SALON

Thursday, Feb 21, 2013 1:38 PM UTC

Colorado may allow tourists to get high

The state task force wants visitors to be able to use legal pot

By

Topics: AlterNet, marijuana, Pot, Pot Legalization, Colorado,

Colorado may allow tourists to get high (Credit: Reuters/Cliff Despeaux)
This article originally appeared on AlterNet.

The Colorado task force in charge of setting up regulations for the state’s legal marijuana has decided to let tourists in on the weed, the Associated Press reports. Lawmakers, law enforcement and marijuana policy activists on the task force assembled and agreed Tuesday that Amendment 64 legalizes marijuana for all adults at least 21 years old, and does not exclude out-of-state visitors.

AlterNet

Members of the task force were concerned whether allowing tourists to purchase marijuana would encourage or discourage illicit sale. “Imposing a residency requirement would almost certainly create a black market for recreational marijuana in the state,” task force member Rep. Dan Pabon, a Denver Democrat, said at the meeting.

Regulators agreed that marijuana tourists should be warned via billboards and airport signs not to take Colorado marijuana home, and that an undetermined limit of sale should be established for non-residents.

If lawmakers agree with the task force recommendation, tourists will be free to get stoned in Colorado. Still, whether they, or anyone else in the state can do so in public is up for a more heated debate.

According to the Associated Press:

Task force members were less successful agreeing to recommendations on marijuana growing and public use. Colorado’s marijuana law allows home growing but requires plants to be in a locked, secure location out of public view. The task force couldn’t agree whether a “locked” and “secure” location would mean a backyard surrounded by a fence, or whether an enclosure such as a shed or greenhouse should be mandatory.

Greenwood Village Police Chief John Jackson, whom the AP called “one of the task force’s most vocal marijuana critics,” expressed concern that a chain-link fence would not be sufficient in keeping kids out of a backyard pot garden. Prominent marijuana policy activist Meg Sanders disagreed, and said requiring coverings like greenhouses would be unfair.”I think it goes too far in restricting what people can do on their own private property,” Sanders said at the meeting.

According to the AP, Jackson and like-minded members of the task force also want to ban marijuana use on publicly visible patios, porches and backyards.

“So I can drink a beer on my porch? But I can’t smoke a joint?” marijuana advocate Christian Sederberg chided at the meeting.

State Sen. Cheri Jahn (D-Wheat Ridge) also warned against regulating the use of a legal substance on private property, asking, “What about backyard grills that send the smell of hamburgers into the nose of a neighbor who’s vegetarian?”

“I don’t know how far we want to go telling people what they can’t do on their own porches,” she said at the meeting.

The task force created by Colorado governor John Hickenlooper has a February 28 deadline for marijuana regulation recommendations, which the state legislature and Department of Revenue (which oversees gambling and alcohol) will ultimately decide.

In the meantime, residents and visitors can learn more about their rights to legal weed in Washington and Colorado here.

More Kristen Gwynne.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • This photo. President Barack Obama has a laugh during the unveiling of the George W. Bush Presidential Center in Dallas, Tx., Thursday. Former first lady Barbara Bush, who candidly admitted this week we've had enough Bushes in the White House, is unamused.
    Reuters/Jason Reed

  • Rescue workers converge Wednesday in Savar, Bangladesh, where the collapse of a garment building killed more than 300. Factory owners had ignored police orders to vacate the work site the day before.
    AP/A.M. Ahad

  • Police gather Wednesday at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to honor campus officer Sean Collier, who was allegedly killed in a shootout with the Boston Marathon bombing suspects last week.
    AP/Elise Amendola

  • Police tape closes the site of a car bomb that targeted the French embassy in Libya Tuesday. The explosion wounded two French guards and caused extensive damage to Tripoli's upscale al-Andalus neighborhood.
    AP/Abdul Majeed Forjani

  • Protestors rage outside the residence of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Sunday following the rape of a 5-year-old girl in New Delhi. The girl was allegedly kidnapped and tortured before being abandoned in a locked room for two days.
    AP/Manish Swarup

  • Clarksville, Mo., residents sit in a life boat Monday after a Mississippi River flooding, the 13th worst on record.
    AP/Jeff Roberson

  • Workers pause Wednesday for a memorial service at the site of the West, Tx., fertilizer plant explosion, which killed 14 people and left a crater more than 90 feet wide.
    AP/The San Antonio Express-News, Tom Reel

  • Aerial footage of the devastation following a 7.0 magnitude earthquake in China's Sichuan province last Saturday. At least 180 people were killed and as many as 11,000 injured in the quake.
    AP/Liu Yinghua

  • On Wednesday, Hazmat-suited federal authorities search a martial arts studio in Tupelo, Miss., once operated by Everett Dutschke, the newest lead in the increasingly twisty ricin case. Last week, President Barack Obama, Sen. Roger Wicker, R.-Miss., and a Mississippi judge were each sent letters laced with the deadly poison.
    AP/Rogelio V. Solis

  • The lighting of Freedom Hall at the George W. Bush Presidential Center Thursday is celebrated with (what else but) red, white and blue fireworks.
    AP/David J. Phillip

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 2 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

Salon is proud to feature content from AlterNet, an award-winning news magazine and online community that creates original journalism and amplifies the best of hundreds of other independent media sources.

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
“This could be a career ender for Michele Bachmann”
193 points194 points | 88 comments
vote
"Contrary to the myth of the happy, apple-cheeked great-great-grandmother, cooking has rarely been seen as a source of fulfillment, historically speaking." DIY domesticity, femivores, and refutations on the impacts of feminism on fast-food culture.
48 points49 points | 38 comments
vote
Are millennials delusional? New research suggests that members of "Generation Me" are warped by a profound sense of entitlement
33 points34 points | 36 comments
vote
6 insidious ways you’re getting ripped off … And how to fight back
27 points28 points | 4 comments
vote
Today's Teens more Materialistic, Less Likely to Work Hard, according to study in "Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin"
26 points27 points | 7 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: "The Shelter Cycle": Raised in a cult

Recommendations