Pubdate: Fri, 05 Aug 2016 Source: Chico Enterprise-Record (CA) Copyright: 2016 Chico Enterprise-Record Contact: http://www.chicoer.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/861 Note: Letters from newspaper's circulation area receive publishing priority Author: Loretta Ann Torres POT PROFITEERS PAY BOUNTY FOR SIGNATURES Again, again? Are you kidding me? Yes, the Inland Cannabis Growers Association (better known to law enforcement in Butte County as pot profiteers) have done it again. Last Tuesday they presented enough signatures to the Board of Supervisors to put measure MC-3 on the ballot in November. We, the voters, thought we had voted to limit pot growing in Butte County by voting overwhelmingly for Measure A two years ago. But no. We had to vote to stop them again last June (with Measures G and H). The dirty little-known secret is: Using their ill-gotten money, they can bus people into a county, put them up in hotels, pay them $15 to gather each signature and (surprise) get all the signatures they need. We need to ask our legislators to help protect us from this by passing some stringent permit laws requiring signature gatherers to reside in our county, have background checks and plainly display to voters what they are being paid per signature. If legal steps are not taken to limit this behavior, we will be seeing these pot referendums every time we go to the polls. - - Loretta Ann Torres, Chico - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom