Florida’s House of Representatives proved today there is nothing its grubby little hands can’t screw up. After more than 72 percent of voters statewide voted to legalize medicinal marijuana for people with “debilitating diseases,” a term that includes cancer, AIDS, and Alzheimer’s, the Florida House today passed its own series of rules regulating the state’s new medical weed industry.
And, this being Florida, the Republican-crafted bill bans smokable weed, creates a state-controlled cartel of legal cannabis farms, and pisses off medicinal marijuana advocates across the Sunshine State. On Tuesday, that terrible bill — HB 1397 — passed the House by a 105-9 margin.
Colorado has been a 4/20 destination for more than a decade, and the allure of tax dollars helped spur a legalization movement that now brings tens of millions of consumer dollars into the state every April.
Data from the Colorado Department of Revenue shows that Colorado made $2.49 million from the state’s 2.9 percent marijuana sales tax in March 2016. (That includes medical and recreational dispensaries and doesn’t count the 10 percent retail marijuana tax and other local taxes specific to cities and counties.) In May 2016, Colorado made $2.76 million from the same tax. But in April 2016, that tax total was significantly higher than in the preceding and following months: $3.29 million. Dispensary sales aren’t just rising in April; they’re rising annually, at an extremely fast rate.
In Colorado, 4/20 is famous for large rallies, smoke-filled concerts and the best deals of the year at dispensaries. If you want to avoid the crowds, you can host your own 4/20 dinner— maybe a potluck? — as an alternative celebration. Here are five tips on how to do it:
Organizers are estimating that there will be more than 80,000 people celebrating in downtown Denver on 4/20, so the Colorado Department of Transportation is partnering with Lyft to give out free ride credits and discounted rides all week.
The collaborators even created a scavenger hunt for people to earn the free rides. There’ll be “Mile 420” signs hidden at prominent marijuana events, each with a promo code to redeem $42 worth of ride credits. Lyft will also have street teams at 4/20 events handing out discount ride codes.
On 4/20, it’s all about smoking on the go — and what better to bring with you than pipes made by artisans working right here in Colorado? Whether you want a small pipe to slip discreetly in your pocket or a Gandalf bowl, here are ten creations that are sure to turn heads.
The driver of a hearse filled with 68 pounds of marijuana told federal agents on Saturday that he had taken up smuggling because his Tucson funeral-services business “had been slow.”
Christian Lee Zuniga, 28, a U.S. citizen from Nogales, Arizona, was arrested after agents became suspicious of him and his hearse and found the pot, court records show.
This is actually the second headline-making smuggling failure for Zuniga.
Dear Stoner: I’m about to get on a flight, and I hear that TSA has changed its rules about allowing you to carry on marijuana. What’s up with that?
Flying High
Dear Flying High: You heard wrong, sadly. In an April 5 article on MassRoots, Tom Angell reported this: “It’s official: The federal government doesn’t care if you bring medical marijuana on airplanes.” Angell had noticed that the “What can I bring?” page on TSA’s website had changed the red “No” next to checked and carry-on baggage for medical marijuana to a green “Yes.” He quickly took a screen shot of the page and wrote an article, and just as quickly, TSA’s Twitter replied with this: “@cannaadvisors: We’re sorry for any confusion. A mistake was made in the database of our new ‘What can I bring?’ tool.” TSA’s web page also changed the “Yes” back to “No” under medical marijuana. Tom Angell’s credit, he updated the article as TSA corrected itself. But confusion remains.
A Denver-based medical marijuana edibles manufacturer has recalled nearly 1,000 products from dispensary shelves because of potentially harmful marijuana, according to an announcement from the Denver Department of Environmental Health.
Approximately 980 Mountain Medicine products are subject to a recall because they were made with marijuana flower from Good Meds, a Denver wholesale marijuana cultivator. Good Meds voluntarily recalled its marijuana flower, concentrates and edibles earlier this month after city inspectors found “a lack of effective controls in place to prevent and detect pesticide contamination, and the presence of potentially unsafe pesticide residues.”
The pesticides in question contained fungicides tebuconazole and myclobutanil, according to the Department of Environmental Health.
What was once Colorful Colorado has been turning greener since recreational cannabis became legal, especially on 4/20. For music fans, the holiday has been attracting some of the greatest talent around, for block parties and concerts alike, making this state a place where you can match your extracurricular smoking activities with some of the best local and national music acts, all for the love of everything green.
When Amendment 64 passed in 2014, adults in Colorado not only had the right to possess recreational marijuana, we gained the right to grow it. However, growing the potent, stanky cannabis many of us are used to smoking is no easy task for a rookie. Home growers spend years perfecting their lighting, nutrients, feeding schedule and more, but few have the time and bandwidth to breed their own genetics.
Most experienced home growers will tell you that the best way to grow your own is by planting reliable seeds, growing your own clones from a mother plant or finding a trustworthy clone breeder that doesn’t have anything to lose from selling you his or her best genetics – but for newbs and those too lazy to build a community, dispensaries provide a convenient place to start your home-growing journey.
To my chagrin, not too many pot shops in Denver sell clones anymore, making them hard to track down even after a Google sesh. Here’s a list of dispensaries in Denver that sell the green little guys (in alphabetical order), with more to be added as I find them.