After six months of forums, discussions, political mailers and vigorous, and sometimes vociferous, debate, Mendocino County voters finally had the opportunity to say their piece on the future of the county's marijuana policy.
With 100 percent of the precincts reporting at 12:35 a.m. Wednesday, Measure B was winning 52.15 percent to 47.85 percent. The Elections Office recorded a 34.94 percent turnout for the election and counted 16,436 ballots.
Provisional ballots remain to be counted.
"We're very confident that we're going to win," Ross Liberty, spokesman for the Yes on B Coalition, said earlier in the evening.
Measure B repeals Measure G, the county's personal use marijuana law, and sets medical marijuana possession limits in Mendocino County at the state limits of six mature or 12 immature plants and eight ounces of dried marijuana.
Measure G was passed by county voters in 2000 and instructed law enforcement to make the prosecution of possession of 25 marijuana plants or fewer the lowest possible priority.
No on B campaign spokeswoman Laura Hamburg said early in the evening that she was optimistic and excited about the results despite the fact that initial reports showed Measure B passing by a margin of more than 10 percent of the vote.
"The early results are always brutal," she said. "It's the most conservative group."
While the measure appeared to be passing from the earliest returns, Liberty said he was disappointed with the margin. Liberty said a poll conducted before Measure B was put on the ballot showed it passing with 65 percent of the vote.
"It's important to win," he said.
"We will all have done a great disservice to this county if we lose," Liberty said.
As the evening wore on, Yes on B maintained its almost 11 percent lead, though it eventually narrowed to around 5 percent.
Hamburg said no matter what the results of the election were, it would be counted as a victory by No on B because the campaign had created a dialogue about marijuana in Mendocino County.
"What happens tonight is just one slice of it," she said.
Liberty acknowledged that the fight over Measure B had been a divisive campaign and that a dialogue between the groups would be good.
"We have more common ground than we tended to acknowledge during the campaign," he said.
Hamburg said representatives of both campaigns as well as public health and other county entities would be meeting soon to discuss what can be done to deal with the crime and environmental degradation that often surrounds illegal marijuana grows.
"The whole county says no to that," she said.
All results from election night are unofficial. The definitive results will not be released until a canvas of the votes is completed, which could take up to 28 days.
Ben Brown can be reached at udjbb@pacific.net.
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Mendo pot vote: Repeal?
Published: Tuesday, June 3, 2008 at 8:56 p.m.
Last Modified: Tuesday, June 3, 2008 at 11:45 p.m.
Mendocino County voters were repealing, by a 56-44 percent margin, local marijuana standards that had earned the county a national reputation as a haven for commercial growers.
The tally represented about 50 percent of the expected vote, including the Ukiah Valley area where strong support for Measure B was expected. However, votes still were to be counted in Willits and Laytonville, rural areas where the underground marijuana economy is more pronounced, and along the Mendocino Coast, a liberal voter bastion.
The divisive Measure B campaign was marked by high-profile, local criminal cases, including the marijuana possession arrests of the daughter of a former congressman and a local high school teacher.
In a new case that further underscored public concerns, sheriff’s deputies said Monday a Willits-area man could face criminal charges for destroying 37 towering fir trees in a public preserve so he could provide more light for his marijuana garden.
http://www1.pressdemocrat.com/article/20080603/NEWS/444498383
Measure to curb marijuana growing in Mendocino approved
The Associated Press
Article Launched: 06/03/2008 11:17:23 PM PDT
UKIAH, Calif.—A measure approved by Mendocino County voters to scale back one of the country's loosest marijuana laws isn't likely to end pot growing beneath the redwoods any time soon.
But backers of Measure B, which had 55 percent of the vote with nearly all ballots tallied early Wednesday, said discouraging personal use of the drug was never their intent.
"It's not the goal to arrest people," said Ross H. Liberty, a spokesman for the Yes on B Coalition. "It's the goal to get compliance with the law."
Eight years ago, voters approved a measure that let county residents grow up to 25 marijuana plants for medical or recreational use, far higher than the state standard of six. Measure B repeals the 2000 measure and returns the limit to six plants.
Momentum for the newly approved measure came from residents fed up with growers pouring in from outside the county to set up criminal operations in what they considered the "marijuana capital of the country," Liberty said.
Supporters say passing Measure B lets illicit growers in particular know they're not welcome.
A spokeswoman for No on B did not immediately return calls seeking comment after the results of the vote were in, though opponents have said during the campaign that they also want to evict the criminals.
They argue that Measure B will do little to curb crime but will punish people who need the drug for medical reasons.
The issue offers a glimpse into the murky
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world of medical marijuana in California, which is legal under state law but banned by the federal government.
Using marijuana for medical purposes has been legal in California since 1996, when voters passed Proposition 215.
State lawmakers subsequently allowed counties to issue ID cards to protect medical users from being prosecuted by local authorities.
Each cardholder is allowed to have up to a half pound of dried marijuana or six mature marijuana plants, although local governments can set laws exceeding the state's limits.
Meanwhile, federal authorities, who never recognized Proposition 215 and deny that marijuana has medicinal properties, have won a number of legal showdowns over the measure.
http://origin.mercurynews.com/breakingnews/ci_9472139
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