Residents will get a chance to testify Tuesday on whether the Anchorage Assembly should vote to ban commercial marijuana facilities in Alaska's largest city.
The ordinance, introduced by Eagle River Assembly member Amy Demboski, has caused supporters and opponents of the initiative, just weeks past the election, to regroup around the measure.
Demboski's ordinance, if approved by the Assembly, would allow the city to accept the "opt out" provision of Ballot Measure 2, the initiative legalizing recreational marijuana in Alaska.
Demboski has said she would like to see the city take a "wait and see" approach to the rule-making process. In an interview last month, she said the municipality should take its time and watch what comes out of the Legislature and the nine-month marijuana rule-making process that will begin in February, when the initiative goes into effect.
Anchorage appears to be the first community to consider the opt-out provision of the initiative. At least one assembly member on the Kenai Peninsula has indicated he plans to introduce legislation that would ban commercial grow operations in the Kenai Peninsula Borough, while in Fairbanks, leaders came to no conclusions on how they might regulate the substance until after the rule-making process concludes.
For many who supported Ballot Measure 2, the "wait and see" approach seems like too much, too soon.
"When you have a community supporting the initiative and then just a week or two later you have a single Assembly member asking (to) ban it without doing any work beforehand, that sets off alarm bells, particularly in Anchorage," said Taylor Bickford, spokesman with the Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol in Alaska, referencing the fierce debate over AO 37, an ordinance rewriting Anchorage's labor laws.
The campaign has worked to get people to the meeting Tuesday, starting a Facebook event with 86 confirmed guests, creating a form from which people can email Assembly members directly and sending out a mass email from initiative co-sponsor Tim Hinterberger.
Hinterberger, who advocated for the measure throughout the campaign, expressed frustration with the Assembly's move Thursday.
"We hope to remind people (that) why we're doing this kind of stuff is to take it out of the hands of criminals, and now the Assembly is stepping in to try to prevent this," he said.
Bickford noted that if the ordinance passes, the campaign would work toward supporting the industry in outlying areas, specifically the Matanuska-Susitna Borough, in an effort to begin to stifle the black market.
Bickford also said that if the ban is approved, it does little in terms of a policy perspective. If anything, it gives Anchorage less authority to offer input during the rule-making process. He said Anchorage has a chance to be a leader when it comes to crafting marijuana laws, a position it will lose if it opts out now.
"It's just so early. Most people recognize that it doesn't make a whole lot of practical sense for a community to issue a ban before the rules are written," Bickford said. "Nothing is going to happen between now and then. It's really just a political stunt."
All three Assembly members sponsoring the ordinance -- Demboski, Dick Traini and Paul Honeman -- have either announced or indicated some interest in a run for mayor.
Bickford, with the marijuana campaign, was earlier tapped to run Demboski's mayoral bid. In an interview Friday, Bickford said that while the two are friends, he "never really" had a formal position with her campaign and does not currently.
"I agree with her on most things but I disagree with her on this," he said.
Alaska Mental Health Trust Authority CEO Jeff Jessee, a volunteer with the Big Marijuana. Big Mistake. Vote No on 2 campaign, said he did not want to speculate on Demboski's political motivations for introducing the ordinance.
"The conversations I've had with her, she seems to be very thoughtful, which is what I'm interested in," he said.
Jessee said he supports the ordinance, arguing it will create a safer business environment, since businesses won't risk losing money investing in ventures that could be banned once the regulatory process concludes or if, in two years, the state Legislature decides to repeal the initiative.
"The people I hear from are excited about it being introduced," Jessee said. "This gives us a chance to really think through what this might mean."