{"id":19204,"date":"2016-01-29T09:04:22","date_gmt":"2016-01-29T17:04:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/wasilla-bans-pot-businesses\/"},"modified":"2016-01-29T09:04:22","modified_gmt":"2016-01-29T17:04:22","slug":"wasilla-bans-pot-businesses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/news\/wasilla-bans-pot-businesses\/","title":{"rendered":"Wasilla bans pot businesses"},"content":{"rendered":"

WASILLA \u2014 <\/strong>Southcentral Alaska\u2019s cannabis business just got more concentrated in Anchorage. A big chunk of the Valley, long a byword for marijuana cultivation, is out.<\/p>\n

The Wasilla City Council voted unanimously on Jan. 25 to ban all commercial marijuana within city limits, further narrowing options for Alaska cannabis industry to enter the newly legal market.<\/p>\n

The ban prohibits testing, processing, cultivation, and retail sales within Wasilla city limits, and also expressly prohibits consumption anywhere except a private residence with the owner\u2019s permission.<\/p>\n

A state ballot initiative that passed in November 2014 legalized commercial marijuana activities in February 2015, but the ballot also specified that localities could opt out. In the Mat-Su, the city of Palmer has already banned commercial cannabis activities, and the Mat-Su Borough will have a borough-wide ban on its next public ballot.<\/p>\n

Industry representatives \u2014 who had packed the house alongside marijuana opponents \u2014 said the ban is yet another step in a slippery slope of local bans.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to puke,\u201d said Midnight Greenery chief operating officer Tina Smith, a Wasilla resident. \u201cThis is the first step of banning it at the borough. We have the biggest grow in Alaska, right here. Once we start banning it, our industry is done. The more places opt out, the closer it gets to being closed entirely.\u201d<\/p>\n

Daniel Bracken, a local pastor who led his congregation in speaking in favor of the ban, said the council made the right decision for the majority of Wasilla voters who voted against Ballot Initiative 2 in 2014.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m pleased,\u201d said Bracken. \u201cI think they made the right decision in respecting the will of the voters.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u2018I can do it here, or I can do it in Houston\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n

Emotions ran high during public comment, both against the ban and in favor of it. Proponents of the ban had a running concern over providing a wholesome and safe environment for children.<\/p>\n

The congregation of local King\u2019s Chapel Alaska turned up in force to voice concerns. Bracken implored the council to spare Wasilla\u2019s children from an influence he associates with criminality and vice. A mother, formerly homeless, linked her previous poverty to her young intro to the substance.<\/p>\n

Like alcohol, said Wasilla man Leland Bogess, marijuana could work its way down to children and \u201cinfect\u201d middle school and high schools. Youthful mistakes, others said, lead to lifelong regrets.<\/p>\n

\u201cIs it fair for boys like these to grow up poor, hungry, uneducated, malnourished, and complete the cycle of their parents?\u201d asked Chris LaCroix.<\/p>\n

Still other mothers, like pregnant Allie Van Eck, excoriated the council for even considered the \u201cunfounded and unbalanced\u201d ordinance that would take away her favorite anti-morning sickness aid, cannabis edibles. Medical users poured out stories of cancer pains and post-traumatic stress disorder cured by cannabis use.<\/p>\n

Cannabis industry proponents looked for the nuts and bolts approach to convince the council to vote down the measure. Cannabis industry advocates cited Colorado and Washington to remind Wasilla of the potential tax dollars and the potential tourist trade the marijuana trade could create for the city.<\/p>\n

Industry hopefuls insisted that regulated business is less a risk than a thriving black market without the security and age requirements of the regulated market.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy are we possibly saying no to a viable industry here in our home town?\u201d asked Smith, of Wasilla\u2019s Midnight Greenery. \u201cGive us a chance to show you the possibility before you shut us out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Robert McMasters, who plans to open a 10,000-square foot cultivation facility in Wasilla, said he plans to produce enough cannabis to pay the City of Wasilla $200,000 in excise tax.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can do that here, or I can do that in Houston.\u201d<\/p>\n

For a few cannabis advocates, the ban simply amounted to a denial of what they see as an Alaskan right.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t agree with our voted-upon rights being stripped away because one person doesn\u2019t agree with another person\u2019s personal decision,\u201d said Chris Butters.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u2018Not in my town\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n

Council chose, in the end, to keep to what they said was their city\u2019s will, not the state\u2019s. The council passed the vote unanimously.<\/p>\n

Mayor Bert Cottle, who only votes in the event of a council tie, put the council\u2019s feelings as a matter of the local popular vote.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn November 2014\u202648 percent of people in Wasilla voted yes, and 52 percent voted no,\u201d Cottle said. \u201cThe same people who elected us every year are the one who voted. I guarantee you, if the vote had gone the other way, the discussion would\u2019ve gone the other way.\u201d<\/p>\n

Council member Stu Graham earned a roomful of hisses when he equated cannabis consumption with the privilege of driving or alcohol consumption, saying alcohol has little social value and implying neither would marijuana.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe citizens of Wasilla said, \u2018not in my town,\u2019\u201d said Graham. \u201cAnd that\u2019s where we need to be.\u201d<\/p>\n

Deputy mayor Gretchen O\u2019Barr denied earlier comments from cannabis industry representatives that said a highly regulated market would be a more effective deterrent for underage consumption than the current black market.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust because it\u2019s a legal business doesn\u2019t mean we can necessarily keep it from children,\u201d O\u2019Barr said. \u201cI don\u2019t see how any drug use in general can go down.\u201d<\/p>\n

Council member Brandon Well said he sympathized with medical concerns brought up during public comment by medical marijuana users, but said medical usage is not the point.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis isn\u2019t about medical marijuana,\u201d said Wall. \u201cUnfortunately we have a Legislature that\u2019s completely filled with cowards that didn\u2019t want to address medical marijuana when they had the chance. I agree with the notion that there are benefits to medical marijuana you\u2019re not going to get with the big pharmaceutical companies, but what we\u2019re talking about\u2026is retail sales in city limits\u2026I don\u2019t see the win for Wasilla tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wall also added an amendment that specified marijuana consumption is solely limited to private property with the explicit consent of the property owner.<\/p>\n

Concerns over the accepting marijuana industry\u2019s federally illegal cash-only market swayed council member David Wilson to vote in favor of the ban.<\/p>\n

\u201cBeing a schedule 1 ban, it is federally illegal, and banking institutions have not stepped up to accept that money,\u201d Wilson said. \u201cWith that, it becomes and issue for the city if we were to tax that…I feel the city shouldn\u2019t take on responsibility of those funds.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2022 DJ Summers is a reporter for the Alaska Journal of Commerce. He can be reached at daniel.summers@alaskajournal.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WASILLA \u2014 Southcentral Alaska\u2019s cannabis business<\/a> just got more concentrated in Anchorage. A big chunk of the Valley, long a byword for marijuana cultivation, is out. The Wasilla City Council voted unanimously on Jan. 25 to ban all commercial marijuana within city limits, further narrowing options for Alaska cannabis industry to enter the newly legal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[230],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-19204","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-state-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19204"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19204\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19204"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=19204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}