Reflections from the trenches of a recent statewide debate on legal marijuana.
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Get Out Your Checkbook: What Legalized Marijuana is Going to Cost→
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With such overwhelming support, one could assume that legalization has clear benefits for everyone. That assumption is not only costly, it could prove to be dead wrong.
Read MoreLegal weed isn't living up to all of its promises. We need to shut it down→
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Today, a growing class of well-heeled lobbyists intent on commercializing marijuana are doing everything they can to sell legal weed as a panacea for every contemporary challenge we face in America. Over the past several years we've been barraged by claims that legal pot can cure the opioid crisis, cure cancer, eliminate international drug cartels, and even solve climate change.
Read MoreMarijuana, Legalization and the Workplace
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This year American workers tested positive for illicit drugs at the highest rate in 12 years with marijuana positivity increasing 75%. Being in construction and manufacturing business for over 40 years I know well the challenges of finding, training, and maintaining an effective workforce. There is also the demand for creating and maintaining a safe workplace. None of these business demands are assisted by having marijuana legalized.
Read MoreLegalized marijuana turns Colorado resort town into homeless magnet→
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Caleb Preston, a store manager in a gift shop and a former “street entertainer,” said the homeless and panhandling issue in Durango has gotten out of hand since the state legalized marijuana.
“Just this year there has been a major influx of people between 20 to 30 who are just hanging out on the streets,” Preston said. “The problem is while many are pretty mellow, there are many more who are violent.”
Read MoreMarijuana laws hard and expensive to enforce→
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While serving on Gov. John Hickenlooper’s task force to implement Amendment 64, I quickly learned that we were changing more than our laws, we were engaged in a huge paradigm shift which was the creation of what would be a new marijuana culture. To this day, Colorado law enforcement struggles with the litany of conflicts created by “legal marijuana.”
Read MoreNew report by National Families in Action rips the veil off the Medical Marijuana Industry
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The NFIA study, Tracking the Money That’s Legalizing Marijuana and Why It Matters, exposes, for the first time, the money trail behind the marijuana legalization effort during a 13-year period. The report lays bare the strategy to use medical marijuana as a runway to legalized recreational pot, describing how financier George Soros, insurance magnate Peter Lewis, and for-profit education baron John Sperling (and groups they and their families fund) systematically chipped away at resistance to marijuana while denying that full legalization was their goal.
Read MoreExperts Link Homeless Surge To Pot
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Homeless people in the streets are a staple of the landscape in downtown areas of Colorado Springs, Denver and most other Colorado communities. Visitors from other states are struck by the dilemma, even when visiting from large cities on the coasts. Experts on homelessness point to marijuana.
Read MoreHeavy, persistent pot use linked to economic and social problems at midlife→
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A research study that followed children from birth up to age 38 has found that people who smoked cannabis four or more days of the week over many years ended up in a lower social class than their parents, with lower-paying, less skilled and less prestigious jobs than those who were not regular cannabis smokers. These regular and persistent users also experienced more financial, work-related and relationship difficulties, which worsened as the number of years of regular cannabis use progressed.
Read MoreDefiant Pot Shop Must Pay $1.8 Million
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“The judges are sending a message, and so are we: Marijuana dispensaries can either follow the law or they will pay a high price for their actions,” City Attorney Jan Goldsmith said. “Every business has to comply with zoning laws. You can’t open a dog kennel or a dry cleaner anywhere you like, and neither can you open a marijuana dispensary in neighborhoods where City zoning laws forbid them. My office will continue to close these illegal dispensaries and see that their operators face stiff consequences.”
Read MoreClearing the Haze→
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The Gazette has started a perspective series that examines health, social, regulatory and financial issues associated with legal marijuana. Here is a taste:
"... The ugly truth is that Colorado was suckered. It was promised regulation and has been met by an industry that fights tooth and nail any restrictions that limit its profitability. ”
Read MoreThe Financial Cost
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In 2005, for every $1 collected in taxes on alcohol and tobacco, almost $14 was spent to repair the vast social damages caused by their use. Legalization of marijuana will see increased use and increased social damage as a result.
The “medical” marijuana experience has shown that growers and dispensaries sell marijuana on a cash basis "under the table" and are not paying taxes. It is also impossible to track sales, unless they are investigated by law enforcement. This has put a huge burden on the already stretched budget of our police force.
With legalization, dispensaries will be primary sellers of marijuana. Do we expect them to suddenly start paying taxes?
A Regulatory Mess
The tax burden falls to cities and counties under the legalization initiative. The state of California cannot collect taxes from the sales of marijuana, therefore this monumental and expensive task falls to each of the state’s 416 cities and 58 counties. The end result will be a patchwork quilt of taxes and procedures across all local governments. Will your city or county be able to collect taxes from the large, powerful marijuana cartels operating in your area?
Regulating the growing and selling of marijuana will also default to the same under-funded cities and counties. Anyone will be able to grow and sell marijuana, even those with a criminal record. Much of the marijuana in California is supplied by illegal drug cartels and marijuana grow sites that ravage our environment. Legalization, as proposed, does nothing to fix these problems. Drug cartels and other, smaller operations will always want to operate in the black market, as they won't have to report their sales, pay their taxes, or adhere to marijuana-related laws and ordinances. As a Rand research report concluded, “There is a tremendous profit motive for the existing black market to stay in the black market, as they can cover their costs of production and make a nice profit.”
A further problem occurs when employment is taken into consideration. Employers will be forced to accommodate marijuana usage and will not be able to test for use in their employees. The federal government, which employs more California citizens than any other single entity, requires a drug-free workplace. If this can’t be guaranteed, jobs will go to other states.
The proliferation of pot will affect our workforce, bringing slower upward mobility to our citizens and stifling their income (as well as the taxes they would generate). Less qualified workers will hurt employment and our economy as a whole.
No employer, public or private, will be able to protect themselves from the liabilities of marijuana use.