MARIJUANA LEGALIZATION GROUP TRIES A NEW STRATEGY

Pro-pot side offers 'professional' ads, well-chosen
speakers

A group calling itself Yes on 2 has begun campaigning in earnest for a
November ballot measure to legalize and regulate marijuana in Alaska
and has a strategy different from what voters saw for a similar,
unsuccessful initiative in 2000.

This time around, organizers are asking less of voters in an attempt
to make the measure more appealing in the Nov. 2 election. They also
have enlisted a more carefully selected group of spokespeople to help
make their pitch, including a biomedical professor, a former
high-ranking state corrections officer and a prominent Republican
Party official.

The statewide campaign, which includes television and radio spots and
a push to get supporters registered to vote by the Oct. 3 deadline,
has some opponents worried.

"The legalizers have done a good job this time," said former U.S.
Attorney Wev Shea, who backed a 1990 initiative to criminalize pot in
Alaska and was also a key spokesman against legalization in 2000.
"Have you seen the commercials? ... They're really
professional."

There does not appear to be any organized opposition to Ballot Measure
2, another worry for initiative foes. "I'm very concerned," said Shea,
who called on federal and state prosecutors and Alaska politicians to
take a strong stand on the issue.

Shea said in his years in law enforcement he spoke with several
junkies who told him "it all starts with marijuana or alcohol."

U.S. Attorney for Alaska Tim Burgess and state Attorney General Greg
Renkes both said in interviews Tuesday that laws forbid them from
using their positions to tell people how to vote. Both did say,
however, that they believe marijuana is dangerous.

Gov. Frank Murkowski also by law cannot campaign against Ballot
Measure 2. His personal feeling, according to a spokeswoman, is that
legalizing marijuana could encourage use and abuse of the drug, which
has damaging consequences to children and families.

"He is absolutely against it," said Murkowski's press secretary, Becky
Hultberg.

Alaska has gone back and forth on its marijuana laws over the last
three decades.

In 1975, the landmark case Ravin vs. State made it legal for adult
Alaskans to possess a small amount of marijuana in their homes for
personal use. But in 1990 voters criminalized all amounts of pot.

That initiative appeared to kill Ravin. But last year, the Alaska
Court of Appeals weighed in, saying that wasn't so. The Ravin ruling
was based on privacy rights guaranteed in the Alaska Constitution, the
appellate court said, which can't be taken away by voters or
legislators. The Alaska Supreme Court earlier this month let that
ruling stand by refusing to review the case.

The first big push to legalize all amounts of marijuana statewide came
in 2000. Proponents wanted the drug to be legal for those 18 and older
and also wanted the government to set free some jail inmates convicted
of marijuana crimes and set up a commission to consider reparations
for them. Sixty percent of voters turned the initiative down.

Shea said it was easy debating that measure. "It was just gross
overreaching" on the part of legalization backers, he said.

This year's initiative drops the amnesty and reparations ideas and
also increases the legal age of pot use to 21. It also allows for
government regulation of marijuana similar to tobacco or alcohol and
for laws limiting use in public and to protect public safety, such as
forbidding people to drive under the drug's influence. The measure
also allows for taxation of marijuana.

"There's a little more common sense in the approach this time," said
Republican Moderate Party founder Ray Metcalfe, who supports the measure.

The 2000 campaign, which had several groups behind it, also lacked a
unified front, said Yes on 2 treasurer Ken Jacobus, who last year
stepped down as attorney for the Republican Party of Alaska in an
amicable split after he said his involvement in preparing the
marijuana initiative and other issues made him "too much of a
lightning rod."

Jacobus said the campaign for the 2000 initiative "was worse than
unorganized. They were fighting with each other."

The current campaign has some new faces, the most visible of whom is
the paid Yes on 2 spokesman, Bill Parker, a former legislator and
deputy commissioner of corrections in Alaska from 1995 until his
retirement in 2002.

Parker said in a recent interview that Alaskans should vote for Ballot
Measure 2 because it would protect individual privacy rights, stop the
government from wasting taxpayer dollars to fight marijuana and
regulate the drug in a way that will make it harder for kids to get
but easier for adults to obtain legally. Drug dealers don't
discriminate between children and adults by asking for an ID, Parker
said.

At the Yes on 2 campaign kickoff last Thursday evening, in a loft-type
office on Northern Lights Boulevard, Parker seemed confident the
measure would pass.

"We are going to change the laws in this state on marijuana," he
declared to a crowd of about 200 supporters who had gathered for the
party, which featured food, drinks and a drum circle.

Jacobus said one problem with state law as it stands now is that there
is no way for residents -- including medical marijuana patients -- to
legally obtain marijuana. Ballot Measure 2 would take care of that by
regulating the drug, he said. "Kids should not be able to get it anywhere."

Renkes said the notion that making Alaska's drug laws more permissive
would somehow help better control marijuana use just doesn't ring
true. "There's no data to prove that," he said.

Jennifer de Vallance, a spokeswoman for the Office of National Drug
Control Policy, agreed. She said alcohol is regulated and kids still
get their hands on it. "It doesn't make sense that making this legal
would hamper access," she said. "If anything, it sends a mixed message
to kids that it's OK."

Jacobus said for him Ballot Measure 2 is all about individual rights.
"I don't smoke marijuana," he said. "I don't think it's good for you.
But I don't drink either." If people want to use those substances,
that should be their business, not the government's, he said.

Dr. Tim Hinterberger, an assistant professor for the biomedical
program at the University of Alaska Anchorage and a sponsor of Ballot
Measure 2, said marijuana is widely recognized as being far less toxic
than substances such as cocaine or alcohol. He said he has never heard
of a case where someone died from a pot overdose. In terms of
addictiveness, pot is more on par with caffeine, he said.

Renkes challenged that assertion too, saying pot is addictive and
mind-altering and can lead to worse drugs. He called substance abuse
"the most serious social issue facing the state," noting that many
crimes, injuries, deaths, as well as about 87 percent of
incarcerations in Alaska are related to alcohol and drug abuse.

Alaska spends more money per capita on drug prevention and treatment
than any other state in country, Renkes said. "This is a problem that
we all share," he said. "I'm offended by Outside money and Outside
groups coming here and thinking that they can easily impact our laws."

Yes on 2 is funded by individual donations and contributions from two
main groups: Alaskans For Marijuana Regulation and Control, which gets
most of its funding from the Washington, D.C.-based Marijuana Policy
Project, and Alaska Rights and Revenues, which gets its funding from
800 Alaska donors and an Outside group called The Foundation for
Constitutional Protection, according to each group's treasurer.

David Finkelstein, treasurer of Alaskans for Marijuana Regulation and
Control, said he expected Yes on 2 to spend "hundreds of thousands" of
dollars on its campaign.

Which is yet another worry for initiative opponents. "That's a
frustrating part of the drug legalization movement," de Vallance said.
"There is no well-funded political movement to keep our society safe."

No clear picture on how the state would go about regulating marijuana
has emerged. Both sides do agree on one point, however: Even if the
initiative passes, marijuana would still be illegal in Alaska under
federal law.