Stoughton Community Leaders Attend Seminar on Effects of Marijuana Legalization

From Norfolk District Attorney's Office:

Medical marijuana is rolling out into local communities that are not always well prepared to handle its impact on public health and safety. A question on the fall ballot would to make the drug ubiquitous.

More than a dozen Stoughton community leaders were among 200 local health, school, police and drug-abuse prevention leaders who attended a half-day seminar recently, called "The Impacts of Marijuana: Strategies to address related health, social and legal issues." The event was presented by Norfolk District Attorney Michael W. Morrissey in partnership with the substance abuse prevention coalitions of Avon, Needham, Stoughton and Weymouth, Walpole Police Chief John Carmichael and Attorney John Scheft.

“Colorado’s legalization of marijuana has been a disaster for the people of that state, and it is important that Massachusetts communities be prepared for what is coming,” District Attorney Morrissey said after the event. “Pueblo County Hospitals are working to repeal legalization there. Meanwhile, we have to prepare, at the very least, for broad use under the guise of medicine.”

Fire Chief Michael Laracy was joined by SYC Director Karen MacDonald, SHS PE teachers Jaclyn Bontya and Greg Burke, school health services supervisor Sally Borges, Fire Lt. Timothy Carroll, Coalition Coordinator Lyn Frano, School Resource Officer Sheanna Isabel, Officer Din Jenkins, Planning Board Chair Joe Scardino and School Committee member Joaquin Soares, among others from Stoughton.

“Instead of decreasing underage use, now Colorado has about twice the national rate of users in every age range. The number of black-market seizures has gone up instead of down. The promised tax revenues have been cut by black market sales and disproportionate use of low-tax medical dispensaries instead of taxed retail,” Morrissey said. “It has unfolded as the opponents feared and not as the proponents promised. And one way or the other, it’s coming.”

The May 13 seminar, held in donated space at the Bank of Canton, included model health regulations for dispensaries, K2, Spice and drug paraphernalia, checklists for local boards of health to correctly implement the law and information on home cultivation and how to prevent illegal diversion to children.