The city council of Long Beach, California, voted last night to pursue taxes on medical marijuana dispensaries, part of what may become a wave of communities turning to such proceeds to plug budget deficits.
The Los Angeles suburb with a population of almost 500,000 scheduled a public hearing on the drug levy for Aug. 3. If the council later approves the wording, a ballot initiative establishing a 5 percent tax on the city's 35 dispensaries could go to voters in November, according to Lori Ann Farrell, Long Beach's director of financial management.
Long Beach joins California cities including the state capital, Sacramento, weighing marijuana taxes to bridge falling revenue from the worst recession since the 1930s. The nation's largest state by population saw an explosion in the number of marijuana dispensaries after voters approved a 1996 referendum legalizing pot for medicinal use.
"We're looking under every rock to find revenue sources and under one of those rocks could be a marijuana tax," Long Beach council member Patrick O'Donnell said in an interview. His city faces an $18.5 million deficit for 2011, according to a letter to the council yesterday from Long Beach's financial management department.
Long Beach's plan also proposes a 10 percent tax on non- medicinal marijuana sales to take effect only if the state's residents vote for Proposition 19, according to Farrell.
Proposition 19
The proposition, a referendum on the November ballot, would make it legal for anyone age 21 or older to possess 1 ounce or less of marijuana, and allow local governments to regulate and tax sales.
"We're not trying to create a free-for-all, we're trying to end it," said Jeffrey Jones, a longtime advocate of marijuana legalization and sponsor of the referendum, in a telephone interview.
Californians are about equally divided on the ballot initiative, according to a survey released June 29 by Ipsos SA, the Paris-based polling company. Support for legalization is highest among Democrats, at 62 percent, compared with Republicans, at 32 percent, the company said.
In San Jose, the 10th-largest U.S. city by population, the city council will consider putting a marijuana tax to a public referendum at its Aug. 3 meeting, according Michelle McGurk, a spokeswoman for Mayor Chuck Reed. Sacramento's council will take up a similar measure on July 13, according to Michelle Heppner, who handles legislative issues for the city.
Berkeley Council
The city council of Berkeley, a community of 100,000 people in the San Francisco Bay Area, will vote July 13 whether to put a marijuana-tax initiative on the ballot in November, Mayor Tom Bates said at a meeting last night.
Berkeley's measure would establish a 1.8 percent tax on its three dispensaries, according to Wendy Cosin, the community's deputy planning director. The city balanced its current fiscal- year budget in part with $300,000 in anticipated revenue from the tax, Cosin said in a telephone interview.
In Long Beach, the city has already closed libraries several days a week, eliminated after-school programs and for the first time in its history cut police and fire positions, Farrell said. Unlike sales and property taxes, which are shared with the county and state, business taxes are kept by the city, she said.
The medical-marijuana tax is modeled after one by the City of Oakland, which expects to collect $1 million a year in revenue from its four authorized dispensaries, Farrell said.
"Oakland taught us to get on our game," council member O'Donnell said. "If you can tax my Irish whiskey, why not your Humboldt Bud?"
NewsHawk: Ganjarden: 420 MAGAZINE
Source: The San Francisco Chronicle
Author: Pete Young, Ted Bunker
Contact: The San Francisco Chronicle
Copyright: 2010 Hearst Communications Inc.
Website: California's Long Beach Votes to Tax Pot to Plug Gap
* Thanks to MedicalNeed for submitting this article
The Los Angeles suburb with a population of almost 500,000 scheduled a public hearing on the drug levy for Aug. 3. If the council later approves the wording, a ballot initiative establishing a 5 percent tax on the city's 35 dispensaries could go to voters in November, according to Lori Ann Farrell, Long Beach's director of financial management.
Long Beach joins California cities including the state capital, Sacramento, weighing marijuana taxes to bridge falling revenue from the worst recession since the 1930s. The nation's largest state by population saw an explosion in the number of marijuana dispensaries after voters approved a 1996 referendum legalizing pot for medicinal use.
"We're looking under every rock to find revenue sources and under one of those rocks could be a marijuana tax," Long Beach council member Patrick O'Donnell said in an interview. His city faces an $18.5 million deficit for 2011, according to a letter to the council yesterday from Long Beach's financial management department.
Long Beach's plan also proposes a 10 percent tax on non- medicinal marijuana sales to take effect only if the state's residents vote for Proposition 19, according to Farrell.
Proposition 19
The proposition, a referendum on the November ballot, would make it legal for anyone age 21 or older to possess 1 ounce or less of marijuana, and allow local governments to regulate and tax sales.
"We're not trying to create a free-for-all, we're trying to end it," said Jeffrey Jones, a longtime advocate of marijuana legalization and sponsor of the referendum, in a telephone interview.
Californians are about equally divided on the ballot initiative, according to a survey released June 29 by Ipsos SA, the Paris-based polling company. Support for legalization is highest among Democrats, at 62 percent, compared with Republicans, at 32 percent, the company said.
In San Jose, the 10th-largest U.S. city by population, the city council will consider putting a marijuana tax to a public referendum at its Aug. 3 meeting, according Michelle McGurk, a spokeswoman for Mayor Chuck Reed. Sacramento's council will take up a similar measure on July 13, according to Michelle Heppner, who handles legislative issues for the city.
Berkeley Council
The city council of Berkeley, a community of 100,000 people in the San Francisco Bay Area, will vote July 13 whether to put a marijuana-tax initiative on the ballot in November, Mayor Tom Bates said at a meeting last night.
Berkeley's measure would establish a 1.8 percent tax on its three dispensaries, according to Wendy Cosin, the community's deputy planning director. The city balanced its current fiscal- year budget in part with $300,000 in anticipated revenue from the tax, Cosin said in a telephone interview.
In Long Beach, the city has already closed libraries several days a week, eliminated after-school programs and for the first time in its history cut police and fire positions, Farrell said. Unlike sales and property taxes, which are shared with the county and state, business taxes are kept by the city, she said.
The medical-marijuana tax is modeled after one by the City of Oakland, which expects to collect $1 million a year in revenue from its four authorized dispensaries, Farrell said.
"Oakland taught us to get on our game," council member O'Donnell said. "If you can tax my Irish whiskey, why not your Humboldt Bud?"
NewsHawk: Ganjarden: 420 MAGAZINE
Source: The San Francisco Chronicle
Author: Pete Young, Ted Bunker
Contact: The San Francisco Chronicle
Copyright: 2010 Hearst Communications Inc.
Website: California's Long Beach Votes to Tax Pot to Plug Gap
* Thanks to MedicalNeed for submitting this article
