MARIJUANA ADVOCATE THROWS FINAL HEMP PARTY AT HIS HOME

World Hemp Festival 2000, A Three-Day Celebration Hosted By Bill Conde, Will
Draw Thousands To Harrisburg This Weekend

HARRISBURG -- The brothers and sisters streamed into camp Friday: the
tie-dyed, the poor, the dreadlocked, the doobie-rolling masses yearning to
be free.

They built a tent city on a flat patch of dry grass about 90 miles south of
Portland and set up more than 200 booths in a peace-sign pattern. Perhaps
10,000 will plant themselves here this weekend in a village reeking of
patchouli, sage smoke and -- depending on who's looking -- puffs of
marijuana.

They've gathered to buy and sell hemp shoes, lip balm, bongs, massage oils,
herbal soaps, digital scales, crystals, lighters, T-shirts, jewelry, drums,
wooden masks, flags, hand-crafted rugs and a thousand images of Bob Marley.
They are here to party at Bill Conde's place one last time.

The three-day celebration that ends Sunday -- its official title is the
World Hemp Festival 2000 -- is the final bow for Conde, a 57-year-old
marijuana activist and one-time candidate for Oregon governor. After hosting
five hemp festivals and many rock and reggae concerts, Conde said he hopes
to sell his redwood lumber business and High-5 concert venue and move to the
Central American nation of Belize this year.

Linn County authorities have described previous festivals as open-air drug
bazaars. Sheriff Dave Burright said peddlers sold his undercover deputies
marijuana, hallucinogenic mushrooms, LSD and all manner of pills.

Drug sales were so rampant at one festival, Burright said, that when one of
his deputies answered "yes" to a dealer's time-honored question -- "Are you
a cop?" -- the dealer sold him drugs anyway.

Last month, for the first time, Conde and his associates applied to the
county for a mass-gathering permit, and county commissioners granted the
request. Conde promised to hire professional security guards and banish
people for selling or openly using illegal drugs, although he maintains that
drugs can be found almost everywhere.

"The sheriff can't keep drugs out of his jail," Conde said. "We will be
looking in people's coolers for alcohol, and we will look into people's
backpacks for weapons.

"And if we find a quantity of drugs in there, we're gonna tell them, 'Hey,
that's not allowed in here.' The only alcohol I want in here is what's
purchased at the beer garden, 'cause I get a piece of the action," he said.

Conde faces trial on a pair of felony counts charging that he aided and
abetted drug transactions at a previous hemp festival.

Conde denies the charges, claiming that he merely held an event where some
people were accused of selling drugs. But he said he's following the rules
to avoid more problems.

He has long advocated the legalization of marijuana. He claims he is
licensed to smoke marijuana in Oregon to ease the pain of irritable bowel
syndrome and said he sees no difference between medicinal and recreational
uses of the drug.

Burright, who planned to send undercover deputies onto the property this
weekend, said he has long contended that Conde's festivals were created as a
safe haven for people to openly defy drug laws. "It's extraordinarily
aggravating," he said.

But few festival-goers seemed to be lighting up in the daylight Friday,
although one man sat in the grass smoking a joint at 9:18 a.m. Some
observers suggested that the real partying would begin after dark.

"It's a little early in the day for debauchery," said one vendor who
declined to identify himself. "I don't think people change. I just think
they're politely discreet."

Many of the festival's vendors sold shoes, clothing, paper, coffee and
nutritional supplements made with industrial hemp. Although the federal
government generally bans growing the plant, its fiber can be imported. The
plant is identical in every way to marijuana except for its narcotic effect.

Eugene's Wild Duck Brewery set up a beer garden at the event in part to sell
a novelty beer, "Rastale," made with hemp seeds.

"If a person's open-minded," said vendor Kelli Thompson, the 40-year-old
owner of Kelli's Aromatherapy, "there's something for all ages here."