Pending the formality of a second reading next Tuesday, San Francisco has joined several cities, most recently Santa Cruz, Santa Monica, and Santa Barbara, all in California, as well as Missoula, Montana, and Eureka Springs, Arkansas, in making marijuana the lowest local law enforcement priority.  The ordinance was approved 8-3, with only one neighborhood group in opposition.

Camilla Norman Field, deputy director of DPA’s San Francisco office, who was deeply involved in the effort, said, “By urging our law enforcement community to ignore adult marijuana offenses, we can help our police officers focus on battling the increase in serious and violent crime, much of which is ironically directly related to our failed prohibitionist approach to drugs.”

Similar to ordinances in Oakland, West Hollywood, and Santa Cruz, the San Francisco ordinance deprioritizes investigation, citation, arrest, and property seizure for most marijuana offenses by adults (including possession, distribution, and sale). Exceptions are made for driving under the influence or involving minors, as well as for situations that jeopardize public safety or take place on or within view of public property.  The ordinance also creates an oversight committee that can review cases in which individuals feel they were wrongly targeted.  The ordinance also directs the Board of Supervisors’ Clerk to annually notify state and federal governments that “the Board of Supervisors of the City and County of San Francisco has passed an ordinance to deprioritize marijuana offenses by adults, and requests that the federal and California state governments take immediate steps to tax and regulate marijuana use, cultivation, and distribution and to authorize state and local communities to do the same.”

According to the FBI's annual Uniform Crime Report close to 800,000 Americans were arrested for marijuana offenses in 2005 — 88% for possession only.  This number exceeds the total number of arrests in the U.S. for all violent crimes combined, including murder, manslaughter, forcible rape, robbery, and aggravated assault. So the need to adjust enforcement priorities is clear.

The San Francisco legislation was sponsored by Supervisor Tom Ammiano, co-sponsored by supervisors Mirkarimi, Daly, and McGoldrick, and was supported by the San Francisco Police Department, the Public Defender’s office, and other drug policy reform organizations, including Marijuana Policy Project, California NORML, Californians for Civil Liberties, Axis of Love SF, the Harvey Milk LBGT Democratic Club, and Hempevolution.org.