The ACLU-WA presents a discussion on the history, current status, and future of marijuana-law reform in Washington and the United States. Local and national panelists include travel writer Rick Steves; Keith Stroup, founder of, and legal counsel to, the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws; Washington state Sen. Jeanne Kohl-Welles; Rob Kampia, co-founder and executive director of the Marijuana Policy Project; and Ethan Nadelmann, founder and executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance. Moderated by ACLU-WA Drug Policy Director Alison Holcomb.
Free and open to the public. This is not a ticketed event. Admission is on a first-come, first-served basis.
Panelist Bios
Rob Kampia is co-founder and executive director of the Marijuana Policy Project, the largest organization in the U.S. that's focused exclusively on ending marijuana prohibition; MPP and Kampia are based in Washington, D.C. Kampia has testified before Congress, the Washington state legislature, and nearly a dozen other state legislatures. Kampia has debated on national TV dozens of times, including on NBC's "Today Show," the Fox News Channel's "O'Reilly Factor," CNN's "Anderson Cooper 360," the Fox Business Network, CNBC, and MSNBC. MPP was partially or exclusively responsible for enacting the medical marijuana laws in the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Maine, Michigan, Montana, Rhode Island, and Vermont; the marijuana decriminalization law in Massachusetts; local marijuana initiatives that have passed in Seattle and dozens of other cities; and the U.S. Justice Department's policy to de-prioritize the enforcement of federal marijuana laws in (the now 14) states where medical marijuana is legal.
Jeanne Kohl-Welles has represented the 36th Legislative District in the Washington State Senate since 1994 after serving for three years in the House of Representatives where she was Majority Whip. In addition to her chairmanship of the Sen. Labor, Commerce & Consumer Protection Committee, Sen. Kohl-Welles sits on the Senate Ways & Means and Judiciary Committees. She has a Ph.D. in Sociology of Education from UCLA and was a Fannie Mae Foundation Fellow at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government’s Senior Executives in State and Local Government Program. Sen. Kohl-Welles was prime sponsor of SB 6032 (passed in 2007), which clarified Washington’s medical marijuana law and required the state Department of Health to study patient access issues, and SB 5798 (passed in 2010), which expanded the list of healthcare professionals who can authorize the medical use of cannabis to include physician assistants, osteopathic physicians’ assistants, advanced registered nurse practitioners, and naturopathic doctors.
Ethan Nadelmann is the founder and executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance, a leading organization in the United States promoting alternatives to the war on drugs grounded in science, compassion, health and human rights. Nadelmann was born in New York City and received his B.A., J.D., and Ph.D. from Harvard, and a master’s degree in international relations from the London School of Economics. He then taught politics and public affairs at Princeton University from 1987 to 1994, where his speaking and writings on drug policy—in publications ranging from Science and Foreign Affairs to American Heritage and National Review—attracted international attention. He authored Cops Across Borders, the first scholarly study of the internationalization of U.S. criminal law enforcement, and co-authored another book entitled Policing the Globe: Criminalization and Crime Control in International Relations, published by Oxford University Press in 2006.
Rick Steves grew up in Edmonds, Washington and studied at the University of Washington where he received degrees in Business Administration and European History. But his real education came in Europe — since 1973 he's spent 120 days a year in Europe. Spending one third of his adult life living out of a suitcase in Europe has shaped his thinking. Today he employs 80 people at his Europe Through the Back Door headquarters where he produces over 50 guidebooks on European travel, the most popular travel series in America on public television, a weekly hour-long national public radio show, and a weekly column syndicated by the Chicago Tribune. Rick Steves lives and works in his hometown of Edmonds, Washington. His office window overlooks his old junior high school.
Keith Stroup is a Washington, D.C. public-interest attorney who founded NORML in 1970. Stroup obtained his undergraduate degree in political science from the University of Illinois in 1965, and in 1968 he graduated from Georgetown Law School. Following two years as staff counsel for the National Commission on Product Safety, Stroup founded NORML and ran the organization through 1979, during which time 11 states decriminalized minor marijuana offenses. Stroup has also practiced criminal law, lobbied on Capitol Hill for family farmers and artists, and served as executive director of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL). In 1994 Stroup resumed his work with NORML, serving again as Executive Director through 2004. He currently serves as Legal Counsel with NORML. In 1992 Stroup was the recipient of the Richard J. Dennis Drugpeace Award for Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Drug Policy Reform presented by the Drug Policy Foundation, Washington, D.C.
The Hemp and Cannabis Foundation present Hempstalk 2010. Please join us in beautiful Kelley Point Park.
For more information, please see http://www.hempstalk.org/ or call 503-235-4606.
The 2010 NORML Conference will be held in beautiful Portland, Oregon...please join us!
Panel Topics:
Medical Cannabis-only day
For more information and to register, see: http://norml.org/index.cfm?Group_ID=8125.
For general questions, please contact 1-888-67-NORML or [email protected].
We are publishing a lot of stuff on our new web site -- read about it here -- but it was a really big week for drug policy reform in Washington, and we want to make sure that the very latest big news does not drive the really really big news too far down on the screen for people to notice. And so, a brief wrap-up of the biggest news of the week:
Join us! Admission to Seattle Hempfest is free!
The event spans three Seattle waterfront parks: Elliott Bay Park (North Entrance), Myrtle Edwards Park, and Olympic Sculpture Park (South Entrance).
To beat the crowds, use the north entrance by crossing the Amgen Pedestrian Bridge off of W Prospect Street. It has an elevator and is wheelchair accessible, placing the avid attendee just north of Seattle Hempfest's north entrance. There is very little parking at W Prospect Street. So your best bet is to walk, bike, or take a metro bus to that location. For example, take metro bus 18 to north entrance, and 15 to south entrance. Between downtown Seattle and Leary Way. There are many other Metro buses routes that can drop you at either entrance too. Downtown Seattle has several parking garages. Bicycles should enter through the North entrance in Elliot Bay Park to utilize the bike racks. Attaching bikes to the fence at Olympic Sculpture Park is not allowed.
Park Rules:
For more information, see http://hempfest.org/drupal/attendees
You may have seen it off-Broadway, or caught a glimpse on HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher, but here’s your chance to see the critically acclaimed Marijuana-logues, live at Washington D.C.’s Harmon Center for the Arts.
Written by Arj Barker, Doug Benson, and Tony Camin, The Marijuana-logues played at the legendary Actor’s Playhouse in West Village from March 18, 2004, to March 27, 2005. Told from all points of view, from hazy to high-brow, the show sets marijuana center-stage, delving into fact and fiction, myths and misnomers alike. Performers will riff on the rites and rituals of marijuana and regale the crowd with the highs and lows of the plant, demonstrating that the stories that surround marijuana are as varied as those who indulge.
General admission tickets are $20 each and can be obtained at the Harmon Center box office, by phone at (202) 547-1122, or online at marijuanalogues.com/tour/. And don’t forget to stop by the MPP table while you’re there.
Here’s a sampling of what’s to offer:
"The Marijuana-Logues light up NYC! Emitting an air that is slightly subversive and laughter-inducing ... fast moving ... this talented and complementary trio breathes new life into pot humor. Inventive writing, irresistibly funny ... tongue firmly planted in cheek." — Associated Press
"It's a rare example of hipster comedy that truly gets the last laugh." — New York Press
"Side-splittingly funny. Leave your stereotype of the half-baked stoner at home; these guys are very alert and have their material down like clockwork, providing hit after hit of funny send-ups, commentary and anecdotes." — TalkinBroadway.com
Thanks, hope to see you there!
