Pubdate: Thu, 02 Jan 2014
Source: Pottstown Mercury (PA)
Copyright: 2014 Associated Press
Contact:  http://www.pottstownmercury.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2287
Author: Kristen Wyatt, Associated Press

LEGAL RECREATIONAL POT INDUSTRY OPENS IN COLORADO

DENVER (AP) - Crowds were serenaded by live music as they waited for 
the nation's first legal recreational pot shops to open. They ate 
doughnuts and funnel cakes as a glassblower made smoking pipes. Some 
tourists even rode around in a limo, eager to try weed but not so 
eager to be seen buying it.

And when the sales began, those who bought the drug emerged from the 
stores, receipt held high and carrying sealed shopping bags, to cheers.

"I'm going to frame the receipt when I go home, to remind myself of 
what might be possible: Legal everywhere," said musician James Aaron 
Ramsey, 28, who did some time in jail for pot possession in Missouri 
and played folk tunes with his guitar for those in line.

Activists hope he's right, and that the experiment in Colorado will 
prove to be a better alternative to the costly American-led drug war, 
produce the kind of revenue that state officials hope and save the 
government costs in locking up drug offenders.

Just on the first day, prices in some places rose to more than $500 
an ounce, and some shops announced midafternoon they would close 
early because of short supply. It's too soon to say whether the price 
spikes and long lines will persist.

Washington state will open its pot industry later this year. Both 
states' programs will be watched closely not just by officials in 
other states, but by activists and governments in other countries 
because the industries will be the first to regulate the production 
and sale of the drug.

Some countries have decriminalized the drug, and the Netherlands lets 
people buy and sell it, but it's illegal to grow or process it.

Just as shops opened Wednesday, the Denver Police Department tweeted, 
"Do you know the law?" and linked to city websites on state and local 
laws that include bans on public consumption, driving under the 
influence, taking marijuana out of state and giving pot to anyone under 21.

Denver police said one person was issued a summons for public 
consumption. The Colorado State Patrol reported no pot-related 
incidents. No pot-related incidents were reported at Denver 
International Airport, where signs warned travelers that they can't 
take the drug home.

At least 24 pot shops in eight towns opened. In Denver, pot users 
welcomed the new year and the new industry by firing up bongs and 
cheering in a cloud of marijuana smoke at a 1920s-themed "Prohibition 
Is Over" party - a reference to the 1930s-era law that outlawed marijuana.

Shopper Jacob Elliott said he wrote reports in college about the need 
to end pot prohibition, but never thought it could happen in his lifetime.

"This breaks that barrier," said Elliott, who traveled to Colorado 
from Leesburg, Va., to be among the first to buy legal weed.

Preparation for the retail market started more than a year ago, soon 
after Colorado and Washington voters in 2012 approved legal pot 
industries. Uruguay passed a law in December to become the first 
nation to regulate pot, but regulatory system isn't in place yet.

Pot advocates, who had long pushed legalization as an alternative to 
the drug war, had argued it would generate revenue for state coffers 
- - and in Colorado's case to support education - and save money by not 
locking up low-level drug offenders.

"I feel good about it. The money's going to schools," said shopper 
Joseph Torres of Denver.

The price for high-quality weed at some shops was around $400 an 
ounce. That's about four times what smokers are paying on the black 
market in Colorado, according to crowd-sourced Internet surveys. Much 
of the extra cost was attributed to state and local taxes in excess 
of 25 percent.

People who were waiting in line shared their pot incarceration 
stories over coffee and funnel cakes.

"Trafficking conviction. Nineteen years old. For a plant, how 
stupid," said 24-year-old Brandon Harris, who drove 20 hours from 
Blanchester, Ohio.

Colorado set up an elaborate plant-tracking system to try to keep the 
drug away from the black market, and regulators set up packaging, 
labeling and testing requirements, along with potency limits for edible pot.

The U.S. Justice Department outlined an eight-point slate of 
priorities for pot regulation, requiring states to keep the drug away 
from minors, criminal cartels, federal property and other states in 
order to avoid a federal crackdown.

With the additional police patrols, the airport warnings and various 
other measures, officials hoped they have enough safeguards in place 
to avoid predictions of public health and safety harm from the 
opening of the pot shops.

A group of addiction counselors and physicians said they're seeing 
more marijuana addiction problems, especially in youths, and that 
wider pot availability will exacerbate the problem.

"This is just throwing gas on the fire," said Ben Cort of the 
Colorado Center for Dependency, Addiction & Rehabilitation at the 
University of Colorado Hospital.

Some medical marijuana patients groups say they're worried about 
supply. That's because the retail inventory for recreational use is 
coming entirely from the preexisting medical inventory. Many in the 
industry warned patients to stock up before the sales began.

It was too soon to tell whether prices for medical marijuana patients 
were going up.

For now, they should have plenty of places to shop. Most of 
Colorado's 500 or so medical marijuana shops haven't applied to sell 
recreational pot, and many that have plan to serve both recreational 
and medical patients.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom