The Bay Citizen ran, without comment or perspective, a Bay City News item Dec. 23 noting that the Hayward Police Department and other local law-enforcement agencies picked up some $1.2 million when the feds disbursed the money that was seized from a marijuana dispensary that was busted in 2006.Read more »

More American teens are smoking pot, and fewer are drinking alcohol, according to a new survey that's at the very least interesting and could be a push for policymakers to start thinking about how we regulate marijuana.Read more »

UPDATED BELOW As I worked on this week's story about the federal crackdown on California's marijuana industry, I tried to get a statement from California Attorney General Kamala Harris. After all, it's her job to defend California's medical marijuana laws, which she was fairly supportive of as our district attorney. And she was an early Barack Obama backer who could probably get him or U.S. Read more »

Hopes of legalizing marijuana may have gone up in smoke after Prop. 19’s defeat by a slim margin, but proponents are far from giving up. Groups such as Drug Policy Alliance, Just Say Now, and Bay Area proponents are already looking forward to 2012 to score more voters and support. But to win, they’re going to have to find solutions to the challenges they faced in this election.Read more »

The Bay Area's medical marijuana community may be divided over the legalization measure Prop. 19, but Reason's Brian Doherty has penned an excellent analysis of the current campaign, why it will probably succeed, and how that will likely lead to a nationwide normalization of pot use rather than the federal crackdown and general sky falling that many critics of the measure predict.

Once again proving itself to be an corporate-run embarrassment to a city that has been at the forefront of progressive reform – including the movement to legalize medical marijuana – the San Francisco Chronicle this morning recommended that voters reject Prop. 19, which would allow cities and counties to legalize marijuana use by adults. And it did so with tortured logic and a cowardly, disingenuous claim to support legalizing marijuana.Read more »

Updated info below

The medical marijuana community – everyone from small growers to Harborside Health Center, the biggest dispensary in Oakland – are reacting strongly against an ordinance proposed by Oakland City Council members Rebecca Kaplan and Larry Reid to limit and license marijuana cultivation, a proposal that will be heard tonight (7/13) at 6 p.m. by the council's Public Safety Committee. Read more »

By Brady Welch

Puff, puff, pass on the good news. A new poll finds that a majority of California voters—51 percent—support the fall ballot measure to legalize, tax, and regulate marijuana for even strictly recreational uses (40 percent opposed it). And support rises a point when respondents are asked about its various benefits. Read more »