ADVOCATES SAY JOBS, TAX REVENUE AT STAKE IN MARIJUANA VOTE

Jeff Cassinari was unemployed for six months before landing a job a
year and a half ago as a manager at Green Natural Solutions, a
medical marijuana center at 733 Rood Ave.

If voters in April decide to ban the centers, Cassinari expects he
will be forced to go back on unemployment until he finds a new line
of work. Cassinari's fate may be like an estimated 130 people in
Grand Junction who have landed jobs in the business of selling
medical marijuana, according to the advocacy group Mesa County
Constitutional Advocates.

"I'm definitely worried," Cassinari said. "I definitely do better
with a job. My family and I may have to move. That would mean a loss
to the city of all the things we buy here: groceries, movies, rent."

Grand Junction voters will decide April 5 whether medical marijuana
centers should stay or go. Mesa County voters already determined the
centers should not be allowed in unincorporated areas of the county.

Besides jobs, medical marijuana centers provide local sales tax
revenue. Since 2009, the city's medical marijuana centers have
produced $164,000 in city sales tax receipts.

City staff broke out medical marijuana sales tax receipts,
specifically, at the request of City Council.

The city tax is 2.75 percent of sales. Total tax for city, county and
state is 7.65 percent. In lean times, the city of Grand Junction
collects about $3.5 million a month in sales tax revenue, but that
can increase to nearly $5 million a month during times of robust
consumer spending.

As of November, medical marijuana had produced $2.2 million in sales
tax statewide.

Grand Junction has reported having as many as 32 medical marijuana
sales tax licenses. That number has been reduced to 19 shops with
active sales tax accounts. Six of the 19 shops are delinquent on
paying sales taxes, city records show.

For the most part, medical-marijuana advocates say city voters may be
more amenable to allowing centers to continue operating in city
limits. During November's countywide vote, more city dwellers voted
to keep the centers, while more voters in unincorporated Mesa County
opposed the idea. The measure failed by a 2.5-percentage-point margin.

"We feel pretty confident that the city vote is going to go better
than the county vote," said Shawn Kizer, an employee at Nature's
Medicine, 2755 North Ave. "We are just making future plans as if
we're going to be here."

Some customers who lived in the unincorporated county and saw their
neighborhood shops close didn't realize they could have voted against
closing it, Kizer said.

And some people still think voting against having medical marijuana
centers in town is a vote against medical marijuana.

"It is not," he said. "If we get voted out, it goes back to the
caregiver model. That's what we're trying to get out is that getting
it at (dispensaries) is the safest way to get it."

Although the election is still more than two months away, members of
the Mesa County Constitutional Advocates said they plan to hit the
streets soon, taking their message door to door.

"We're definitely fighting for our shops," said Kate Reyes, the
group's spokeswoman.