* Arrests only include personal possession, not sales, trafficking, or manufacturing..
† includes murder, non-negligent manslaughter, forcible rape, robbery, and aggravated assault.
Drug War Clock
ALERT - New Oregon Anti-Smoking Law means NO MORE CARDHOLDER MEETINGS at the Mt. Tabor Legacy Theater!
Due to the Oregon Smoking Ban, a new law that has gone into effect on January 1, 2009, Oregon NORML can no longer hold its meetings at the Mt. Tabor Theater. The smoking of Medical Marijuana is now prohibited by any Oregon establishment that also sells alcohol.
THAT DOES NOT MEAN THAT WE ARE ENDING OUR MISSION OF PROVIDING RESOURCES FOR OUR MEMBERS WHO ARE OREGON MEDICAL MARIJUANA PATIENTS! We are committed to our members and are doing everything in our power to secure a new, permanent location for Oregon NORML Headquarters so we can maintain control over the cardholder meetings without interference from the Oregon Liquor Control Commission.
Please check your email, visit this website, or call 503-239-6110 for the latest updates on the location of the Jan. 10th and future Cardholders' Meetings.
Thanks you for your patience in dealing with this transition, and your ongoing support to Normalize Cannabis!
Vote for REAL Change We Can Believe In at Change.gov
Make your voice heard! President-elect Barack Obama's transition team has re-opened the "Open for Questions" feature at their website, Change.gov. They are asking citizens to submit their questions about the issues facing the incoming administration.
When this feature debuted, hundreds of thousands of votes were cast by tens of thousands of people over thousands of questions, and the #1 vote getter was:
Q: “Will you consider legalizing marijuana so that the government can regulate it, tax it, put age limits on it, and create millions of new jobs and create a billion dollar industry right here in the U.S.?” S. Man, Denton
A: President-elect Obama is not in favor of the legalization of marijuana.
Not only was legalization #1, but some form of "end the Drug War" was 2 of the top ten, 6 of the top twenty, 16 of the top fifty, and 31 of the top 100 questions asked!
Now they have re-opened the questions and the voting, this time divided by categories.
#1) "Our current war on drugs is failing America. Billions of dollars are spent on a losing campaign. Our prisons are overflowing with people that don't deserve to be there. What is the government going to do in an effort to fix this major problem?"
In the "Additional Issues" Category:
#2) "The people of this country want marijuana decriminalization, when will marijuana be decriminalized? Why continue to spend billions of dollars to prohibit marijuana when evidence shows that the war on drugs is, as you said, "an utter failure"?"
#3) "Why do you believe that marijuana should not be legalized? How is the prohibition of Marijuana any different than the prohibition of alcohol? 100,000 Americans die every year due to alcohol but none to Marijuana"
Dan Harmon and Associated Oregon Industries ready to severely roll back OMMA in 2009 Legislative Session
Dan Harmon, an Exec. VP and legal counsel at Hoffman Construction, is on a "moral crusade" and Oregon’s medical marijuana law is being widely abused, and the law itself "says something about permissiveness in this state, and we’ve got to stop this permissiveness."
Harmon has been presenting to Chambers of Commerce all across the state to gain support for these goals in 2009 (read more):
Reintroduce SB 465 to confirm that employers are not obligated to accommodate medical marijuana in any workplace, regardless of where the use occurs.
Reintroduce SB 690 to establish Drugfree Workplace program standards and protect employers from lawsuits for false positives
Amend OMMA to reduce the quantity in possession to 2 oz., reduce the number of plants grown to 3, establish maximum reasonable plant size and prohibit communal grows
Require certification of a bona fide physician-patient relationship of a specific duration before a card may be issued
Require verification of dosage, frequency of use and method of consumption from the doctor
Require unsuccessful use of Marinol before being granted a Medical Marijuana card
Require notification of the employer when an employee makes an application for a card
Offensive Billboard on Hwy 99E paid for by YOUR tax dollars!
An alert Oregon NORML member snapped this photo of a billboard on Hwy 99E that claims "MARIJUANA - A Gateway Drug to METH". This billboard, like many throughout the country, is produced by a local anti-drug organization that receives its funding from the Office of National Drug Control Policy, which last year dished out $74 million in YOUR taxpayer dollars to produce propaganda like this.
