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As better numbers of Texas voters bitter on harsh punishment for marijuana offenses, Austin voters will doubtless resolve in Might whether or not to successfully decriminalize the drug.
The poll measure, pushed by the group Floor Recreation Texas, would forbid Austin cops typically from ticketing or arresting folks on low-level pot costs like possessing small quantities of the drug or associated paraphernalia — until the offenses are tied to extra extreme crimes. Town additionally wouldn’t pay to check substances suspected to be marijuana — a key step in substantiating drug charges.
Each practices have already been informally adopted in Austin, however advocates wish to solidify them on the Might poll field.
“The first impact is that it will make the decriminalization that exists in Austin as we speak truly long run and would put the power of regulation behind it,” mentioned Chris Harris, coverage director at Austin Justice Coalition.
Austin regulation enforcement has met the thought with various levels of hostility and indifference lately. After the Austin Metropolis Council informally requested the Police Division in 2020 to halt citations and arrests for misdemeanor marijuana charges, then-Chief Brian Manley mentioned the council doesn’t have the authority to inform him to not implement state regulation. And officers nonetheless have latitude to resolve whether or not to make arrests and write citations.
Chief Joseph Chacon has been mum on the present proposal. A consultant for the Austin Police Division didn’t return a request for remark Monday.
And the Austin Police Affiliation, the union that represents Austin officers, is staying out of the poll battle — however not as a result of it’s proud of the thought.
“We do not help it simply because we really feel like it is best to comply with state regulation,” mentioned Ken Casaday, head of the union. “They’re skirting state regulation. However the factor is that if this makes folks in Austin completely happy, so be it.”
Austin’s metropolis clerk verified Monday that the marketing campaign collected sufficient signatures — at the very least 20,000 — to look on the Might poll. The Metropolis Council nonetheless should vote to place the measure, which additionally would formally ban “no-knock” warrants, on the poll.
However the measure faces one massive impediment: Though marijuana legal guidelines in Texas have loosened somewhat in recent years, the drug stays unlawful on the state stage.
Public help for harsh marijuana legal guidelines and prosecutors’ willingness to deliver costs for minor offenses has waned lately.
The variety of new costs for misdemeanor marijuana possession fell by 59% from 2016 to 2020, according to figures from the Texas Office of Court Administration, as prosecutors within the state’s main city areas have more and more deprioritized marijuana prosecutions.
Most Texas voters help decriminalizing marijuana in some kind. Three-fifths of Texas voters say at the very least a small quantity of marijuana must be authorized, based on a University of Texas/Texas Tribune Poll final yr.
That help cuts throughout partisan traces. Practically three-fourths of Democrats and independents suppose marijuana must be authorized. So do 43% of Republicans, a plurality of that group.
It’s towards that backdrop that Floor Recreation Texas — a progressive group targeted on problems with “staff, wages and weed” — plans to mount decriminalization campaigns in Killeen and Harker Heights. In San Marcos, another organization is gathering signatures for a similar ballot measure.
“It is a very fashionable situation, even amongst plenty of Republicans,” mentioned Mike Siegel, political director for Floor Recreation Texas.
Prior to now, Gov. Greg Abbott and Republican leaders have sought to punish Austin for adopting left-leaning measures like slicing town’s police spending or permitting homeless encampments in public.
However Abbott has signaled openness to some types of marijuana decriminalization. In Might, he signed an growth of the state’s medical marijuana program to incorporate folks with most cancers and post-traumatic stress dysfunction. And on Monday, he mentioned he has little urge for food for extreme punishment for low-level marijuana offenses.
“One factor that I imagine in, and I imagine the state Legislature believes in, and that’s jail and jail is a spot for harmful criminals who could hurt others,” Abbott mentioned Monday throughout a marketing campaign cease in Edinburg. “Small possession of marijuana will not be the kind of violation that we wish to stockpile jails with.”
Regardless of Abbott’s assertion about lawmakers’ positions, payments aiming to decriminalize or legalize marijuana haven’t gotten by means of the Legislature lately. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, a fellow Republican who heads the state Senate, has beforehand mentioned he’s “strongly opposed” to loosening punishment for pot possession.
A part of Abbott’s play is to not alienate average voters within the November common election who imagine in a point of marijuana decriminalization, mentioned Brandon Rottinghaus, a political science professor on the College of Houston. His Democratic opponent, former Congressman Beto O’Rourke, has regularly backed marijuana legalization on the marketing campaign path.
“The governor does not wish to be on the fallacious facet of public opinion on what’s in any other case a preferred situation in direction of decriminalizing and, for some, outright legalization for leisure use,” Rottinghaus mentioned.
Disclosure: College of Houston has been a monetary supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan information group that’s funded partially by donations from members, foundations and company sponsors. Monetary supporters play no function within the Tribune’s journalism. Discover a full list of them here.
Correction, Jan. 11, 2022: A earlier model of this text incorrectly acknowledged the date of the election for which the poll measure certified. The election is in Might, not November.
