From: Ken Wolski [mailto:info@actionnetwork.org]
Sent: Monday, January 22, 2018 4:09 PM
To: Turner, Sen. D.O. <SenTurner@njleg.org>
Subject: Support Marijuana Legalization in New Jersey
Sen. Shirley K. Turner,
As your constituent, I’m writing to urge your support for marijuana legalization efforts in New Jersey, specifically with bills that support home cultivation.
Never in modern history has there existed greater public support for ending the nation's nearly century-long experiment with marijuana prohibition. The continued criminalization of adult marijuana use is out-of-step with the views of adults in NJ. According to statewide polling data, 65 percent of New Jersey voters support the legalization of marijuana.
The ongoing prohibition of marijuana financially burdens taxpayers, encroaches upon civil liberties, engenders disrespect for the law, impedes legitimate scientific research into the plant's medicinal properties, and disproportionately impacts communities of color.
It’s time to stop ceding control and revenue of the marijuana market to unregulated and untaxed criminal enterprises. A pragmatic regulatory framework that licenses production and sale of marijuana to adults - but continues to criminalize sale to minors - best reduces the risks associated with its use and commerce.
Please support efforts to legalize marijuana in New Jersey. As executive director of the Coalition for Medical Marijuana--New Jersey, I believe that legalizing marijuana is the best way to get the right medicine to the most people.
Ken Wolski
ohamkrw@aol.com
Trenton, New Jersey 08618
Reply from NJ State Senator Shirley Turner: “I am reluctant to support the legalization of marijuana.”
From: Turner, Sen. D.O. (SenTurner@njleg.org)
To: Ken Wolski, Trenton, NJ 08618
Dear Mr. Wolski:
Thank you for contacting me to express your support for the full legalization of marijuana. I appreciate knowing your position and that you took the time to contact me.
I am reluctant to support the legalization of marijuana due to my strong concerns about the message that the legalization of a mind-altering drug sends to our children. The casual acceptance of marijuana could have unfortunate consequences at a time when we are already struggling with an opioid epidemic. Many teens who became addicted to opioids and heroin began misusing or abusing their parents’ prescription drugs. Children whose parents use marijuana may be more susceptible to developing a habit themselves. Additionally, children are at risk of unintended exposure through second hand smoke, as well as through marijuana edibles in the form of sweet treats. The marijuana industry seems to market to children with marijuana infused gummy bears, lollipops, candies and cookies.
We have not seen enough evidence of the benefits of legalization from the states that are currently working through the early stages of a regulated system. Since Colorado legalized marijuana in 2014, the state has seen an increase in accidents and drugged driving. When visiting Colorado recently for a conference, I took the time to visit a cannabis shop and had a long conversation with the attendant. She indicated that the increase in accidents has been a serious problem, among other issues. Additionally, Colorado has the highest youth rate of marijuana use in the nation. According to an editorial in the Colorado Springs Gazette, high school drug violations have increased 71 percent since legalization and school suspensions for drugs increased 45 percent.
The American College of Pediatricians and the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP) oppose the legalization of recreational use of marijuana because it is harmful to children and adolescents and poses serious health risks. The AACAP reports that marijuana contributes to “deleterious effects on adolescent brain development, cognition, and social functioning.” Additionally, marijuana is also more potent than it was 20 years ago, exacerbating the negative health effects of the drug and intensifying its addictive potential.
I also disagree with the idea of enacting policies that encourage and raise revenue from people’s vices, as our state already relies too heavily on revenue from gambling, lotteries, cigarettes, and alcohol to fund government. I would support the decriminalization of small amounts of marijuana for personal use, which will help to reduce the unnecessary costs and burdens on individuals, families, and the criminal justice system. I also support an expansion to our state’s medical marijuana program, to help improve access for individuals with documented illnesses. I am drafting a bill to eliminate the sales tax on medical marijuana. Additionally, Governor Murphy has recently announced that he is seeking improvements to the medical marijuana program, and I will do all that I can to ensure that includes a review and expansion of qualifying conditions. I am not convinced that carte blanche access is the appropriate direction for our state, although I would not oppose a ballot initiative to allow the voters to decide, as was the pathway for legalization in all of the other states, except Vermont.
