Sensible Santa Barbara has submitted 11,556 signatures in support of its initiative, and has qualified to be placed on the November 2006 ballot!
1) It makes marijuana offenses, where cannabis is intended for adult personal use, the lowest police priority, and
2) Frees up police resources to focus on violent and serious crime, instead of arresting and jailing nonviolent cannabis users.
The campaign phone number is
Ethan Kravitz, Heather Poet and Lauren Vasquez
chaired the Feb. 26 meeting and answered questions.
Organizers of the petition drive and their supporters met Feb. 26 in the Santa Barbara Public Library to discuss the proposition. Over 50 people turned out, and many indicated that they would volunteer to collect signatures, and some expressed their enthusiasm to collect 100 signatures each.
Ethan Kravitz, chair of Sensible Santa Barbara (SSB)and UCSB NORML co-chair, began the meeting by providing background on the initiative effort. Heather Poet, SSB treasurer and proponent, and Lauren Vasquez, SSB secretary, explained that the proposition calls for Santa Barbara city law enforcement to officially treat marijuana possession and use by adults as a less serious offense than all other crimes. They answered questions about the initiative from the audience along with Mikki Norris, campaign consultant for this effort and three other similar city initiatives to be run in Santa Cruz, West Hollywood, and Santa Monica. Chris Conrad, volunteer petition coordinator for California's Prop. 215, author, and court-qualified marijuana expert, gave a training session on how to collect good signatures.
Santa Barbara businessman Steve Levine and
campaign advisor
Mikki Norris with Heather, Ethan and Lauren.
Sensible Santa Barbara is a citizen advocacy committee that was formed by a group of local community activists. It has a voter initiative approach like that used to pass similar ordinances in Seattle, Oakland, Columbia, Boston and Denver. The campaign is partly sponsored by the Marijuana Policy Project. We need your support to help qualify the initiative for the ballot and to pass it during the November 2006 election. Please give us your support and endorsement.