Global Ganja Report

Many rural California communities have high expectations over the prospect of commercial cannabis cultivation, officially licensed by local authorities under provisions of the Medical Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act (MMRCA), which was passed by Sacramento last year. Humbold County issued its first commercial cultivation licenses this summer. Now a less likely entry, Kern County in the conservative southern end of the Central Valley, has seen its first licenses. These were issued by the municipality of California City, where officials expressed some surprise at their own actions. "It's a new industry for us. It kind of came and dropped in our laps," city manager Tom Weil told Bakersfield's KBAK. "It's not something we were looking for."

Oakland's KTVU  on Oct. 5 noted a miltestone for the East Bay city: exactly 10 years of operation for Harborside Health Center, the foremost "pioneering enterprise" in California's cannabis industry. "The world's attitude towards cannabis has shifted massively in the course of the 10 years that Harborside has been open," box-store dispensary founder Steve DeAngelo told the station, noting legalization of recreational use in four states and the District of Columbia. "So we have seen really a massive, tectonic shift in attitudes towards cannabis." KTVU hails Harborside as "a solid, respected business with 200 employees and contractors, serving 200,000 patients."

Amid a shameful paucity of media coverage, inmates at facilities in several states have organized work stoppages following a call for a nationwide prison strike to begin on Sept. 9—the anniversary of the 1971 Attica prison uprising. Organizers say inmates in at least 29 prisons in 12 states have launched strikes, with an unprecedented more than 24,000 prisoners participating. "This is a call to end slavery," reads the official call for the strike, issued by the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee. "They cannot run these facilities without us." While there have been prison strikes before—two earlier this year, in Texas and Alabama—this marks the first one to be nationally coordinated. Prisoners are using social media and smuggled cell phones to organize the national strike.

With California preparing to vote on a marijuana legalization initiative in November,  the city of Oakland is seeking not only tax revenues but a direct cut of profits from local cannabis business. A measure introduced in the City Council would require any new Oakland cannabis company to make the city government a 25% partner. Companies that don't cut Oakland in would not get a permit and therefore not be allowed to operate under local law—or state law, which mandates compliance with municipal ordinances.

Researchers at Stanford University have developed a "potalyzer"—a device that can detect human THC levels, so cops can determine if a motorist is too impaired to drive. The hand-held device uses sophisticated bio-sensors to detect THC molecules in saliva. Police officers will supposedly be able collect a spit sample with a cotton swab and read the results on a smartphone or laptop in just three minutes.

A police raid of a Southern California medical marijuana dispensary was caught on hidden cameras—leading to accusations that officers exceeded their legal authority during the operation. "These guys were doing this to shut down a business without due process because they don't like it," Matthew Pappas, attorney for the now-closed Costa Mesa Collective told the Orange County Register in an Aug. 4 report. "They became judge, jury and executioner."

Northern California's traditional cannabis heartland of Humboldt County this summer gave an official go-ahead for two commercial medical marijuana farms, the Eureka Times-Standard reports. The two operations are Honeydew Farms, a seven-acre outdoor grow in the town of Honeydew, and a quarter-acre "mixed-light" farm run by Blessed Coast LLC in Carlotta. These are the first such enterprises in the county, "marking the beginning of a new era for the industry."

The Adult Use of Marijuana Act (AUMA) officially made the California ballot on June 28, as the Secretary of State's office confirmed that enough signatures had been gathered—a total of 600,000. "Today marks a fresh start for California as we prepare to replace the costly, harmful and ineffective system of prohibition with a safe, legal and responsible adult-use marijuana system that gets it right and completely pays for itself," Jason Kinney, a campaigner for the measure, told KTLA.  The initiative would allow adults ages 21 and up to possess, transport and consume up to an ounce of cannabis, and permit individuals to grow up to six plants. (Drug War Chronicle, June 29)