Marijuana decriminalization stalled by Texas cities despite voter approval

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The struggle in a number of Texas cities to decriminalize marijuana has entered a brand new part, as some metropolis leaders have rebuffed voter-approved guidelines that largely finish prison enforcement in opposition to having small quantities of the substance.

Last month, residents in Denton, San Marcos, Killeen, Elgin and Harker Heights overwhelmingly approved poll measures that sought to ban arrests and citations for carrying lower than 4 ounces of marijuana in most situations. They additionally accepted new guidelines blocking cities from funding THC focus assessments, plus eradicating marijuana odor as a possible trigger for search and seizure usually.

Winning over voters was simply half the battle.

Since then, organizers behind the poll questions in some cities have clashed with their metropolis and county leaders who’re tasked with placing the brand new legal guidelines in place, in addition to legislation enforcement. Those officers have stated the trouble violates state legislation and hinders cops.

The battle has been the hardest in Harker Heights, a city of 33,000 about 55 miles southwest of Waco. Despite the proposition profitable greater than 60% of the votes, the City Council decided to repeal the ordinance simply two weeks later. City Manager David Mitchell stated in a subsequent letter that the choice to decriminalize ought to be left to the state.

For Harker Heights residents who supported decriminalizing marijuana, the repeal is a stinging present of disrespect for his or her train of democracy.

“I don’t do any kind of drugs nor does my wife, but we’re here for the vote,” stated Brian Burt, who casted his poll for the proposition.

“A vote is a vote,” Alexandra Burt chimed in. “We are also aware that minorities disproportionately take the brunt of the law, so it is time for that proposition to go through.”

To power the City Council’s hand, the Burts and lots of of different residents backed a brand new petition by Ground Game Texas, a progressive group that co-led the decriminalization marketing campaign, to place the council’s resolution to repeal on the May poll and revive the ordinance within the meantime.

Julie Oliver, the group’s govt director, stated the council’s resolution to revoke a preferred alternative by voters has backfired.

“Shutting down someone’s vote is ill-advised, so this has really brought the community together,” she stated.

Organizers throughout the state going through comparable pushback additionally say they would like the Texas Legislature to go legal guidelines that might decriminalize and even legalize marijuana — although they acknowledge how unlikely that’s given the state’s conservative energy construction.

“We can all see the way that this country is heading, state by state, but it looks like Texas is going to be one of the last,” stated Deb Armintor, a Decriminalize Denton organizer and a former City Council member who championed decriminalization throughout her two phrases. “There’s no point in cities waiting.”

A town-by-town struggle

The crux of the struggle might be traced again to the state’s legalization of hemp in 2019. While hemp is authorized and marijuana shouldn’t be, they’re just about indistinguishable by sight or odor. The solely option to decide if a substance has kind of than 0.3% of THC focus — the authorized threshold that separates the 2 — is to run lab assessments. Without the resources to satisfy this requirement, many prosecutors throughout the state have dropped and delayed low-level marijuana possession circumstances, and a few police departments like Austin’s have adopted swimsuit by creating a policy to not cite or arrest folks usually.

This gave organizers a gap. In May 2022, Ground Game Texas gained its first case as Austinites voted by 85% to codify their police division’s coverage and formally decriminalize.

“That’s the core of our reform movement,” stated Mike Siegel, the group’s political director.

Several cities and cities have since adopted. Elgin, a metropolis of about 10,500 those who sits simply east of Austin, voted to decriminalize by nearly 75%. Its council has made the least quantity of noise in placing the ordinance in place.

Other metropolis and county officers, nonetheless, have raised issues about a statute from the Texas Local Government Code that claims municipal our bodies like metropolis councils and police departments “may not adopt a policy under which the entity will not fully enforce laws relating to drugs.”

Last month, Republican Bell County District Attorney Henry Garza cited it when asking the police chief of Killeen, the place near 70% of voters favored decriminalization, to reverse his order telling officers to comply with the vote. Following a pause, Killeen City Council approved the ordinance on Dec. 6 after eradicating the part banning officers from utilizing marijuana odor as possible trigger for search and seizure.

“The amendment was not preferable but now our residents do not have to fear an arrest that will affect their employment opportunities, education opportunities and housing opportunities,” stated Louie Minor, a Bell County commissioner-elect who labored on each the Killeen and Harker Heights campaigns.

More not too long ago, Republican Hays County Criminal District Attorney Wes Mau requested an attorney general opinion concerning the ordinance’s enforceability over comparable questions. Mano Amiga — the group co-leading the trouble in San Marcos — instantly pushed again, as voters had handed the proposition by nearly 82% and the City Council already accepted it in November.

Mau stated he has “no plans to file a lawsuit” in his final month of workplace. His Democrat successor Kelly Higgins helps decriminalization.

“The Attorney General cannot overturn the referendum, nor am I asking him to,” Mau stated in a press release to The Texas Tribune. “But an opinion as to whether the ordinance is enforceable may be helpful to the City moving forward.”

In the North Texas suburb of Denton, the place voters accepted decriminalization by greater than 70%, the City Council has additionally accepted it. But organizers fear about its enforcement as a result of City Manager Sara Hensley has opposed implementing parts of it as a consequence of comparable points. Organizers responded in November with a memo arguing that Hensley doesn’t have policymaking authority and that the town has discretion to enact insurance policies conserving scarce sources.

City Council member Brian Beck then pitched adopting an similar proposition via the council to resolve any confusion on the ordinance’s funds energy. He didn’t win over sufficient of his colleagues.

Decriminalize Denton is now contemplating subsequent steps, together with recalling those that voted in opposition to Beck’s proposition.

