Legal marijuana: Boston health officials bracing for legalization in December 2016

The state’s 7.5 percent sales tax is tacked on top of that for recreational marijuana, but the ballot proposition repeals that tax for medical marijuana. When word of Proposition 64 began circulating earlier this year, some municipalities scrambled to get local laws against weed on the books before the state law changed. It’s one of many wins marijuana advocates saw Election Day, such as California and MA voting in favor of legalizing recreational marijuana use.

Ong said it will depend on how the initiative is implemented, whether officials follow through on the regulation, and how involved public health officials are with it.

“We have been talking about this for weeks, in anticipation, as the polling showed this was probably likely to pass”, Doyle said.

California’s adult smoking rate is the second lowest in the country, at 11.6 percent, according to the California Department of Public Health.

In fact, there was still some confusion on this topic during his campaign.

Trump’s team also includes Peter Thiel, whose Founder’s Fund, made one of the first major mainstream investments into the cannabis industry past year.

Those who advocated for medical marijuana have said at multiple California hearings that unlike recreational-use plants, medicinal strains of the plant have smaller amounts of tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, the psychoactive chemical that produces the “high”.

A 15% sales tax was also planned to be deposited in a Marijuana Fund and distributed to the Department of Marijuana Licenses and Control and to the Department of Revenue.

State Treasurer Deborah Goldberg, who will appoint the three commission members and will oversee the marijuana industry in MA, told reporters on November 9 that she doesn’t think there should be “rigid deadlines” for the law’s implementation, according to the State House News Service.

As states weigh whether to legalize marijuana, one of the most contentious issues is whether legalization increases adolescent use.

In Maine, a “yes” on Question 1, would make it legal for a person 21 or older to use marijuana.

Mirando said scientific methods also are being sought to determine when and how much marijuana someone has consumed.

“This is the beginning of the end of the war on marijuana in the United States”, said Newsom, who is running for governor. “That’s my concern”, she said.

Politicians billed medical marijuana restrictions as a way to “do this right”.

Under Proposition 64, marijuana can’t be smoked in public areas, or places where tobacco smoking is prohibited. “There is tremendous overlap potential”, he said. Thanks to Treasury Department guidance issued in 2014, banks can legally handle money for businesses that truck in cannabis, but only if they collect intelligence on those businesses and file reports on their activities. “It is entirely a different thing to ignore the tens of billions that the California cannabis industry will generate”, said Michael Weiner, a Denver lawyer who represents pot-related companies. In Log Lane Village, the town repaved two city blocks thanks to sales tax from two new pot shops – revenue that almost doubled the city’s budget.

Doyle said commission members have already started discussing coordination among city agencies to handle monitoring and regulation of marijuana shops, and how to better collect data to measure the effects of legalization.

A town can’t just look at revenues from marijuana; it must also consider the possibility of additional expenditures, said Kevin Bommer, the Colorado Municipal League’s director. “The ideal situation is where it’s legal so nobody is thrown in jail, but nobody wants to buy it”.

Some are joining blue-collar unions, getting health benefits as they grow and sell a plant they’ve long loved.

That’s probably why Christie received a D+ when NORML graded all 50 USA governors. The incoming administration is not really faced with such a simple binary choice on marijuana legalization as “shut it down” or ‘leave it alone.’ Those already named by Trump for his administration play hardball.

“Teenagers are actually smarter than most of the adult propaganda”, Nadelmann said. “If it is positive for marijuana, you don’t know if they smoked it three weeks ago or an hour ago”.