Unfortunately, there are so many conflicting reports and studies on a number of salient issues on the debate about marijuana use. For example, proponents of marijuana legalization argue that marijuana is neither addictive, nor a gateway drug. However, marijuana is more potent than it was 20 years ago, and we do not yet know the consequences of exposure of high levels of the chemicals in marijuana that produce a psychological response. Some people, do in fact, develop a psychological dependency to marijuana, and others may begin using marijuana, but seek out other drugs that have a more powerful effect. Other reports point to a reduction in use of other hardcore drugs by those who have access to marijuana. I am continuing to carefully review multiple sources to get a better understanding of the risks and advantages for marijuana consumers.
While the legalization of marijuana will help to cut down on arrests, I do not believe it can be relied upon as a type of reform. According to a recent report by the Drug Policy Alliance, in states that have legalized marijuana, racial disparities continue to exist in arrests for underage possession, unlicensed sales, and public consumption. The problems with discrimination in the criminal justice system run much deeper than crimes of possession of marijuana.
I recognize that there may be some benefits to legalization; however, I am concerned about short term gain, but long term pain. My concerns about the impact that the legalization proposal will have on our young people far outweigh any economic benefits. Notwithstanding my concerns, I will continue to weigh the benefits and drawbacks of the proposal and consider your comments and position. Thank you, again, for contacting me on this issue. Please feel free to share any additional comments you may have on this issue.
Sincerely,
Shirley K. Turner
Senator – 15th District
SKT:mlo
My Reply to Shirley K. Turner, Senator – 15th District
3/2/18
Dear Senator Turner—
Thank you for your thoughtful reply to my letter urging
your support for marijuana legalization efforts in New Jersey, specifically
with bills that support home cultivation.
Before I address your concerns about legalization in New
Jersey, I want to specifically thank you for your support for decriminalization
of small amounts of marijuana for personal use, which will help to reduce the
unnecessary costs and burdens on individuals, families, and the criminal
justice system. I am also grateful for your support for an expansion to our
state’s medical marijuana program, to help improve access for individuals with
documented illnesses, along with expansion of qualifying conditions and
elimination of the sales tax on medical marijuana. These are changes that are
long overdue.
You say you are reluctant to support the legalization of
marijuana due to your strong concerns about the message that the legalization
of a mind-altering drug sends to our children.
First of all, why are we trying to send messages to
children? In my experience, including nine years working with juvenile
offenders in the New Jersey Department of Corrections (NJDOC), the most
effective way of dealing with children is to clearly tell them what to do, in
an honest and consistent manner, with the expectation of being obeyed. Of
greatest concern is telling the truth to children. But marijuana prohibition
rests on a lie. The lie is that marijuana is a Schedule I drug, with no
accepted medical uses in the U.S., and is unsafe for use even under medical
supervision and it has a high potential for abuse. None of that is true. New
Jersey is one of 30 states that have accepted medical uses for marijuana; the
safety profile of marijuana is the envy of most prescription drugs and even
many over-the-counter drugs, and while marijuana may have a high potential for
use, it does not typically interfere with a person’s life to the extent that it
could be considered “abuse.” Most people who use marijuana—about 20 million
Americans a month—use it periodically or episodically. As a Schedule I drug,
marijuana is in the same class with heroin, a powerfully addictive and
potentially deadly drug. Yet marijuana is about as addictive as caffeine and
has never killed anyone through overdose. To put marijuana in the same class
with heroin is absurd. Even kids know that. When minors find out they have been
lied to about marijuana they will not believe the very real dangers that can be
associated with the use of other drugs. This Big Lie is the basis for the
current draconian penalties against marijuana and it is an appalling lie to
tell children.
