Posted August 19, 2002

(MarijuanaNews note:
The Seattle Hempfest is a truly amazing accomplishment.
There are over one thousand volunteers, and this year’s attendance was up a
whopping 50% over last year’s 100,000. I am filled with admiration and
appreciation for our friends who manage this event. It has become “a force to be
reckoned with.”

However, the event has grown so much that is in danger of becoming a victim
of its own success. The Myrtle Edwards Park on the waterfront in downtown
Seattle where it is held was jammed to capacity. But for now it is truly the
world’s premier cannabis reform event in terms of size, and that is also being
converted into political impact.

The huge number of cannabis related vendors was also astonishing. There were
several glass pipe vendors and I tried to give them all copies of Friday’s
MarijuanaNews posting,
See
Operation Peacepipe:
Calling On the Makers and Sellers of Glass Art Pipes to Defend Their Art and Our
Freedom.

Of course, that was not a good time to talk politics with them, but it will
be interesting to see what their response will be, if there is any.

There were so many speakers that each was limited to five minutes, although
most were scheduled for multiple appearances on the four stages, assuming they
could make it through the crowds.

NORML sent a full crew, including NORML founder Keith Stroup and NORML
Foundation Executive Director Allen St. Pierre, a across the country to be
there, and they certainly don’t go that far for the party. There were also a
number of NORML affiliates with their own booths there.

Last year, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer managed to overlook the event
entirely, even though its offices overlook the park in which it was held. The
Seattle Times gave it one story, but this year both Seattle dailies had two
glowing reports on the event.
See the Seattle Times report


Hempfest crowd rallies for pot-policy reform

And the Seattle Weekly
had a booth next to NORML’s, reminding everyone that they have long supported
cannabis reform.

An excerpt from the P-I story is below, and this really is a case where the
story is a story in itself, because they have sometimes treated the event rather
shabbily in the past. Oddly, they gave it good coverage when it was much smaller
and perhaps less threatening.
From 1998 see

Seattle Paper Gives Friendly Coverage To The Local Hempfest

But they seem to be waking up. Last October the P-I even editorialized
against devoting police resources to cannabis cultivation while there is a
severe meth problem in the state.

Why have the Seattle papers been so hesitant about dealing with the city’s
largest annual political event? Perhaps it just does not fit the stereotype of
cannabis users, because it is so well-organized. Perhaps it makes all too clear
that the establishment is so out of touch with the people, and yet they wonder
why readership is down and the public does not trust the media.

Whatever their excuses, it is now obvious that just ignoring it will not make
it go away.

As noted below, the specific political focus of the event was to get enough
signatures to get Initiative 75 on the local ballot in November.

The initiative, which is sponsored by
Sensible Seattle,
cannot change the state or federal laws, but it would make marijuana possession
the lowest priority for the Seattle police. That is more than just symbolic,
because it would be a significant development if Seattle joins Vancouver in its
non-arrest policy for cannabis possession.

Then Seattle, famous for its coffee shops, might have venues like Vancouver’s
Blunt Bros.
where people can smoke openly with their friends. Of
course, this does nothing to separate cannabis from the hard drug market, but it
is still a major step in the right direction.

It has been endorsed by Seattle City Councilman Nick Licata, who spoke at the
event, and by Roger Goodman, Director of the
Drug Policy
Project of the King County Bar Association.
They have done some outstanding work on drug policy reform. Their report last
year, Is It Time
To End The War On Drugs? was a major
contribution to the debate.

That report prompted the P-I to editorialize, “Time’s up for the War on
Drugs” concluding that “Our local and state governments desperately need the
hundreds of millions of dollars wasted on imprisoning drug possessors to build
treatment facilities and invest in prevention so we can build a safer, healthier
and more compassionate and productive society.”

While that is hardly the best argument for freedom, it will be interesting to
see if they endorse Initiative 75.
See
I’m A Legalizer. What Are
You? The Nevada Fiasco. Analysis by Richard Cowan

As the Sensible Seattle
web site points out, forty-two percent of all Washington
State drug arrests are for marijuana offenses. Nine out of ten of these arrests
are for possession. Currently, under Washington State law, citizens possessing
as little as one gram of marijuana can be forced to serve up to 90 days in jail
and incur a fine up to $1,000.

Moreover, while Seattle’s African American Community represents only 8% of
Seattle’s population, they made up 35% of all marijuana possession arrests by
the Seattle Police in 2000.
See

The
Sexist And Racist Implications Of The Supreme Court’s Further Erosion Of Rights

Will Have Greatest Impact In Marijuana Cases – An Op-ed and An Article

and
The Racist Origins Of
Canada’s Marijuana Prohibition Reported In the National Post.

In the meantime, the challenge ahead for the event organizers will be the
wonderful problem of dealing with success, and whether it can be replicated in
other cities.

Theoretically, it should be possible to organize similar events elsewhere –
especially on the West Coast. There is certainly a need, but that does not mean
that it will be possible to keep the same spirit that creates such a great event
in Seattle.)

Excerpted from The Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Full story

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/83279_hempfest19.shtml

Hempfest pushes fall ballot measure
August 19, 2002
By Neil Modie
Seattle Post-Intelligencer Reporter

“Come out of the closet” about marijuana use was the theme of this
year’s Seattle Hempfest, the fragrant annual waterfront event. And at least
several of the tens of thousands of festival-goers did come out of the closet.