Council members who didn’t approve the pitch — together with Mayor Gerard Hudspeth and council members Jesse Davis and Chris Watts — reiterated that the identical ordinance is already on the books and pointed to the bounds imposed by state legislation.

“The will of the voters must be respected absolutely. But the voters of Denton don’t have the ability to change or circumvent State law,” Davis stated in a press release.

Organizers and metropolis officers who help decriminalization, similar to Denton City Council member Brandon Chase McGee, pointed to locations like Austin as a information.

“Similar ordinances have been passed in other municipalities all over this state, and to my knowledge, those ordinances have not faced any legal challenges,” McGee stated in a press release.

But some metropolis leaders like Davis fear about potential retribution from state lawmakers who don’t agree with decriminalization. Legislators have pushed again on different insurance policies they don’t like — for instance, approving a invoice in 2021 that penalizes cities for cutting police budgets, based on Katharine Neill Harris, a drug coverage fellow at Rice University’s Baker Institute.

But Neill Harris additionally famous that the Austin Police Department has basically decriminalized since 2020 after which absolutely adopted the ordinance that codified its coverage over the previous seven months with out points. APD communications supervisor Brandon Jones informed the Tribune that “conversations with both the District Attorney’s Office and County Attorney’s Office were crucial in ensuring we were all on the same page.”

The huge image

Organizers stated these totally different responses from officers highlight the necessity for legislators to go statewide marijuana updates.

“It needs to be a legislative change at the state level. It needs to be broadened out,” stated Shirley Fleming, a former Killeen City Council member who helps lead the initiatives in Bell County.

And most Texans want legal marijuana, which matches additional than decriminalization. Texas lags behind huge states similar to California and Illinois and conservative states similar to Alaska and Montana, as earlier efforts to vary state legal guidelines have faced opposition from high Republicans.

And as a result of the Legislature controls what will get on the statewide poll, Texans haven’t been capable of straight vote on it as voters have in Maryland and Missouri.

Currently, 21 states and Washington, D.C., have legalized leisure marijuana.

Texas nonetheless considers marijuana unlawful despite accepting hemp and derivatives like CBD. Texas additionally permits for medical hashish, however its program applies to a really restricted subset of medical problems and permits just for 1% of delta-9 THC — the identical restrict state police use to check if a hashish product is illegitimate for any consumer. So far, this system has enrolled only a tiny fraction of the eligible inhabitants.

“We continue to have one of the most restrictive medical programs across the United States,” stated Neill Harris, the drug coverage professional.

She added that claims about marijuana reforms resulting in extra crimes are not supported by evidence. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention additionally says “there is limited evidence suggesting that using marijuana increases the risk of using other drugs.”

Amid this legislative lag, decriminalization organizers stated Black Texans and different communities of colour are facing disproportionate levels of marijuana enforcement and the ensuing impression on their information. And that is nonetheless occurring following hemp legalization, which contributed to the state’s number of marijuana possession arrests plummeting from the latest peak of just about 74,000 arrests in 2010 to beneath 23,000 arrests in 2021.

This concern is mirrored in information requests obtained by native organizers in 2021 and reviewed by the Tribune. About 35% of arrests made by Denton police in 2019 and 2020 concerned Black people, information confirmed, though the town’s Black inhabitants is just over 11%. And round 75% of arrests made by Killeen police between 2019 and early May 2021 concerned Black people, information indicated, however solely 39% of the city’s residents are Black.

“Police need to concentrate on more important things rather than trying to stop Black and brown people with low-level marijuana,” Fleming stated.

Some state legislators agree with the message despatched by these cities’ vote to decriminalize.

“That’s what happens when we drag our feet at the state on policies that the majority of the state agrees with,” stated state Rep. Joe Moody, D-El Paso.

Moody himself has lengthy advocated for marijuana reform. For the upcoming legislative session, for which there are already several bills in search of to ease marijuana legal guidelines, Moody pitched House Bill 218 to scale back the penalty for possessing 1 ounce of marijuana and permit for information expungement in sure circumstances. His comparable invoice from 2019 acquired bipartisan support within the House, but it surely died within the Senate beneath Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who has lengthy opposed easing marijuana legal guidelines. Still, Moody is feeling optimistic.

And given the present Republican management, average payments like his are probably the most promising, based on consultants.

In the meantime, organizers say they are going to proceed to interrupt new floor throughout the state.

Since October, there was a marketing campaign underway in San Antonio to place a question — which proposes decriminalizing marijuana and abortion, in addition to banning no-knock warrants and chokeholds by police — in entrance of voters in May. Ground Game Texas and native organizers are in search of 35,000 signatures by early January to satisfy the required 20,000 verified signatures.

The marketing campaign has up to now reached over 75% of its aim.

“Folks are excited and engaged to vote for something that’s more than a politician,” stated Ananda Tomas, govt director of Act 4 SA, which focuses on police reform.

The resistance from native officers has already began. The San Antonio Police Officers’ Association took out a full-page newspaper advert final month to criticize the trouble. Its president, Danny Diaz, stated in a press release that the affiliation needed to sign to voters that “some things are too good to be true,” noting that the proposed whole ban on chokeholds would hinder officers.

The metropolis has already prohibited chokeholds besides in life-or-death conditions, although it isn’t but codified and might be modified beneath totally different management.

And despite these pushbacks, native organizers and Ground Game Texas are holding agency on their organizing efforts to decriminalize through citywide ballots — and have interaction voters by extension.

“It’s so incredibly popular and it’s going to get people out to vote,” Oliver stated. “That’s what we need in our state.”

Disclosure: Rice University has been a monetary supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news group that’s funded partially by donations from members, foundations and company sponsors. Financial supporters play no position within the Tribune’s journalism. Find a whole list of them here.