POT INITIATIVE MAY MAKE BALLOT

Petition: State Won't Fight Order To Count 200 Booklets

An initiative to decriminalize marijuana in Alaska may end up on the 2004
ballot after all.

The state will not appeal a court order to reconsider nearly 200 petition
booklets that state elections officials had invalidated, Lt. Gov. Loren
Leman said Monday.

The state weighed the cost of appealing the court order against the risk of
losing.

"The risk wasn't worth the cost," said Leman, who oversees the state
Division of Elections.

In a Sept. 23 ruling, Anchorage Superior Court Judge John Suddock ordered
Leman and the Elections Division to take another look at the rejected
booklets, saying officials did not do enough to help the petitioners
through the complicated initiative process.

As a result of the state's actions, proponents came up more than 7,000
signatures short of the required 28,742 to get their initiative on the ballot.

Elections workers are counting the resurrected ballot signatures and will
have a final tally by the Nov. 23 deadline set by Suddock, Leman said.

Timothy Hinterberger, a sponsor of the measure, said initiative supporters
are confident they have enough valid signatures to get the measure on the
ballot. He was among those who sued the state after it turned the
initiative down in January.

Proponents had collected about 50,000 signatures, Hinterberger said. Each
petition booklet contains 150 lines for signatures, so the 194 rejected
petition booklets represent as many as 29,100 signatures that can now be
reviewed.

"We're pleased, of course," said Hinterberger, who attended Monday's news
conference. "We did not believe there were strong grounds for appeal. Now
we can educate voters."

Hinterberger said proponents expect the initiative to fare better than a
more sweeping measure rejected by voters in 2000. It sought to legalize
marijuana and provide reparations for some people convicted of drug crimes.

The new measure would decriminalize marijuana for people at least 21 years
old and "open the way for agricultural production of hemp products,"
Hinterberger said.

Supporters want government to regulate marijuana the same as alcohol.

"Drug policies overall are full of contradictions and hypocrisy,"
Hinterberger said. "Prohibition of a popularly used substance does not work
in a free society."

Leman is a former state senator who sponsored a bill in 1999 to restrict
Alaska's medical marijuana laws and is a critic of efforts to decriminalize
marijuana.

He said his views had nothing to do with disqualifying the initiative. He
was acting on a recommendation by the Division of Elections, followed by a
second opinion from the Department of Law in January, shortly after he took
office.