Politics
Police Groups Urge Massachusetts Voters To Keep Cannabis Sales Legal By Rejecting Ballot Measure
A national group representing Black police officers is joining with Massachusetts law enforcement officials in urging voters in the state to reject a ballot measure that would roll back the state’s marijuana legalization law.
The National Association of Black Law Enforcement Officers (NABLEO) on Monday announced its endorsement for the No On 8 campaign as a group of more than 50 current and former law enforcement officials separately signed an open letter opposing the anti-cannabis initiative on Tuesday’s ballot.
“A return to the prohibition and criminalizing of cannabis commerce will only increase demands on already over-burdened law enforcement resources and raise serious questions regarding enforcement priorities, consumer safety and the effective use of public resources,” NABLEO Chairman Lieutenant Charles Wilson (Ret.) said.
Meanwhile, current and former police officials from Massachusetts and other states signed a letter arguing that “repealing legal, regulated sales would not eliminate demand for marijuana or meaningfully reduce its consumption” and would instead “only strip the market of the licensing, testing and accountability the current regulatory system provides, pushing transactions toward sellers with no age checks, no product standards, and no legal responsibility to consumers or the state.”
“Many of us spent our careers enforcing marijuana laws,” the letter, signed by former Massachusetts State Trooper Karen Hawkes, former Assistant Attorney General John Amabile, former Massachusetts Juvenile Court First Justice Jay D. Blitzman and former Brockton Police Department Detective Kenneth Williams, among others, said. “We know firsthand what that system cost: resources diverted away from violent crime and toward low-level cannabis offenses, lack of visibility into an unregulated market, and no tools to hold sellers accountable when something went wrong.”
“The 2016 vote to legalize and regulate marijuana changed that. A decade later, the evidence shows the current system is working. There is no good reason to go back… Recriminalizing nonmedical cannabis sales would pull police, prosecutors, courts and correctional resources back into enforcement against activity that licensed businesses in Massachusetts have been conducting safely and legally for years. These resources are better spent on issues like violence, impaired driving, illegal sales to minors and organized drug trafficking.”
Two retired police officers with the group Law Enforcement Action Partnership separately authored an op-ed urging Massachusetts voters to reject the anti-marijuana ballot measure, arguing that “police already face considerable demands on their time and resources, and renewed cannabis enforcement would add to that burden.”
Stop the Repeal Chairperson Ryan Dominguez said in a press release on Monday that Massachusetts has “one of the most strict enforcement laws in the country that keep cannabis sales within a regulated and age-gated system with product testing from seed to sale.”
“We should not be pushing consumers toward sellers with no age checks, product standards or oversight,” he said. “We are grateful to have the support of the National Association of Black Law Enforcement Officers in helping us to defeat this damaging ballot question that threatens public safety.”
The law enforcement officials’ opposition to Question 8—which would repeal laws allowing the regulated commercial sales of recreational cannabis and home cultivation while maintaining legal possession and continuing the medical marijuana system—comes as a number of prominent elected officials are also speaking out against the measure.
Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey (D) and GOP challenger Mike Minogue both recently said they support keeping marijuana sales legal, for example.
Last month, more than 50 state lawmakers said they will be voting against the anti-marijuana ballot measure. That includes the House speaker and Senate president.
U.S. Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Ed Markey (D-MA) both recently told Marijuana Moment that they will be voting against the anti-cannabis measure.
“We could make improvements in the operations but legalizing cannabis is better than continuing an unregulated, underground market,” Warren said. “So I’m opposed to the repeal. I’m voting no on the ballot to repeal.”
Markey, for his part, said the state’s marijuana legalization law that voters approved in 2016 continues to enjoy “overwhelming support.”
“We’ve had debate,” he said. “The voters are satisfied at this moment with the experience that the state has had with it… I support keeping it on the books and overwhelmingly so do the people of Massachusetts.”
Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) also recently urged voters to reject the measure, saying that “keeping marijuana legal in Massachusetts is both economic justice and racial justice policy.”
Boston’s mayor also said she is voting against the initiative to roll back marijuana legalization.
The City Council in Worcester—the state’s second-most populous municipality—passed a resolution urging voters to reject the anti-cannabis initiative.
Broken Lizard, the comedy troupe behind films such as Super Troopers and Beerfest, recently launched a video ad that explains how Massachusetts residents who want to keep cannabis sales legal should vote on the measure given its confusing wording and path to the ballot.
The Massachusetts House of Representatives recently passed a bill to increase military veterans’ access to medical marijuana by allowing them to receive patient cards without having to get a doctor’s recommendation and adding additional qualifying conditions.
