Oakland Becomes the First City to Assess a Tax on Marijuana
Oakland Campaign Poster
The Christian Science Monitor reported that Oakland, CA, this week became the first city in the US to assess a tax on marijuana.
Approved by a margin of 80 percent to 20 percent, Oakland voters said “yes” to Measure F: “Shall City of Oakland’s business tax, which currently imposes a tax rate of $1.20 per $1,000 on ‘cannabis business’ gross receipts, be amended to establish a new tax rate of $18 per $1,000 of gross receipts?”
Advocates of the tax celebrated the victory is a historically significant turning point, paving the way for taxation in other communities and states. Perhaps more important to them is that the passage of the measure will establish a wider social acceptance of marijuana use.
Opponents claim that an irreversible threshold has been crossed, opening the door to more crime and heavier drug use. Trygve Mikkelsen, a Norwegian immigrant living on the Berkeley-Oakland border and a father of three, is convinced that younger people will have more access to marijuana. “I prefer that it is difficult to get a hold of an illegal substance,” he says.
“The voters of Oakland have sent a message to the nation that cannabis is better treated as a legitimate, tax-paying business than as a cause of crime and futile law-enforcement expenditures,” said Dale Gieringer, California state coordinator for the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.
According to the Monitor, the city estimated that the measure will raise $294,000 in additional tax revenue in 2010. There is hope that the measure will provide funds to help offset the city’s current $83 million deficit
Pot users can go to a doctor, complain of symptoms, and for about $100, get a prescription for the drug.
“It’s so easy to get a card that it’s almost as if physicians will help lead you to your story of chronic pain, insomnia, fatigue, etc.,” says John Diaz, editorial page editor of the San Francisco Chronicle.
Federal law continues to prohibit the use and sale of marijuana.
US Attorney General Eric Holder has said that federal law enforcement will no longer conduct raids in the states that have legalized medical-marijuana use.
Nationwide, about 775,000 people were arrested for marijuana possession in 2007.
