Hit the Bricks

Despite some progress, New Mexico has a long way to go before laws are likely to budge

Paul Hillman was one of the handful of volunteers who participated in a drive to decriminalize marijuana in Santa Fe last year.

His participation came after a personal history with the herb dating back to 1967 as a young graphic artist for The 10 O'Clock News with Bill Jorgensen in New York City. At 5 pm, he and his colleagues would take a break, share a couple of joints in the film room, which had air filtration, and eat dinner at a Jewish deli before the show started.

Hillman's career in TV news lasted more than 40 years; he worked on art direction for shows like CBS Sunday Morning with Charles Osgood and ABC's The View. Throughout it all, he says he smoked pot two to three times a day.

"Ninety percent of the people I knew in the business—everyone smoked," Hillman says. "It was common. No big deal."

Hillman adds that he was careful to maintain a professional reputation the entire time and not play into the stereotype of the lazy, unproductive stoner. When he recently relocated to Santa Fe, he saw that "change can happen here and your voice can be heard."

"I feel this whole marijuana issue is so blown out of proportion and artificially maintained because of old schisms," Hillman says.

Last August, the efforts of Reduce Penalties NM, a campaign launched by ProgressNow NM and Drug Policy Alliance New Mexico, helped prompt the Santa Fe City Council to decriminalize cannabis in the city.

The move marked the first significant step toward marijuana reform for New Mexico in a long time. To Emily Kaltenbach, state director of Drug Policy Alliance New Mexico, the vote was a key example of how far the local dialogue had advanced in such a short time.

When she joined Drug Policy Alliance four years ago, Kaltenbach recalls a time when Gov. Susana Martinez had just won a first term after a campaign in which she spoke disapprovingly of the medical marijuana program, adopted by state lawmakers in 2007.

"When I came in, we were in a mode to protect medical marijuana," Kaltenbach says.

But a bill to end the Medical Cannabis Program went nowhere that year. Martinez, shortly after stepping into the governor's office, also stated that repeal wouldn't be a priority.

Since then, pot has increasingly become more mainstream. In 2012, voters in Colorado and Washington State made history by legalizing recreational use of marijuana. Voters in Alaska and Oregon followed suit last fall.

Even city government is giving accolades to marijuana businesses. Last week, Santa Fe gave Fruit of the Earth Organics an award for its sustainability practices. Lyra Barron, director of the business, which grows cannabis for medical patients, says plants grow outdoors in the sun and collect natural rainwater. All edibles are made with organic ingredients.

Barron describes her operation as nothing different from a small organic farm.

"I happen to be a person who's spent her life getting off the grid as much as possible," she says. "I'm not going to have my business do anything different."

Like Hillman, Barron also collected signatures for a ballot initiative to decriminalize marijuana in Santa Fe. She also views medical marijuana programs as a steppingstone to legalization.

In fact, both Hillman and Barron say that "all use is medical."

"Our whole culture has come to judge getting high as a bad thing, when in actuality getting high is kind of an inner desire to connect with something higher and something meaningful in ourselves," Barron says. "Whether you call it medicinal or recreational, I think it's one and the same—our desire to feel whole and happy."

Still, the city doesn't seem to have an organized approach to changing law-enforcement practices here. Santa Fe's new city ordinance dropped penalties of possessing one ounce or less of marijuana from a misdemeanor punishable with a $50 to $100 fine to a civil infraction costing $25. Police officers, however, are permitted to cite either the new, less strict city law or the harsher state law in marijuana cases.

And apparently all of them feel that the harsher state law is the best way to go. Citation forms for the new city law weren't provided to city's police until January, and since then few have been used.

Santa Fe Police Department spokeswoman Andrea Dobyns says "some" have been issued but couldn't immediately provide details. Deputy City Attorney Alfred Walker says those who are issued citations can appeal to a hearing officer or agree to pay a fine. He tells SFR that to his knowlege, no hearings have been held, and also couldn't say if anyone has paid a fine to date.

Dobyns argues that police have nothing against making civil citations for pot possession and want to "work with the City Council on this 100 percent." Most of the time when people are cited for possession under the state law, she maintains, it comes with other crimes committed on the spot.

For the most part, she's right. An SFR investigation of city marijuana citations last fall found that, with some glaring exceptions, few people arrested for possessing small amounts of marijuana went to jail. Dobyns says the department will soon start roll call training with officers about the city law.

"It's a new thing for officers," she says. Kaltenbach expresses frustration over that point.

She's disappointed the police don't seem to be honoring the wishes of voters or local lawmakers.

"I think it's a whole culture shift," she says. "And we're going to have to work with them until it becomes a practice."

Still, Kaltenbach predicts that within five years, New Mexico could finally legalize recreational marijuana. That may be optimistic, given that it hasn't gotten far, and many local lawmakers still make Reefer Madness-esque talking points. But this legislative session did mark the first time a legalization bill ever passed a committee in the Roundhouse. In other words, the question of legalization in New Mexico is more a matter of not if, but when.

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