Secondly, the message that we think we are sending is not
necessarily the message that is being received by minors. For example opponents
of medical marijuana—some of the same people who currently oppose legalization
of marijuana-- said that we would be sending the wrong message to children if
we legalized marijuana for medical use. They were willing to let patients
suffer needlessly because they were concerned about a “message.” Their real
concern was how could they continue to support their dire warnings about the
harms of using marijuana when cancer patients and AIDS patients and hospice
patients and children with intractable seizures—some of the most vulnerable
people in our population—were seen to be using medical marijuana and getting
better and stronger because of their use of this substance? The message minors
were actually receiving from these opponents of medical marijuana was one of
intolerance—a message of uncompromising and unyielding cruelty. The message is
completely lacking in compassion and it is a message that is being resoundingly
rejected by young Americans. Nearly 70% of the Millennial Generation—those born
between 1981 and 1996—support the legalization of marijuana. Generations of
Americans have been lied to and frightened by our government’s demonization of
marijuana. The fact is that most people who use marijuana use it responsibly.
They should not be considered criminals for doing so.
Let me be clear that the availability and the use of
marijuana by minors is a very real concern that advocates of legalization share
with opponents. But the facts belie the fears that marijuana legalization will
lead to increased teen use. “Since the (Monitoring the Future) MTF study began
in 1975, between 80% and 90% of 12th graders each year have said that they
could get marijuana fairly easily or very easily if they wanted some, with that
figure standing at 81% in 2016.” So for the last 41 years in a row over 80% of
high school seniors in New Jersey have said marijuana is “easy to get” or
“fairly easy to get.” This is the legacy of the current “Prohibition approach”
to marijuana with its numerous, unintended negative consequences. Teen access
is nearly universal. You could not make marijuana more available to teens if
you put it in little baggies and handed it out in high school cafeterias. The
most pernicious advertising of marijuana to teens is exaggeration of
marijuana's dangers. This only makes it more attractive to teens. By contrast,
teen use of marijuana in California has dropped over 50% since the medical
marijuana law passed there in 1996. Teens don’t find it glamorous when AIDS
patients, cancer patients and hospice patients are using marijuana. Again,
honesty about marijuana is clearly the best policy.
http://www.monitoringthefuture.org/pubs/monographs/mtf-overview2016.pdf
Further, has marijuana legalization actually increased
teen use? Not according to Colorado and Washington, where teen marijuana use
has remained steady since legalization for adult use. Some relevant facts: both
Colorado and Washington have issued regulations that prohibit cannabis from
being sold or packaged in a manner intended to appeal to children. So we need
not fear that pot-infused candy or ice cream will be commercially available in
a strictly regulated market. These are the kind of things that regulations can
address and that are not possible to address in an unregulated market.
https://www.cannalawblog.com/marijuana-edibles-in-washington-state/
The prestigious Washington State Institute for Public
Policy has been conducting an intensive, empirically grounded study on the
impact of legalization in that state since 2014. A report issued this past
September concluded that, thus far, there is no evidence that legalization has
increased marijuana use among minors or increased overall drug dependence in
that state.
http://www.wsipp.wa.gov/Reports/604
In fact, no state that has legalized marijuana is
seriously considering a return to its criminalization. The benefits are too
many; the downsides too few.
This is also why we advocates insist that legalized
marijuana be sold in licensed stores only to adults over 21, by clerks who will
be severely penalized if they sell to minors. Currently, drug dealers do not
check the ID cards of anyone they sell to, and they may well have other, more
dangerous drugs to sell to their underage clientele as well.
A culture of prohibition is unable to establish
reasonable regulations regarding cannabis use. For example, it makes no sense
to say minors should not use marijuana if you are saying at the same time that
adults are also forbidden from using marijuana. It makes no sense to forbid
marijuana use while driving a car, if marijuana use is also forbidden while not
driving a car. With legalization of marijuana in New Jersey, we have the
opportunity to create reasonable regulations regarding marijuana age restrictions
and use restrictions that residents will be more likely to adhere to.
