The campaign to get a marijuana legalization amendment on the statewide ballot is moving forward, now that the Attorney General has approved the amendment’s language.
Statehouse correspondent Karen Kasler reports.
ResponsibleOhio’s amendment proposes 10 official growing sites for marijuana, and would allow Ohioans to apply for licenses to grow small amounts of pot in their homes. The approval of the language by Attorney General Mike DeWine doesn’t mean he supports it – in fact, he and every other statewide executive officeholder has come out against it. ResponsibleOhio says it’s pleased it can now move on to getting the ballot board to approve the language, so it can gather signatures to put it before voters this fall. The group says marijuana prohibition has failed and that legalization could bring in more than a half a billion dollars in new tax revenue. But the opposition to the amendment is sounding off, and getting tough in its language. Jon Allison with the Drug Free Action Alliance says the “pot cartel investors”, as he calls them, are centered on greed, and he notes that casinos produced less than half of the tax money they promised last year.