STONER STANDOFF

Pot Movement Clashes Over Dueling Pot Initiatives

The spirit of brotherhood and sisterhood will awaken in blissful
harmony this weekend at Hempfest, the world's largest celebration of
the magickal cannabis plant, as activists unite behind a communal
strategy to legalize marijuana.

Just kidding.

These activists are at each other's fucking throats.

Specifically, two factions of the marijuana legalization movement will
clash in Myrtle Edwards Park this weekend (August 19-21) with dueling
initiatives. So if you sign a pot petition at Hempfest and somebody
asks you to sign another petition a few minutes later, it may be a
different one. Because even though Hempfest will likely be another
breezy affair in a marijuana-friendly city, Seattle's pot movement is
divided by money, policy, and (of course) cultural
differences.

The front-running campaign filed an initiative in June--with a cast of
straitlaced sponsors, including former US attorney John McKay and
travel personality Rick Steves--and has already raised a
quarter--million dollars. The pioneering initiative would raise
hundreds of millions in tax dollars for the state by allowing adults
to purchase marijuana in stores, but it would ban people from growing
marijuana at home. Between 85 and 100 petitioners are signed up to
canvass the crowd to place this measure on next year's fall ballot,
says campaign director Alison Holcomb.

The group is called New Approach Washington--known for short as
NAW.

So what's the problem?

"I think NAW is a piece of shit," says Douglas Hiatt, who ran the
campaign for another initiative, Sensible Washington, which raised
relatively little money and failed to gather enough signatures two
years in a row. He believes federal drug laws would nullify most of
the NAW measure, and a provision that establishes an automatic penalty
for driving under the influence of pot would turn medical marijuana
patients who drive into criminals.

"I think it's divided the community pretty severely," Hiatt says about
the hundreds of volunteers he's worked with and Seattle's robust
medical marijuana industry. He calls the NAW measure "an expensive
publicity stunt."

So on July 27, a new group filed a petition to legalize marijuana,
based on the text of Sensible Washington's twice-failed measure. This
statewide initiative would simply remove all state penalties for
marijuana. That approach, says spokesman Don Skakie, would let you
"grow it for yourself" without paying taxes on the pot.

The name of that new group? Yes End Penalties--or YEP!

That's right: It's YEP versus NAW.

"It's positive versus negative, as far as I'm concerned," Skakie says.
He acknowledges that the backers of his measure, which he estimates
needs 300,000 signatures, "don't have funding." His group has only
about 30 volunteers lined up for Hempfest. However, he hopes to make
the ballot in 2012 and beat out NAW when people "vote their
conscience."

This reflects a classic divide between mainstream political players
and grassroots activists--in nearly every political movement. In this
case, NAW is playing to polling that shows most voters want government
to regulate the marijuana market and punish people who are high behind
the wheel. It's a calculated compromise. On the other end, activists
take a more fundamentalist approach (no penalties, grow at home, zero
taxes, free the weed!). If history is a guide, the group with the
money, the strategy, the notable sponsors--and a slightly less radical
proposal--has the upper hand.

In the short term, the NAW campaign is attempting to take the high
road. "I just really want to see a victory delivered in 2012," says
Holcomb. "But the only way it's going to happen is if we pull
together... to push the first domino that's going to topple marijuana
prohibition in this nation."

But local division could prevent that kind of national
victory.

"I just hope we don't have the sort of fight here that they had in
California in 2010," says Washington Cannabis Association member
Philip Dawdy. Last year in that state, factions of the marijuana
movement split. Pot growers and some activists voted against
Proposition 19 in droves, believing that the new rules it created
would be more nettlesome than the status quo. Sound familiar? That
contributed to an eight-point defeat.

Dawdy says the marijuana movement here has grown exponentially in the
last few years. "But," he warns, "it is in danger of pulling itself
apart."