Concern about the safety and well being of children seems
misplaced in a culture of marijuana prohibition. New Jersey police made nearly
25,000 marijuana possession arrests in 2014. Think of the children of those
25,000 people. A parent in jail has a tremendous impact on a child. It deprives
the child of loving supervision, guidance and support. It lowers the child's
socioeconomic status. Having a parent in prison is an Adverse Childhood Event
(ACE). ACE's are predictors of addictive behavior in later life. Our Drug
Prohibition policy is literally creating wretched outcomes and increased drug
abuse in our society.
https://www.njumr.org/news/2016/05/04/ag-nj-police-made-nearly-25k-marijuana-possession-arrests-20
When you arrest and imprison parents, you nearly
guarantee that their children will have:
· Lower socioeconomic status;
· Greater involvement with the criminal justice system;
· Lower IQ’s; and
· Poorer health.
Since incarcerating parents is tantamount to abuse of the
children of these inmates, incarceration should be reserved for only the most
serious threats to our society. The War on Drugs is at the heart of our
country’s current experiment in mass incarceration. I had a unique perspective
on this experiment. When I started working for the NJDOC in 1984, there were
9,000 inmates in the state system. When I retired from the NJDOC in 2006, there
were 27,000 inmates in the state system (86% of them were Black or Hispanic).
In the 22 years that I worked at the DOC, the inmate population tripled. (The
inmate population has since gone down to about 20,000 in 2018, 78% of whom are
Black or Hispanic.) While about 18% of all New Jersey inmates are incarcerated
specifically for drug offenses, a far higher percentage are second class
citizens living in the War Zones of the inner cities, with little chance for
meaningful education, employment, housing and even family life. The War on
Drugs--mostly a war on marijuana which has been going on for decades--creates
crime and violence, and is certainly ineffective at controlling drug use; drugs
are stronger, cheaper, and more available than ever. The only thing the War on
Drugs is successful at is enriching the Prison-Industrial Complex, protecting
the Pharmaceutical Industry and the Alcohol Industry from a threat to their
profits, and ensuring that this war will continue for generations to come.
http://www.state.nj.us/corrections/pdf/offender_statistics/2018/By%20Race%20Ethnicity%202018.pdf
When you arrest and imprison enough parents from a
particular community, like the inner city, this mass incarceration has a
negative effect on the public health of that community. You wind up with cities
like Camden, Atlantic City, Trenton and Newark where an estimated 40% of the
children will suffer from post traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD) simply as a
result of their living conditions of poverty and violence.
We may not have all the answers about marijuana
legalization yet, but we certainly know that the prohibition of marijuana is a
costly, ineffective failure that greatly harms society in many ways.
Senator Turner, thank you for keeping an open mind about
the Gateway Theory. The Gateway Theory was popularized in the early 1970’s when
there was a general cultural realization in America that the government was
greatly exaggerating the dangers of marijuana use. Since 1937 the federal
government had been insisting that the use of marijuana inevitably led to
“insanity, criminality and death.” But millions of young Americans used
marijuana in the 1960’s and they found that marijuana use was more likely to lead
to peace, love and happiness.
The Gateway Theory was an actually an acknowledgement
that previous information about marijuana was inaccurate. The government was
admitting: “Maybe marijuana isn’t as dangerous as we said it was, but it can
lead to more dangerous things.”
Still, it is difficult to understand what “more
dangerous” thing marijuana can possibly lead to when the federal government and
even the State of New Jersey have both resisted several attempts to reschedule
marijuana from its Schedule I status. By insisting that marijuana remain a
Schedule I drug, in the same class, or equally as dangerous, as heroin, and
MORE dangerous than all drugs in Schedules II – V, including cocaine,
methamphetamine and all prescription drugs, it is difficult to imagine exactly
what more dangerous thing there is that marijuana can lead to.
