INITIATIVE TO LEGALIZE POT PUT ON BALLOT

An initiative to legalize recreational marijuana use in Mendocino County
will be placed on the November ballot, despite the likelihood of it being
unenforceable.

The county Board of Supervisors Tuesday voted unanimously to put the
initiative to a public vote. The supervisors could have adopted it as a
county ordinance but opted to let voters decide.

"We want the voters to have the ability to send whatever message they want
to send," said Supervisor Richard Shoemaker.

The Green Party-sponsored initiative is seen more as a public statement
about marijuana use than as a way to skirt current state and federal laws
that prohibit the sale, cultivation and use of marijuana.

"It is nothing more than a policy statement. It's clearly illegal," said
Michael Delbar, board chairman.

Past efforts to legalize marijuana in California haven't been successful.
And county law enforcement officials said that if this initiative passes,
it cannot be enforced.

"We realize that this is a political statement," said Dan Hamburg, a
spokesman for the Green Party. "But once the vote occurs, it will be a step
forward in de-escalating the war on marijuana."

The initiative would prevent county law enforcement and the district
attorney from arresting and prosecuting people who have 25 or fewer "adult
flowering female marijuana plants or the equivalent in dried marijuana."

The initiative also would direct the county to lobby the state and federal
governments to legalize the personal use of marijuana.

The language of the initiative has been deemed unenforceable by county
Counsel Peter Klein, who said the county cannot have rules that supersede
state and federal laws. But the legality of the initiative will have to be
decided in court.

Sheriff Tony Craver and District Attorney Norm Vroman said they agreed with
Klein's opinion.

The county now has one of the few remaining medical marijuana clubs in the
state -- though the club is embroiled in a legal battle with the federal
government and by court order cannot distribute marijuana.

California voters in 1996 passed Prop. 215 legalizing the use of marijuana
for medical purposes. But many medical marijuana clubs in the state have
been shut down after the federal government challenged the initiative's
legality in court.

Mendocino County supervisors in 1998 passed a resolution, calling for Prop.
215 to be implemented.