Keep AZ Drug Free, which urges a no vote on Prop. 203, held a press conference with Senator Kyl, Senator McCain, Congressman Shadegg, Congressman Franks, Maricopa County Attorney Romley and Yavapai County Attorney Polk. It was archived, in three parts, on YouTube. They’re linked below.
Conservatives have A NUMBER of reasons to oppose Prop. 203. My objection has always been that it’s big government. Carolyn Short of Keep AZ Drug Free debated Andrew Myers, the campaign manager for the Marijuana Policy Project, recently on the radio on Kevin Gassman’s show. According to Ms. Short, Mr. Myers admitted Prop. 203 will result in about 800 pages of rules and regulations from the Arizona Health Department and that’s just the administrative rules. Ms. Short argues that, in fact, there will be no true regulation of the marijuana industry should the proposition pass because the Health Department can’t inspect dispensaries without advance warning, can’t inspect the marijuana at all, and can’t inspect grow operations. That leaves plenty of room for illegal operations to clean up their practices and place of business before authorities arrive. According to Ms. Short, Keep AZ Drug Free’s “beef” with that provision is that any other business regulated by Health Department, McDonalds for instance, gets no warning whatsoever and they can even inspect the hamburgers. It is perverse that advance warning must be given to dispensaries, which will be selling an illegal drug. Apparently, even certain felons can own and operate dispensaries. Ms. Short states that one of the basic problems with Prop 203 is that all of the restrictions are placed on law enforcement, business owners, landlords, schools, and Child Protective Services rather than on marijuana users. She says, “This initiative was written by an out-of-state lobby without any input whatsoever from our legislature or citizens.”
Adding to the big government objections to Prop. 203, Gov. Brewer recently held a press conference on the proposition and underscored the cost of the proposition to the state. We have budget problems enough without further burdening our economy.
The League of Women Voters is passing out a “Voter Guide” with some misleading assertions on the issues surrounding Prop. 203. The LVW guide states that the Arizona Senate passed a bill to tax marijuana and that marijuana sales would generate $1 million in the first year. What the LVW fails to tell voters is that the House failed to act on it, so the bill never became law. As it stands today, there is no legislation in place to tax marijuana sales and dispensaries specifically are exempt from income taxes.
