Mayor of Lansing, Michigan Endorses Cannabis Legalization Initiative
Recently we reported that activists in Lansing, Michigan (the state’s capital) submitted enough signatures to put a cannabis legalization initiative to a vote of the people this November. Today
, Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero announced his support for the proposal, and his desire to see an end to cannabis prohibition.
“Marijuana prohibition has been a complete failure that has mainly succeeded in filling up our prisons with minor drug offenders at an extremely high cost to the taxpayers of this state”, Mayor Bernero said in a recent statement; “Our police officers and courts have more important things to do than pursue and prosecute these violations.”
In his announcment, Mayor Bernero stated that “It is not surprising that this proposal to legalize small quantities of marijuana has garnered enough signatures to be put to a vote of the citizens of Lansing this fall. The public is far ahead of most politicians on this issue, as evidenced by the overwhelming support for medical marijuana when it was on the statewide ballot several years ago, as well as the decriminalization of small quantities of marijuana in cities like Ann Arbor, Detroit, Flint and Grand Rapids.”
Lansing officials have stated that they should have the signatures validated within 2 weeks: If 4,200 of the over 6,400 submitted signatures are from registered Lansing voters, the initiative will be officially placed on the November, 2013 general election ballot.
– TheJointBlog
