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Arizona Proposition 207, Marijuana Legalization Initiative (2020)

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Arizona Marijuana Legalization Initiative
Flag of Arizona.png
Election date
November 3, 2020
Topic
Marijuana
Status
Proposed
Type
State statute		Origin
Citizens

The Arizona Marijuana Legalization Initiative may appear on the ballot in Arizona as an initiated state statute on November 3, 2020.

The ballot initiative would legalize the possession and use of recreational marijuana for adults (age 21 years or older). The ballot initiative would allow people to grow no more than six marijuana plants for personal use in their residence, as long as the plants are within an enclosed area with a lock and beyond public view.[1]

The ballot initiative would make the Arizona Department of Health and Human Services responsible for adopting rules to regulate marijuana, including the licensing of marijuana retail stores, cultivation facilities, and production facilities. The ballot initiative would require the department to first accept license applications (between January 19, 2021, and March 9, 2021) from nonprofit medical marijuana dispensaries and entities operating within counties with fewer than two nonprofit dispensaries.[1]

The ballot initiative would place a 16 percent tax on marijuana sales. The revenue from the tax would be used to implement and enforce marijuana regulations. The remaining revenue would be allocated as follows:[1]

  • 33.0 percent for community college districts;
  • 31.4 percent for municipal police and fire departments and fire districts;
  • 25.4 percent for the state's highway user revenue fund;
  • 10.0 percent for the justice reinvestment fund; and
  • 0.2 percent for the Arizona Attorney General to enforce.

The ballot initiative would also provide local governments with the power to ban marijuana facilities and testing centers and give local control over elements of regulation, zoning, and licensing.

The ballot initiative would also allow anyone convicted of certain marijuana-related crimes to petition for the expungement of the criminal record starting on July 12, 2021.[1]

Text of measure

Full text

The full text of the ballot initiative is below:[1]

The URL or file path File: Arizona I-23-2020.pdf does not exist.

Sponsors

Smart and Safe Arizona led the campaign in support of the ballot initiative.[2] Former Arizona Rep. Chad Campbell (D-24) was chairperson of the campaign committee.[3]

Campaign finance

See also: Campaign finance requirements for Arizona ballot measures
The campaign finance information on this page reflects the most recent scheduled reports that Ballotpedia has processed, which covered through March 31, 2020. The deadline for the next scheduled reports was July 15, 2020.


Total campaign contributions:
Support: $2,769,254.68
Opposition: $0.00

The Smart and Safe Arizona PAC was registered in support of the ballot initiative. The PAC received $2.77 million in contributions, including $1.03 million from Harvest Enterprises, Inc. The PAC expended $2.67 million.[3]

Support

The contribution and expenditure totals for the committee in support of the ballot initiative were as follows:[3]

Committees in support of the Marijuana Legalization Initiative
Supporting committeesCash contributionsIn-kind servicesCash expenditures
Smart and Safe Arizona$2,529,254.68$240,000.00$2,448,754.74
Total$2,529,254.68$240,000.00$2,448,754.74
Totals in support
Total raised:$2,769,254.68
Total spent:$2,688,754.74

Donors

The following were the top five donors who contributed to Smart and Safe Arizona:[4]

Donor Cash In-kind Total
Harvest Enterprises, Inc. $850,000.00 $180,000.00 $1,030,000.00
CuraLeaf $600,000.00 $0.00 $600,000.00
Cresco Labs, LLC $300,000.00 $0.00 $300,000.00
MM Enterprises USA, LLC $200,000.00 $0.00 $200,000.00
Arizona Dispensaries Association, Inc. $0.00 $60,000.00 $60,000.00

Background

Arizona Proposition 205 (2016)

See also: Arizona Marijuana Legalization, Proposition 205 (2016)

In 2016, a citizen-initiated measure, titled Proposition 205, appeared on the ballot. Proposition 205 would have legalized marijuana under state law. Voters rejected the ballot initiative, with 51.3 percent opposed. Arizona was one of five states to vote on a citizen-initiated legalization measure in 2016. Voters in neighboring California and Nevada, along with Maine and Massachusetts, approved their respective ballot measures.

