Pubdate: Wed, 23 Jan 2013
Source: East Bay Express (CA)
Copyright: 2013 East Bay Express
Contact: http://posting.eastbayexpress.com/ebx/SubmitLetter/Page
Website: http://www.eastbayexpress.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1131
Author: David Downs

PIVOTAL POT MEETING AT FORT MASON THIS WEEKEND

The movers and shakers of the cannabis legalization movement are
gathering in San Francisco to plot a plan for the future.

About three hundred activists - the people who likely will operate
and staff the next legalization effort in California in 2016 - will
gather with their allies at San Francisco's Fort Mason Center this
weekend for a pivotal meeting on the future of freeing the herb.
"Cannabis in California: Ending the 100-Year War," sponsored by the
California chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of
Marijuana Laws, will pack eleven strategy sessions over two days with
the rock stars of the reform community, including Colorado Amendment
64 campaign co-director Mason Tvert; Washington Initiative 502
director Alison Holcomb; the leaders of Marijuana Policy Project,
Drug Policy Alliance, and NORML - as well as major dispensary
operators, union organizers, and pioneers in the movement.

These are "people who are seriously active in legalization efforts
taking place in the state," said California NORML director Dale Gieringer.

"Ending the 100-Year War" is the third gathering of its kind. The
first two events occurred in Berkeley and Los Angeles after Prop 19
failed to pass in 2010. Ideas discussed at those events became part of
five different 2012 initiative efforts, all of which failed to make
the state ballot.

A successful run in 2016 is going to take more coordination, Gieringer
said.

This weekend, major reform groups will likely discuss plans to
coordinate efforts on a 2016 legalization initiative. "I think the big
players realize that 2016 is the realistic option," Gieringer said.
Some hardline activists will press for a 2014 initiative, but they are
not well positioned, Gieringer said. "It's not realistic to do in the
2014 timeframe," he said, noting that in 1996, the last time state
voters approved a major cannabis initiative, activists were much
further along in their planning than they are now. "At this point in
the Prop 215 campaign, we had our language in hand," Gieringer
explained. "We had a bill that had passed the legislature only to be
vetoed by the governor."

But while a serious referendum campaign will likely skip the next
election cycle, the federal medical marijuana crackdown rolls on.
"Ending the 100-Year War" also will feature key figures in the ongoing
crackdown in a session called "Responses to Federal Interference."
Mendocino County Supervisor John McCowen will speak on the "Federal
Sabotage of Mendocino's Ordinance," and dispensary operator Stephen
DeAngelo will provide an update on the tax and forfeiture cases
proceeding against Harborside Health Center in Oakland.

US Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske stated on January 8 that the country "is
in the midst of a serious conversation about marijuana." And in late
December, leading drug czar staffer Tommy Lanier began walking back
the charge that drug cartels are growing in national forests. "It
sounds sort of like they are backing off more," Gieringer said.
"They've been less than aggressive."

"Ending the 100-Year War" also coincides with the beginning of the
California legislative session, which will almost certainly include
the reintroduction of Assemblyman Tom Ammiano's medical marijuana
regulation bill. "That's a big mess there that needs to be cleaned
up," Gieringer said of the conflicting efforts at the state Capitol.
"Everybody would like to see the situation fixed in
Sacramento."

For those patients and medical cannabis supporters who are angry and
frustrated about the ongoing crackdown, the NORML conference also will
include a panel on reform strategies that can be implemented
immediately. Southern California registered nurse and organizer Lanny
Swerdlow will call for tactical civic engagement in a talk titled
"Starting Brownie Mary Democratic Clubs."

It only takes twenty registered voters and about twenty hours of work
to set up a weed-oriented Democratic Club, and the results can be
impressive, Swerdlow said. He organized persecuted patients of the
Inland Empire into the country's first-ever Brownie Mary Democratic
Club, named after San Francisco weed activist Brownie Mary Rathburn -
a senior citizen and hospital volunteer who delivered pot brownies to
AIDS patients in the Nineties. Rathburn was arrested three times, and
became a global cause celebre for medical marijuana.

In 2012, the Brownie Mary Democratic Club of Riverside got the
Democratic Central Committee in that city to call on President Obama
to stop the dispensary raids and respect the will of Colorado and
Washington voters. The resolution spread to other central committees
and moved up the Democratic Party hierarchy, he said.

Swerdlow hopes to help create more than seventy Brownie Mary
Democratic Clubs - one for each Democratic Central Committee in
California. "Right now most elected officials have no contact with
marijuana people," he said. "When an official sees you there working,
that changes their perception of just who we are. They're going to see
that we are showing up to these meetings and we're active - that we
are phone banking for Democrats during elections." If activists start
a Democratic club, "they would be right in the grassroots where it's
all being done," he added. "We don't have the money, but we have a lot
of people and we have the time - that's just as important as the money."

Democratic club reps also can lay the foundation for a 2016 victory in
California. "You have this insider position," Swerdlow explained. "I
think ignoring the political process is something we do at our own
peril. We are essentially a political joke, and we are facing some
entrenched, powerful interests: alcohol companies, the pharmaceutical
industry, prison corporations, cops."

With the legalization of pot now being implemented in Washington and
Colorado, pot users in California must get involved this year,
Swerdlow said. "We can't just sit back. We're on a roll now."
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MAP posted-by: Jo-D