And went into jail.
(MarijuanaNews note: Not exactly, as we shall see in a
moment, but that is clever.)

While Seattle police kept a low profile and commended
Hempfest sponsors for an orderly, well-organized event Saturday and
yesterday, it was clear that Initiative 75 — a top political priority of the
festival’s promoters — isn’t law yet, if it ever will be.

If I-75 gains enough voter signatures to qualify for the November ballot and
Seattle residents approve it, it would make adult possession of small amounts of
marijuana the city’s lowest law enforcement priority.

At Myrtle Edwards Park yesterday, as I-75 proponents circulated petitions to
put it on the ballot, it wasn’t yet the lowest priority.

Police, following a “zero tolerance” policy, arrested four people Saturday
and four more yesterday as of 5:45 p.m. One was busted on suspicion of smoking
marijuana and the other seven on suspicion of selling marijuana to undercover
officers, according to patrol Lt. Daniel Whelan.
(MarijuanaNews note: “Zero tolerance” is a dumb
slogan and an even dumber cannabis policy, but the police were ignoring a huge
amount of smoking. I can’t imagine where the person was smoking who managed to
be the only one busted. The police were generally friendly and well-behaved.)

Those seven wouldn’t have been protected by I-75 anyway, of course, since it
would de-emphasize only personal possession. Whelan said
one of the illicit entrepreneurs had 2 pounds of marijuana, packaged for sale,
in his backpack.
(MarijuanaNews note: As for someone dealing with
two pounds in a backpack…)

Overall, however, the lieutenant said there were “very
few problems and everyone seems to be very well-behaved” — despite what
Hempfest promoters estimated was a two-day turnout exceeding 150,000 for what
they called “the nation’s largest drug policy reform event.”
(MarijuanaNews note: In the last couple of years Seattle
has suffered from alcohol related violence at events in addition to riots by
those who supposedly were showing their concern about “globalization” by
smashing the windows of local merchants. “Think globally, vandalize locally?”

The Hempfest, by contrast, was entirely peaceful, despite the unusually warm
weather and large crowds. That fact could not have been lost on the police.

As I watched the police walk through the park, I had to wonder what they were
thinking.

Here were all these people the police had supposedly been instructed to
arrest behaving peacefully at a very well organized – and absolutely huge –
event.

I think that made an impression.

We should remember that converting – subverting? – the police rank and file
is a part of our job.)

Keith Stroup, founder and director of the National Organization for the
Reform of Marijuana Laws, or NORML, the nation’s most prominent marijuana-law
group, proclaimed it “the biggest and the finest pro-hemp event in the world.”
He told the crowd that the laws should be changed because, among other things,
one-third of all adult Americans have used marijuana at some time in their
lives.

Whelan said the “charged political nature of the event”
seemed to prompt Hempfest organizers to go out of their way to ensure that the
festival’s 1,000-strong volunteer staff cooperated with police.
(MarijuanaNews note: It might be the other way around. The
police were very friendly.)

Most festival-goers were there perhaps less for the political cause than for
the non-stop music, the food, the spectacle and the mellow, ’60s-throwback
ambiance.
(MarijuanaNews note: Too many Americans forget that “the
pursuit of happiness” was listed third, after life and liberty.)

As usual, the scent of marijuana wafted among Hempfest’s crowded, mile-long
strip of musical and speaking stages and vendors’ tents and booths. The
latter’s wares included hemp T-shirts and bags, hemp chocolate-covered bananas,
hemp-seed brownies, marijuana water pipes, silk marijuana-leaf leis and tie-dyed
underwear.

More than 50 political organizations, including the American Civil Liberties
Union and NORML, took part as did more than 50 musical groups, sharing seven
stages with about 50 speakers.

Speaker after speaker, including City Councilman Nick Licata, urged the
crowds to sign Initiative 75 petitions and vote for it.

“The war on drugs is a miserable war. It’s a racist war,” Licata told the
crowd. “We here in Seattle, with Initiative 75, are going to be the first to
change it.”

As Licata spoke, a few in his audience lit up and passed around joints,
despite what Whelan said were instructions to police officers to “take action if
they see anyone smoking marijuana.”

“Of course,” he added, “when you smell marijuana smoke, you don’t always see
who’s smoking it.”

Dominic Holden, director of Hempfest and campaign manager of Sensible
Seattle, sponsor of Initiative 75, said this 11th annual festival sought to
encourage adults who smoke pot to “come out of the closet on marijuana and admit
that they are responsible marijuana users,” and demand that they no longer be
treated as criminals.
(MarijuanaNews note: Dominic is only 25 and is one of the
great younger generation of activists.)

I-75 sponsors have until Thursday to turn in the 17,228 signatures they need
to qualify for the ballot. They submitted 19,600 signatures Aug. 2, but Matt
Fox, the campaign coordinator, said about 5,000 were found to be invalid. Fox
said a professional signature-gathering firm has been hired, and he and Holden
expressed confidence that names collected at Hempfest should give them enough….

© 1998-2002 Seattle Post-Intelligencer

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