The campaigns surrounding Proposition 205 received a similar amount of contributions. The largest donor behind the support campaign was the Marijuana Policy Project, contributing 22.5 percent of the campaign's total funds. The largest donor behind the opposition campaign was Discount Tire, which provided 15.7 percent of the campaign's total. Kevin Sabet, the co-founder of SAM Action, said the measure's defeat provided opponents of marijuana legalization with a model. He stated, "The overarching lesson was that if we could raise enough money early, we can win. Arizona was the only state where we were toe to toe with the 'yes' side, and it's the only state we started early in."[5]

Legalization in the U.S.

See also: History of marijuana ballot measures and laws and History of marijuana ballot measures and laws

California Proposition 19, which would have legalized marijuana, appeared on the ballot in 2010. It was defeated, with 53.5 percent of voters casting "no" votes.[6] U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder commented on Proposition 19, saying President Barack Obama's (D) administration would "vigorously enforce the (Controlled Substances Act) against those individuals and organizations that possess, manufacture or distribute marijuana for recreational use, even if such activities are permitted under state law."[7]

In 2012, legalized recreational marijuana advocates saw their first statewide victories in Colorado and Washington. Two years later, voters in Oregon, Alaska, and Washington, D.C. approved marijuana legalization. Regarding how the federal government would respond, President Obama stated, "We've got bigger fish to fry. It would not make sense for us to see a top priority as going after recreational users in states that have determined that it's legal."[8]

In 2015, voters in Ohio defeated Issue 3, which was designed to legalize the sale and use of marijuana and authorize 10 facilities with exclusive commercial rights to grow marijuana.[9]

Arizona, California, Maine, Massachusetts, and Nevada all had marijuana legalization initiatives on their 2016 general election ballots. The initiatives passed in all of the states but Arizona, where voters rejected the measure 51.3 to 48.7 percent.[10]

Michigan became the first state in the Midwest to legalize marijuana after voters approved Proposal 1 in 2018.[11] North Dakota Measure 3, which was also on the ballot in 2018, would have legalized marijuana but was defeated.[12]

As of 2019, two states—Illinois and Vermont—had legalized the recreational use of marijuana through the legislative process and governor's signature.[13][14]

The following map depicts the legal status of recreational marijuana in different states:

State political context of legalization ballot measures

The following table provides information on the political context of the states that had voted on legalization measures as of 2022.

Click "Show" to expand the table.

Comparison of legalization ballot measures

The following table compares a selection of provisions, including possession limits, local control, taxes, and revenue dedications, of ballot initiatives that were designed to legalize marijuana.

Click "Show" to expand the table.

Path to the ballot

See also: Laws governing the initiative process in Arizona

In Arizona, the number of signatures required to qualify an initiated state statute is equal to 10 percent of the votes cast for the office of governor in the most recent gubernatorial election. Petitions can be circulated for up to 24 months. Signature petitions must be submitted four months prior to the election at which the measure is to appear.

The requirements to get initiated state statutes certified for the 2020 ballot:

If the secretary of state certifies that enough valid signatures were submitted, the initiative is put on the next general election ballot. The secretary of state verifies the signatures through a random sampling of 5 percent of submitted signatures working in collaboration with county recorders. If the random sampling indicates that valid signatures equal to between 95 percent and 105 percent of the required number were submitted, a full check of all signatures is required. If the random sampling shows fewer signatures, the petition fails. If the random sampling shows more, the initiative is certified for the ballot.