You do know that the "marijuana as gateway drug" theory has been debunked so many times that serious scientists won't even bring it up anymore, right? Or that the grant money spent by this Molalla group could've paid for rehab for eight meth addicts? Check out our investigation in our News Forum.
Washington County Sheriff Rob Gordon decides to go "against what the state advises", releases map of county grow sites!
With crime involving medical marijuana grows and use on the rise, the Washington County Sheriff's Office has released a map revealing Oregon Medical Marijuana Program users and growers where crimes have been committed.
This despite the state medical marijuana law (ORS 475.331) stating: "475.331 List of persons issued registry identification cards, designated primary caregivers and authorized grow sites; disclosure. (1)(a) The Department of Human Services shall create and maintain a list of ... the addresses of authorized marijuana grow sites. Except as provided in subsection (2) of this section, the list shall be confidential and not subject to public disclosure. ... (3) Authorized employees of state or local law enforcement agencies that obtain identifying information from the list as authorized under this section may not release or use the information for any purpose other than verification that ... a location is an authorized marijuana grow site." (read more)
Stop Job Discrimination Against Medical Marijuana Patients!
Watch This Video - Get Educated about Dan Harmon's Moral Crusade to Abolish Medical Marijuana Rights! Join the Save OMMP MySpace Page!
2008 Election Results - The Winner is... Marijuana Reform!
The results of the 2008 election are in and marijuana law reformers are big winners in state and local ballot initiatives.
Michigan became the 13th medical marijuana state with 63% of voters approving Proposal 1.
Massachusetts became the 13th state to decriminalize the personal possession of marijuana with 65% of voters approving Question 2.
Fayetteville, Arkansas voters decided marijuana offenses should be the lowest law-enforcement priority by 65%.
Voters on the Big Island (Hawaii County), Hawaii voted to make possession of 24 ounces and 24 plants the lowest law enforcement priority, and to forbid county officials from cooperating in or accepting funds for marijuana eradication efforts on the island.
In bad news, however, Oregon's Measure 57 passed with 61% of the vote, establishing new mandatory minimum sentences for repeat drug offenders, among other things. Measure 61 was still at 50%, but even if it passes, it fails because 57 got more votes (61's mandatory minimums would have included first-time drug offenders)
More bad news comes from California's Proposition 5 (the Non-Violent Offender Rehabilitation Act) which failed with only 40% of the vote. In addition to diverting non-violent drug offenders to treatment, it would have decriminalized personal possession of marijuana.
But there were some successes in California. Proposition 6 was defeated by 70% of the vote, a measure that would have required the eviction of people from public housing for a recent drug offense. Berkeley, California's Measure JJ passed with 62% of the vote, which will ease restrictions on zoning for medical marijuana dispensaries.
Oregon NORML Presents is back on the Air - Channel 11
"Radical" Russ and Paul Loney are back with the latest Hemp Headlines, Legal 411, and Event Videos for the Cannabis Community.
Join us on January 4th, 2009 for our fourth season of our Cable Access show. We will be featuring video from the 7th Annual Oregon Medical Cannabis Awards.
Watch very 1st & 3rd Sunday LIVE at 6pm on Cable Channel 11, or every Saturday at 6pm on Cable Channel 21. Catch up on past episodes here.
California Supreme Court Deals Blow to Dispensaries
We hold that a defendant whose caregiving consisted principally of supplying marijuana and instructing on its use, and who otherwise only sporadically took some patients to medical appointments, cannot qualify as a primary caregiver under the Act and was not entitled to an instruction on the primary caregiver affirmative defense.
872,721 Marijuana Arrests in United States in 2007
89% (775,138) for simple marijuana possession only
Overall, while arrests for marijuana increased by +5.2%, arrests for all other drugs declined by -8.7%. Also, for the fifth year in a row, marijuana possession arrests outnumbered arrests for all murder, rape, robbery, and assault combined (597,447), despite the fact that there were almost 25,000 more violent crimes committed in 2007 than five years before.
Cannabis consumers in Oregon are better off than other Americans. There were 18,644 drug arrests in Oregon in 2007. Marijuana arrests comprise roughly more than one-third of all drug arrests in the Western Region, or an estimated 6,402 Oregon marijuana arrests, 86% of which are for possession only (~5,506). By comparison, about half of the arrests in the Northeast and South are for marijuana, and 3 out of 5 arrests in the Midwest.
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