According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse:
"The majority of people who use marijuana do not go on to use other,
"harder" substances. Also, cross-sensitization is not unique to
marijuana. Alcohol and nicotine also prime the brain for a heightened response
to other drugs and are, like marijuana, also typically used before a person
progresses to other, more harmful substances."
https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/research-reports/marijuana/marijuana-gateway-drug
Even the DEA no longer believes in the Gateway myth.
According to the Department of Justice
Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) published in the
Federal Register / Vol. 76, No. 131 / Friday, July 8, 2011 / Page 40556:
“Marijuana as a ‘‘Gateway Drug’’
The Institute of Medicine (IOM) reported that the widely
held belief that marijuana is a ‘‘gateway drug,’’ leading to subsequent abuse
of other illicit drugs, lacks conclusive evidence (Institute of Medicine,
1999). Recently, Fergusson et al. (2005) in a 25-year study of 1,256 New
Zealand children concluded that use of marijuana correlates to an increased
risk of abuse of other drugs, including cocaine and heroin. Other sources,
however, do not support a direct causal relationship between regular marijuana and
other illicit drug use. In general, such studies are selective in recruiting
individuals who, in addition to having extensive histories of marijuana use,
are influenced by myriad social, biological, and economic factors that
contribute to extensive drug abuse (Hall and Lynskey, 2005). For most studies
that test the hypothesis that marijuana causes abuse of harder drugs, the
determinative measure of choice is any drug use, rather than DSM–IV– TR
criteria for drug abuse or dependence (DSM–IV–TR, 2000).
According to Golub & Johnson (2001), the rate of
progression to hard drug use by youth born in the 1970’s, as opposed to youth
born between World War II and the 1960’s, is significantly decreased, although
overall marijuana use among youth appears to be increasing. Nace et al. (1975)
reported that even in the Vietnam-era soldiers who extensively abused marijuana
and heroin, there was a lack of correlation of a causal relationship
demonstrating marijuana use leading to heroin addiction. A recent longitudinal
study of 708 adolescents demonstrated that early onset marijuana use did not
lead to problematic drug use (Kandel and Chen, 2000). Similarly, among 2,446
adolescents followed longitudinally, cannabis dependence was uncommon but when
it did occur, it was predicted primarily by parental death, deprived
socio-economic status, and baseline use of illicit drugs other than marijuana
(von Sydow et al., 2002).”
My own conclusion is that marijuana is a
"terminal" drug, or perhaps a "reverse gateway." A recent
study by University of California Berkeley Patients Group of 350 cannabis users
found that 40% used cannabis to control alcohol craving, 66% as a replacement
for prescription drugs, and 26% as a replacement for other, more potent illegal
drugs.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19958538
What about motor vehicle safety? Again, let's go to the
National Institute on Drug Abuse: "Several meta-analyses of multiple
studies found that the risk of being involved in a crash significantly
increased after marijuana use - in a few cases, the risk doubled or more than
doubled. However, a large case-control study conducted by the National Highway
Traffic Safety Administration found no significant increased crash risk
attributable to cannabis after controlling for drivers’ age, gender, race, and
presence of alcohol.”
https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/research-reports/marijuana/does-marijuana-use-affect-driving
Opponents of marijuana legalization claim deaths “related
to driving under the influence of marijuana” increased significantly in
Colorado since legalization. Reports from the Rocky Mountain High Intensity
Drug Trafficking Area (RMHIDTA), an agency that owes its existence to the War
on Drugs, are the source of much marijuana misinformation. But even the RMHIDTA
acknowledged that “Terms such as ‘marijuana-related’ or ‘tested positive for
marijuana’ does not necessarily imply that marijuana was the cause of the
incident.”
