The Anchorage Municipality may use its leverage as the state’s population center to influence how laws on commercial marijuana take shape in the year ahead.
Anchorage Assembly member Amy Demboski is behind a proposed ordinance that would ban the sale and cultivation of marijuana in the city. Nation-wide pot is in legal limbo: voters in states and cities are opting for legalization, but the at the federal level it’s still a controlled substance. Those inconsistencies could get very tangled when it comes to entities like banks and highways, which operate locally but have federal standards. Like, say, if you use a federal highway to deposit cash you made selling commercial marijuana, are you or your bank breaking federal laws on money laundering and illegal transport? See how quickly this get’s tricky?
“To me this is just a wait-and-see approach. In no way is this advocating for a ban on personal use of marijuana at all,” Demboski said. “All I’m saying is before we get into a commercialized industry that’s still federally illegal, we need to understand and make sure there’s no federal impacts when it comes to millions of dollars in transportation dollars.”
Because of its population, Anchorage is the largest potential market in the state for regulated marijuana, and Demboski thinks leveraging that influence can help residents and the city set better terms in the implementation phase.
Demboski’s ordinance, which is co-sponsored by Assembly member Dick Traini, will have a public hearing during the Assembly’s regular meeting on December 16th.
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image credit thedailychronic.com
