Campaign for Missouri recreational marijuana begins

A week after Missouri officials announced winners of nearly 200 medical marijuana retail dispensary licenses, officials with a group dubbed Missourians for a New Approach announced their intent to campaign for a recreational, or “adult-use,” marijuana initiative.

They want to get recreational marijuana onto the November ballot.

“We believe Missourians are ready for this,” campaign manager John Payne told the News-Leader. “This has been an issue that’s advanced very quickly nationwide. Sometimes the progress has been surprising to those of us who have been advocating for a long time.”

A Pew Research poll published in November found that 67 percent of Americans say “the use of marijuana” should be legal. USA TODAY reported on an April poll by CBS News that indicated 65 percent of Americans said medical marijuana should be available to adults.

The April poll highlighted a major demographic split: 49 percent of people 65 and older supported legalization; the number jumped to 72 percent for people ages 18 to 34. The poll found that 56 percent of Republicans supported legalization compared with 72 percent of Democrats.

Payne and fellow activists hope to gather roughly 160,000 required signatures between now and May and get on the Missouri ballot in time for a recreational weed question to accompany the presidential election. Many observers see this as a difficult task with a short timeline. [Read more at The Examiner]