The truth is that the adult use legalization of marijuana
is NOT associated with adverse effects on traffic safety. Larry Wolk, Chief
Medical Officer of the Colorado Department of Public Health, said on 10/23/17,
“We have not experienced any significant issue as a result of legalization. We
have actually seen an overall decrease in DUI's since legalization.” http://www.cbc.ca/listen/shows/island-morning/segment/14496573
The Journal of the American Public Health Association
reported in 2017, “Three years after recreational marijuana legalization,
changes in motor vehicle crash fatality rates for Washington and Colorado were
not statistically different from those in similar states without recreational
marijuana legalization." http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/10.2105/AJPH.2017.303848
What about the risks of marijuana with increased potency?
In the 1930’s Prohibitionists associated marijuana with
insanity, criminality and death. In the 1960’s Prohibitionists said that
marijuana damaged the immune system and made men grow female breasts. In the
1990’s marijuana was said to be 10 times stronger than the marijuana of the
60’s and that now it was REALLY dangerous. (Meanwhile, they wouldn’t allow you
to have the weaker stuff, either.) Yes, much of the marijuana of today has
greatly increased potency when compared to the marijuana of the 1960’s. The government
warns that there are new risks associated with this stronger marijuana,
however, this is a groundless fear. I know from personal experience that the
East and West coasts of the United States were saturated with high-grade
marijuana by the late 1960’s. (I attended colleges and universities in
California and New Jersey from 1967 through 1976 and during that time I earned
three undergraduate degrees—Associate in Arts, Bachelor of Arts, and Associate
in Applied Science.) On college campuses, there was Columbian Gold, Panama Red,
Thai Sticks, various Jamaican strains and high grade Mexican marijuana from the
state of Michoacán, to name just a few, that were the equal in THC potency to
any of the strains available today. In addition, there was a wide variety of
hashish (hash) on the campuses. Hash was available from Morocco, Lebanon and
Afghanistan. Hash, which is a collection of the resin of the cannabis
(marijuana) plant, typically had a THC content of 15% - 20% which made it
stronger than any of the marijuana that was available then and equal to some of
the strongest marijuana available now. Hash was desirable precisely because of
its potency. A supply of hash would last longer than a supply of marijuana
because less was required to produce the desired effect. Also, fewer toxins
were introduced into the body because less smoking was required. A commonly
observed phenomenon in the 1960’s was, “Good pot drives out bad pot.” That is,
when marijuana of superior quality was introduced in an area, the more inferior
marijuana was less sought after and hence less available. The same is true
today. The explosion of sophisticated cultivation techniques has greatly
increased the potency and variety of homegrown U.S. marijuana. “Homegrown” used
to be a joke—low potency marijuana that was as apt to produce a headache as a
high. Now, U.S. homegrown is the equal to any of the legendary international
strains of the late 1960’s. This represents progress and the maturity of the
U.S. marijuana market. It does not represent the introduction of a new product
or a new threat. With regulation of marijuana, consumers can have available to
them products with tested and clearly labeled THC content, along with the
content of other cannabinoids—so that they know exactly what strength they are
getting in order to more safely use the substance.
In the 1980’s, the FDA approved the synthetic drug,
Marinol, which has a THC content of 100% and this drug is considered safe for
use by very ill people!
If Prohibitionists were really concerned about people’s
safety, they would abandon Prohibition and:
· work to minimize harms that are associated with drug
use;
· honestly acknowledge the medical benefits and relative
dangers of marijuana; and,
· develop a system of reasonable regulations of marijuana
use that are acceptable to most Americans.
Prohibition is a failed policy. It didn’t even work in
the Garden of Eden.
Thank you for allowing me to share my additional comments
on this issue.
Sincerely yours,
Ken Wolski, RN, MPA
Executive Director, Coalition for Medical Marijuana--New Jersey, Inc.
219 Woodside Ave., Trenton, NJ 08618
609.394.2137 www.cmmnj.org
Senator Turner has been a sponsor of marijuana reform legislation in New Jersey since this dialogue.
