Pubdate: Mon, 20 Jul 2009 Source: Times-Herald, The (Vallejo, CA) Copyright: 2009 Scripps Howard News Service Contact: http://www.timesheraldonline.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/993 Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?115 (Marijuana - California) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?420 (Marijuana - Popular) Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/mmj.htm (Marijuana - Medicinal) THE GRASS IS STARTING TO LOOK GREENER The state of California desperately needs cash. With tax increases off the table and its bond rating near junk statue, it has turned to a variety of creative methods to raise money and buy time -- paying state contractors, and maybe soon its own workforce, with IOUs; borrowing from city and county governments and the schools; cutting 2,000 more state jobs on top of the 4,600 already laid off. A state legislator has proposed a partial solution that is attracting attention -- legalize and tax marijuana. The state government's green eyeshades looked at the proposal and estimated that between a $50 per ounce wholesale fee and the state's 9 percent retail sales tax legal marijuana could generate $1.4 billion a year. That's far short of filling California's $26.3 billion budget shortfall but this is a state that needs every buck it can get and hearings on the legislation are expected this fall. There is the small matter of the growing, possessing and selling marijuana being illegal under federal law, but in 1996 California voters elected to legalize medical marijuana and there is a discreet but open trade in the stuff despite periodic federal crackdowns. The Associated Press reports that there is a move afoot for a 2010 referendum measure that repeal all state and local laws criminalizing marijuana. And, the AP also reports, three members of the Los Angeles City Council have proposed closing that city's budget shortfall by taxing medical marijuana sales. Changing social mores and verification of its medical efficacy may help, but if marijuana is ever truly legalized it likely will be because our politicians need the money. - --- MAP posted-by: Richard Lake