Pubdate: Tue, 09 Feb 2016
Source: Dayton Daily News (OH)
Copyright: 2016 Dayton Daily News
Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/7JXk4H3l
Website: http://www.daytondailynews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/120
Author: Laura A. Bischoff

MEDICAL MARIJUANA PLAN FOR OHIO PITCHED

Goal Is to Get Funds to Collect Valid Voter Signatures.

A team of veteran political operatives put out a 22-page proposal 
that offers up its political talent to help weed business interests 
with deep pockets take a run at putting a medical marijuana question 
before Ohio voters in November.

Calling itself ARC Reaction, the group includes Democrat Aaron 
Pickrell, who was a senior policy adviser in the Strickland 
administration, Republican Mike Hartley, who served as a senior 
staffer in the Kasich administration, and Democrat Steven Stenberg, a 
Washington, D.C.-based direct mail and political strategist.

ARC Reaction is looking for investors to pony up $300,000 by Feb. 15 
for initial research and chip in another $1.5 million by March 1 and 
$3.5 million more by April 1 to collect the 305,000 valid voter 
signatures required by early July to qualify for the statewide ballot.

Pickrell declined to comment on the plan.

ARC Reaction proposes putting together an "industry table" that would 
fund and craft the initiative. "Write the law - as YOU see fit. If 
this table is first to the space, we take the lead in crafting the 
initiative AND the regulatory framework for implementation. Guided by 
polling, we will work with the table to find the best strategy that 
fits electorally and from a lobbying perspective," it says.

The proposal emerges just as Marijuana Policy Project, a national 
advocacy group, is taking a look at launching a medical marijuana 
ballot issue in Ohio and the General Assembly explores how it wants 
to tailor a medical marijuana law.

Just three months ago, Ohio voters soundly rejected a proposed 
constitutional amendment to legalize marijuana for medical and 
recreational purposes and grant exclusive cultivation rights to the 
10 investor groups that were bankrolling the campaign. Issue 3 failed 
by nearly a 2 to 1 ratio.

But polls show widespread support for adult use of medical marijuana. 
Indeed, 23 states already have some sort of comprehensive medical 
marijuana program.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom