Mr Miller concludes – “Finally, putting Measure W on the ballot instead of leaving the ordinance amendable by the board guarantees should any unintended consequences arise they won’t be easily undone. We elected you to lead wisely. We do not accept that wisdom would ever consider throwing such a critical measure on the ballot before it’s been proven workable. Having to admit later, ‘The people have already spoken. We can do nothing about it now’ won’t cut it.”
rebanesruminations.com 
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