Pubdate: Thu, 14 Jan 2016
Source: Appeal-Democrat (Marysville, CA)
Copyright: 2016 Appeal-Democrat
Contact: 
https://appeal-democrat-dot-com.bloxcms-ny1.com/site/forms/online_services/letter/
Website: http://www.appeal-democrat.com
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1343

VOTERS WILL DO MORE THAN CONSIDER THE WORDING OF INITIATIVES

They're Going to Consider the Characters Asking for Their Approval on 
Medical Marijuana Laws

Some marijuana enthusiasts (whether they're legitimate users/growers 
or not) seem to think that they're entitled to grow and use marijuana 
as they see fit and that laws restricting them in any way are not 
real laws. And they also seem to believe that if everything were up 
for a vote, their side would win by a landslide.

We think they're wrong on both counts, and we believe that if they 
want public opinion on their side, they've got a lot of work and 
convincing to do. Unfortunately for those medical marijuana 
supporters who want to legitimately use it and cultivate it in a 
responsible manner, the rowdy crowd at Tuesday's Yuba County 
Supervisor's meeting did them a disservice.

Even if you're a libertarian leaning, 
don't-really-care-about-pot-just-keep-it-under-control sort of 
thinker on the issue of marijuana cultivation, you're going to think 
twice about falling into step with the yellers and finger-waggers.

Medical marijuana supporters gave supervisors a pretty hard time 
Tuesday. And we don't actually know if those who were spewing at the 
meeting were truly advocates of a reasonable medical marijuana 
ordinance for Yuba County, or just pot growers in general who liked 
having a more liberal ordinance to blend in with. (Supervisors 
radically changed the county cultivation ordinance early last year - 
it had allowed a fairly liberal amount to be grown outdoors; now it 
allows no outdoor grows.)

Tuesday, supervisors were considering whether to move local 
initiatives to liberalize the cultivation ordinance and to allow 
dispensaries in the county onto the June ballot. A snarky bunch 
disrupted the supervisors meeting to the point that most of the 
supervisors got up and took a recess to get away from the vitriol. 
The protesters would have preferred the supervisors just vote to 
adopt the initiatives and change the law immediately.

It was reported that four of the five supervisors walked out of the 
board chambers "amid a barrage of vitriolic catcalls from marijuana 
supporters."

Brook Hilton, a member of the Yuba Patients Coalition, in favor of 
the initiatives, spoke to the crowd during that 20-minute break.

"I understand your feelings," Hilton said. "But this is out of order 
and isn't going to get us any place."

Upon their return, supervisors voted to send the two cannabis-related 
initiatives to the voters.

Some of the protesters were indignant that supervisors didn't 
acquiesce. Why, we're not sure  since all five of the supervisors had 
favored the more stringent pot growing ordinance and all five were 
elected by a majority of voters in their districts and they all feel 
they represent the values of their constituencies, why would you 
expect them to buckle under?

Our advice to the real medical marijuana practitioners and those who 
would like to legitimately grow medical marijuana and/or have it 
available at dispensaries: Plan out some events and demonstrations 
where your side is polite, logical, passionate, yet reasonable. 
Voters aren't going to just base their decisions on the wording of 
the initiatives; they're going to consider the character of those 
asking for their votes.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom