"Regulate Marijuana Like Wine" Wins 62% in CA Poll

A voter survey commissioned by California's Regulate Marijuana Like Wine (RMLW) initiative campaign suggests the initiative could win at the polls in November -- if it manages to make it onto the ballot.

RMLW is one of handful of proposed 2012 California marijuana legalization initiatives, all of them ill-funded. For any of them to make the ballot, they have to come up with more than 500,000 valid voter signatures by April, a task that is considered almost impossibly to accomplish by volunteer efforts alone.

RMLW commissioned the poll in a bid to show potential funders it could win in November, and with these poll results, the campaign can now make that argument. California initiative watchers estimate that it would take between $1 and $2 million in paid signature-gathering to make the ballot.

The statewide poll of 800 likely voters conducted by Fairbank, Maslin, Maullin, Metz & Associates found support for the initiative at 62%, with 35% opposed and 3% undecided. No cross-tabs have been made available.

The poll found even higher levels of support for more general critiques of current drug laws and the level of attention California law enforcement pays to marijuana. Four out of five respondents (80%) agreed with the statement, "State and federal drug laws are outdated and have failed, therefore, we need to take a new approach that makes sense for today," while 71% agreed that law enforcement spends too much, time, money, and resources enforcing marijuana laws.

If RMLW were to pass, the California Legislative Analyst's Office has projected "savings of potentially several tens of millions of dollars annually to state and local governments of the costs of incarcerating and supervising certain marijuana offenders," as well as potentially generating "hundreds of millions of dollars in net additional tax revenues related to the production and sale of marijuana products."

"There is no policy that is more discriminatory or wastes more tax dollars," said RMLW treasurer Steve Collett, who hailed the poll results. "This initiative helps farmers, reduces prison overcrowding, relieves burdens on the courts, generates revenues for the state, and frees up police to work on real crimes."

The results also encouraged Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP) co-founder Jack Cole. "LEAP believes the citizens of California are far ahead of the federal government in assessing a policy that will reduce death, disease, crime, and corruption, when they register 62% support for the initiative Regulate Marijuana Like Wine," he said.

Proponents of the competing marijuana legalization initiatives are working to set up a joint meeting, a so-called "Cannadome" in the Bay Area for mid-February. Whether these new poll results will make any difference in forging unity then remains to be seen.