Stages of this initiative

On September 3, 2019, committee Smart and Safe Arizona filed the ballot initiative.[1][15] On March 26, 2020, Stacy Pearson, campaign manager of Smart and Safe Arizona, said the ballot initiative had received more than 320,000 signatures.[16]

Petitioning of Arizona Supreme Court

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On April 2, 2020, four ballot initiative campaigns filed a petition asking the Arizona Supreme Court to allow the campaigns to gather signatures through E-Qual, which is the state's online signature collection platform, during the coronavirus pandemic. E-Qual is available for federal, statewide, and legislative candidates but not ballot initiatives.[17]

The legal petition stated, "The Novel Coronavirus 2019 (“COVID-19”) pandemic changed, quite literally, everything. ... Although this new reality is essential for public health, it is catastrophic to the Initiative Proponents’ exercise of their fundamental constitutional right. ... In short, signature gathering will halt, and the Initiative Proponents’ hard work and investment is in jeopardy. ... This Petition presents an important legal question of first impression: whether the fundamental constitutional rights of the Initiative Proponents are violated by their exclusion from an online petition signature gathering system maintained by the Secretary in the middle of a public health emergency that severely limits (or outright bars) their ability to otherwise collect initiative petition signatures."[17]

The four ballot initiative campaigns that filed the petition are:[17]

Secretary of State Katie Hobbs (D), who was named as the defendant, said she would not oppose the challenge from the campaigns. She stated, "I think that in light of the circumstances that we’re in right now, it’s a reasonable request. We are certainly not opposing it and would hope for a quick resolution... I plan to let the court know that my office can implement the necessary changes, should that be the court’s order... Every voter in the state is eligible to sign an initiative petition. That makes it no different than candidates for statewide office using the system to get the necessary signatures to put their own names on the ballot."[18] Attorney General Mark Brnovich (R) disagreed with the campaigns, stating, "A health crisis is not an excuse to ignore the constitution."[19]

On May 13, 2020, the Arizona Supreme Court ruled against the campaigns in a 6-1 decision.[20]

See also

External links

Footnotes

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 Arizona Secretary of State, "I-23-2020," September 3, 2019
  2. ↑ Smart and Safe Arizona, "Homepage," accessed February 20, 2020
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Arizona Secretary of State, "Campaign Finance," accessed February 19, 2020
  4. ↑ Cite error: Invalid <ref> tag; no text was provided for refs named finance
  5. ↑ Washington Post, "What the future of marijuana legalization could look like under President Trump," November 9, 2016
  6. ↑ LA Weekly, "What Killed Prop. 19?" November 4, 2010
  7. ↑ Washington Post, "How Democrats derailed marijuana legalization in California," November 10, 2014
  8. ↑ Washington Post, "Obama: I’ve got ‘bigger fish to fry’ than pot smokers," December 14, 2014
  9. ↑ CNN, "Ohio voters reject legal marijuana," November 4, 2015
  10. ↑ Time, "These States Just Legalized Marijuana," November 8, 2016
  11. ↑ Forbes, "Michigan Voters Approve Marijuana Legalization," November 6, 2018
  12. ↑ Grand Forks Herald, "ND voters snuff out recreational marijuana measure," November 7, 2018
  13. ↑ Burlington Free Press, "Vermont's legal marijuana law: What you should know," January 23, 2018
  14. ↑ NPR, "Illinois Governor Signs Law Legalizing Recreational Use Of Marijuana," June 26, 2019
  15. ↑ Cite error: Invalid <ref> tag; no text was provided for refs named KJZZ
  16. ↑ Marijuana Moment, "Arizona Marijuana Activists Have More Than Enough Signatures To Put Legalization On Ballot, They Say," March 26, 2020
  17. ↑ 17.0 17.1 17.2 Arizona Supreme Court, "Arizonans for Second Chances, Rehabilitation, and Public Safety et al. v. Hobbs," April 2, 2020
  18. ↑ Arizona Capitol Times, "Hobbs won’t contest legal challenge to put initiative signature gathering online," April 6, 2020
  19. ↑ AZCentral, "Arizona Supreme Court rejects bid by groups to gather initiative petition signatures online," May 13, 2020
  20. ↑ Arizona Supreme Court, "Order," May 13, 2020
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