Pubdate: Thu, 21 Mar 2013
Source: Bangor Daily News (ME)
Copyright: 2013 Bangor Daily News Inc.
Contact: http://bangordailynews.com/opinion/submit/
Website: http://www.bangordailynews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/40
Author: Seth Koenig

PINGREE CO-SPONSORING BILL TO LEGALIZE MARIJUANA NATIONWIDE

PORTLAND, Maine - U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree of Maine is one of 13 
co-sponsors of a bill that supporters say would end marijuana 
prohibition at the federal level.

News of the proposed legislation came on the same day that a petition 
drive seeking to legalize pot possession began in Portland, the 
largest city in Pingree's home state. The effort to decriminalize 
marijuana at a federal level also comes as state Rep. Diane Russell, 
D-Portland, is pursuing a bill in Augusta to do so at the state level.

Robert Schwartz, executive director of the Maine Chiefs of Police 
Association, said Thursday afternoon his group remains adamantly 
against the legalization of marijuana at any level.

Pingree, a Democrat representing Maine's 1st District, is currently 
the only member of Congress from New England to sign on in support of 
H.R. 499, titled the Ending Federal Marijuana Prohibition Act of 
2013. The only Republican co-sponsor is U.S. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher of 
California.

According to the Washington, D.C.-based Marijuana Policy Project, the 
bill would establish a system in which marijuana is regulated 
similarly to alcohol at the federal level, placing the drug under the 
jurisdiction of a renamed Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Marijuana, 
Firearms and Explosives.

Currently, regulation of pot as an illegal substance is under the 
jurisdiction of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

"Congresswoman Pingree supports the bill because it is patterned 
after successful bills in Washington and Colorado, and she feels it's 
a common-sense approach to regulation at the federal level," Willy 
Ritch, a spokesman for Pingree's office, told the BDN on Thursday afternoon.

The proposed legislation, which was introduced by Colorado Democrat 
Rep. Jared Polis, would likely clear up what has become legal gray 
area in enforcement of marijuana laws across the country. While the 
substance is still outlawed by the federal government, 18 states - 
including Maine - have legalized its use as a doctor-prescribed 
medical treatment. At least two other states, Washington and Polis' 
home state of Colorado, have passed laws decriminalizing its recreational use.

In Maine, efforts are under way to make possession of 2.5 ounces or 
less of the drug legal, first through a citywide petition in Portland 
and then through state legislation.

"We need the federal government to lower marijuana on the scheduled 
drug list and essentially treat it like alcohol," said Portland City 
Councilor David Marshall, who attended the city petition drive launch 
Thursday morning. "We should have federal licenses for production and 
distribution."

While federal agents have largely allowed state-approved medical 
marijuana dispensaries operate without intervention, discrepancies 
between federal, state and sometimes local laws on the issue of pot 
legality have been a subject of nationwide debate.

"It makes no sense to punish individuals for using a substance less 
harmful than alcohol," David Boyer, Maine political director for the 
Marijuana Policy Project, said in a statement Thursday. "Instead, we 
should allow adults to use marijuana legally while regulating the 
production and sale of the substance. We will not only better control 
production and sales, but we will also create new jobs and generate 
tax revenue."

Marshall echoed those comments Thursday afternoon, saying the end of 
the prohibition of marijuana could be similar to the end of the 
prohibition of alcohol in 1933 after 13 years in which spirits were 
disallowed and became the focus of black market trade and organized crime.

"The alcohol industry has become manageable. We've been able to 
reduce the amount of alcohol being consumed by teenagers and we've 
been able to hold people responsible for their actions, and that's 
what we'd want to do with marijuana," Marshall said. "Marijuana is 
undoubtedly America's No. 1 cash crop, and all that [money is] going 
untaxed and it's going to people who are not running legitimate 
businesses in the eyes of the law."

Some researchers have estimated the U.S. marijuana market to be 
valued at as much as $100 billion annually, about the same as the 
market for brewed beverages.

But Schwartz argued that the legalization of alcohol has not come 
without repercussions over the decades, and said it's bad logic to 
add more legal drugs to the landscape because another legal substance 
is arguably more harmful. He also reiterated concerns that marijuana 
is a "gateway drug" that people often use while working their way up 
to more dangerous illegal drugs.

"We're opposed to legalizing it. It causes other problems. We don't 
support it," Schwartz said. "They throw a lot of money at alcohol 
problems and substance abuse problems, and this would only add to it."
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom