PETITION ON 'POT' FALLS SHORT OF NAMES

Secretary of State Charlie Daniels rejected Tuesday a proposed initiated
act to legalize marijuana for medical use because the proponents' petition
didn' t contain enough Arkansas voters' signatures to qualify for the ballot.

Daniels' announcement doesn't necessarily signal defeat for the Arkansas
Alliance for Medical Marijuana, however. The group has 30 days to submit
more signatures to reach the 64,456 necessary to put the issue before
voters Nov. 2.

Denele Campbell of West Fork, one of the group's leaders, said supporters
expected the denial and have been collecting more signatures through
volunteers and a paid contractor. "I don't want to say we're optimistic or
feeling comfortable that we're going to accomplish this, but we've got
until [the close of business on Aug. 25]," Campbell said.

Daniels certified that the alliance submitted 29,947 valid signatures,
fewer than half the number needed to qualify.

But Campbell said about 17,000 signatures, more than 25 percent of those
originally submitted, were not counted by the secretary of state's office
because there was an error in the notary public's signature on them.

Janet Miller, spokesman for Daniels, said the eligible signatures on those
petition pages will be counted if the notary's signature is corrected.
Those pages haven't been reviewed, so it's unknown how many signatures
would be added to the total, she said.

Campbell said she hopes that those signatures, once validated, will raise
the total collected to about 40,000.

The Arkansas Medical Marijuana Act would allow Arkansans with "debilitating
medical conditions" to use marijuana, which they or a caregiver grow, on
the advice of a physician. Users would obtain a registry card from the
state Department of Health.

A diagnosis of AIDS, cancer or glaucoma, among other conditions, would
qualify a patient for a registry card, if a physician recommended it.

Campbell said the alliance has raised about $10,000 in the past couple of
weeks, since the Washington-based Marijuana Policy Project pulled out of
the state effort, citing the expense of the campaign combined with the need
to gather more signatures.

Up to that time, Campbell said the Arkansas campaign had been directed by
the Washington group. The campaign had been funded by $336,000 in donations
arranged by the Marijuana Policy Project from Peter Lewis, an Ohio
billionaire who has supported similar efforts in other states. Lewis is
chairman of the insurance company Progressive Corp.

At the direction of the Marijuana Policy Project, the alliance spent
$228,500 on a contract with the Southwest Group of Las Vegas to gather
signatures in Arkansas. Campbell said she continues to wonder where that
money went. "I think it's astonishing that they were paid $228,500 and only
managed to arrive at approximately 30,000 valid signatures," Campbell said.

A telephone message left for officials with the Southwest Group was not
immediately returned Tuesday, and the company has previously declined to
comment.

Campbell said some Arkansas supporters at first blamed her because she has
long led the state effort to legalize marijuana as medicine, and she is the
treasurer of the ballot committee. "I pointed out to them that they're
shooting at the wrong messenger," Campbell said.

Bruce Mirken, a spokesman for the Marijuana Policy Project, said he doesn't
know exactly what happened with the signature-gathering process and that
the Southwest Group would have to answer any questions about it.

Marijuana Policy Project pulled out of the Arkansas effort because of a
combination of factors, he said. "We knew there was going to be another
month of effort to securely get up to the signature amount, plus the cost
of the campaign," Mirken said. "The combination of those was the issue. It
doesn't sound like that situation has changed."

Campbell said the alliance is now paying a Little Rock consultant, Phyllis
Thompson, to gather signatures. Thompson and her staff have gathered about
5,000 so far, Campbell said.

Campbell said she is confident that if the measure is on the ballot,
Arkansans will approve it. Polls in recent years have shown that about
twothirds of Arkansans support the idea, she said.

The Arkansas Poll, conducted by the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville,
reported in 2001 that 63 percent of respondents supported legalization of
marijuana for medical use.

The Alliance for Reform of Drug Policy in Arkansas, of which Campbell is
director, hired Zogby International of New York to conduct a poll in 2002.
The 2002 poll results were similar, with about 62 percent answering
favorably to a question about the prospect of "a law that would allow
people with cancer and other debilitating medical conditions to register in
a state-regulated program permitting them to grow and use a limited amount
of marijuana for medical purposes."

The Arkansas Alliance for Medical Marijuana is the ballot committee for the
Alliance for Reform of Drug Policy in Arkansas.

Campbell acknowledged that opinions of the ballot measure might change
during a campaign, especially with an opposition group working to defeat
the measure.

Larry Page, director of Citizens Against Legalizing Marijuana, said Tuesday
that he was glad to hear that fewer than 30,000 signatures were validated
on the medical marijuana initiative. He said his group is still gearing up
for a campaign, however. "Obviously we think medicinal marijuana is sort of
voodoo medical policy and has a lot more risk than it does potential
benefit," Page said. "We'd like to see it not be qualified for the ballot,
but if it does, we'll try to apprise people of all the facts."

Another proposal supported by a petition has been certified by Daniels for
the November ballot. It is a proposed constitutional amendment to define
marriage as being between one man and one woman. It would bar civil unions.

Two proposed constitutional amendments referred by the Legislature also
will be on the ballot. One would expand the number of terms legislators can
serve. The other would allow the Legislature to issue hundreds of millions
of dollars in bonds to finance infrastructure improvements to attract major
industries.

The Legislature also has referred to the November ballot the question of
whether to raise the minimum property tax rate for school district
operations by 3 mills. The current minimum is 25 mills. A mill is one tenth
of a cent.