{"id":746,"date":"2012-09-24T07:56:50","date_gmt":"2012-09-24T07:56:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.marijuana.net\/?p=20037"},"modified":"2012-09-24T07:56:50","modified_gmt":"2012-09-24T07:56:50","slug":"indiana-may-be-next-state-to-decriminalize-marijuana","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/indiana-may-be-next-state-to-decriminalize-marijuana\/","title":{"rendered":"Indiana may be Next State to Decriminalize Marijuana"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"wp_fb_like_button\" style=\"margin:5px 0 5px 5px;float:right;height:100px;\"><script src=\"http:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/all.js#xfbml=1\"><\/script><fb:like href=\"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/indiana-may-be-next-state-to-decriminalize-marijuana\/\" send=\"true\" layout=\"standard\" width=\"450\" show_faces=\"false\" font=\"arial\" action=\"like\" colorscheme=\"light\"><\/fb:like><\/div><p><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"275\" height=\"183\" src=\"http:\/\/www.marijuana.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/indiana.jpg\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"indiana\" title=\"indiana\" \/><\/p>\n<p><a rel=\"attachment wp-att-20040\" href=\"http:\/\/www.marijuana.net\/news-and-articles\/lawmakers-in-indiana-to-consider-marijuana-decriminalization-bill\/attachment\/indiana\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-20040\" title=\"indiana\" src=\"http:\/\/www.marijuana.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/indiana-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" \/><\/a>As Election Day 2012 quickly approaches, there have been many developments for activists to keep an eye on.\u00a0 Most of that attention is turned toward many of the ballot initiatives that residents across the country will be voting on.\u00a0 As public officials have still been hesitant to fully embrace marijuana reform, residents have found only they typically need to take matters into their own hands to try and change the tides of a losing drug policy.<\/p>\n<p>However, there are several states where lawmakers are pushing for change through the traditional legislative process.\u00a0 Most recently, we learned that an Indiana lawmaker plans to introduce a bill to decriminalize possession of 10 grams or less of marijuana.\u00a0 State Senator Brent Steele is hoping to change the current law, which calls for a Class A misdemeanor for possession of any marijuana up to 30 grams.\u00a0 Mr. Steele noted that many other municipalities and college campuses have enacted decriminalization efforts and \u201cSociety didn\u2019t melt down, and we didn\u2019t turn into a drug-crazed culture as a result of it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The three state wide marijuana legalization bills (Colorado, Oregon, Washington) have received the most media attention as of late, but decriminalization measures may be equally important.\u00a0 For one, decriminalizing marijuana can have an immediate impact and reduce the time money invested by police officers.\u00a0 Additionally, courts and prisons are also strained by a high amount of los level marijuana charges.\u00a0 There are also broad economic implications as well to decriminalization.\u00a0 These arrests, which impact young non-whites at disproportionate rate have compromised the ability for many people to gain employment.<\/p>\n<p>Even if Brent Steele is not immediately successful in getting this current law passed, new age economics seem likely to only increase calls for marijuana decriminalization.\u00a0 The slowed economy of the past few years has ignited serious conversations on wasteful spending.\u00a0 If the country wants to experience better years in front of it, it will require a new approach to how we allocate government resources.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"275\" height=\"183\" src=\"http:\/\/www.marijuana.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/indiana.jpg\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"indiana\" title=\"indiana\" \/><\/p>\n<p><a rel=\"attachment wp-att-20040\" href=\"http:\/\/www.marijuana.net\/news-and-articles\/lawmakers-in-indiana-to-consider-marijuana-decriminalization-bill\/attachment\/indiana\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft size-thumbnail wp-image-20040\" title=\"indiana\" src=\"http:\/\/www.marijuana.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/indiana-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" \/><\/a>As Election Day 2012 quickly approaches, there have been many developments for activists to keep an eye on.\u00a0 Most of that attention is turned toward many of the ballot initiatives that residents across the country will be voting on.\u00a0 As public officials have still been hesitant to fully embrace marijuana reform, residents have found only they typically need to take matters into their own hands to try and change the tides of a losing drug policy.<\/p>\n<p>However, there are several states where lawmakers are pushing for change through the traditional legislative process.\u00a0 Most recently, we learned that an Indiana lawmaker plans to introduce a bill to decriminalize possession of 10 grams or less of marijuana.\u00a0 State Senator Brent Steele is hoping to change the current law, which calls for a Class A misdemeanor for possession of any marijuana up to 30 grams.\u00a0 Mr. Steele noted that many other municipalities and college campuses have enacted decriminalization efforts and \u201cSociety didn\u2019t melt down, and we didn\u2019t turn into a drug-crazed culture as a result of it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The three state wide marijuana legalization bills (Colorado, Oregon, Washington) have received the most media attention as of late, but decriminalization measures may be equally important.\u00a0 For one, decriminalizing marijuana can have an immediate impact and reduce the time money invested by police officers.\u00a0 Additionally, courts and prisons are also strained by a high amount of los level marijuana charges.\u00a0 There are also broad economic implications as well to decriminalization.\u00a0 These arrests, which impact young non-whites at disproportionate rate have compromised the ability for many people to gain employment.<\/p>\n<p>Even if Brent Steele is not immediately successful in getting this current law passed, new age economics seem likely to only increase calls for marijuana decriminalization.\u00a0 The slowed economy of the past few years has ignited serious conversations on wasteful spending.\u00a0 If the country wants to experience better years in front of it, it will require a new approach to how we allocate government resources.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[52,166,119,565,566,567,184,56,9,51,170,70,568,1,3,173,61],"tags":[2632,2744,2697,3138,3139,3140,2762,2636,2631,2748,5,3141,2751,6],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/746"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=746"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/746\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=746"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=746"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannitrol.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=746"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}