The good news: Oregon may have a marijuana legalization measure on the ballot soon. The bad news: It would give the state a monopoly on cannabis sales:
[Legalization advocates] plan to put the issue on the 2010 ballot with an initiative called the Oregon Cannabis Tax Act.
If they can gather 87,000 signatures to put it on the ballot, and voters then approved the initiative, the act would set up the Oregon Cannabis Control Commission. The new agency would sell pot to buyers 21 and over, with 90 percent of the profit going to the state’s general fund and 10 percent for drug treatment.
Activists last put a legalization measure on the ballot in 1986. It got just 26 percent support. But after decades fighting to legalize pot in Oregon, they believe the public has come around.
Have we learned nothing from the Oregon Liquor Control Commission? If we do this, it will take us forever to get new, artisinal brands of pot on the market, “coffeehouse” owners will lose money for months while they wait for licenses, and all the coolest cafes will open in California.
Here’s my idea for a compromise measure: Attach a rider eliminating the OLCC, transferring all its employees to the OCCC. Pot smokers are more relaxed than drinkers anyway, making them much better equipped to deal with lazy agency bureaucrats.
For a glimpse of what happens when the government is the sole distributor of a good, be sure to check out Doug’s write-up of the current state of liquor sales in Washington state. It’s hard to find stories that make the OLCC look good in comparison, but this is one of them.
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The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports on an nineteen state effort to start imposing local sales taxes on internet purchases:
On Tuesday, Washington joins 18 other states that require some e-commerce businesses to collect sales tax. About 1,100 online retailers have volunteered to collect, and in return, Washington promises not to sue them for back taxes they might have owed. Three more states are on the way to adopting the law.
This isn’t an issue I’ve followed closely, but I’m generally in favor of tax-free sales as a useful form of competition that keeps local rates in check. (They’re not technically tax-free now, but the legal obligation to pay falls on consumers and is largely unenforceable.) Changing the point of taxation to the location of the buyer from the location of the seller also threatens to hit businesses with high compliance costs:
The law was poorly thought out, said Karen Evans, accounting manager at Aptech Systems Inc. in Black Diamond.
“I’ve been talking to our state representative, trying to figure out how in the world this legislation got passed,” she said. “I know there are reasons for it. Some of the bigger companies are pushing for it, but they’re doing it on the backs of all the small businesses around the state.”
The problems facing small businesses are two-fold. First, businesses must change their online software to recognize Washington’s 350 taxing districts.
“Ninety-nine percent of our sales goes out of state,” Evans said. “We’ve had to invest $1,000 so far for something that affects less than 1 percent of business.”
Second, if the law goes national, small businesses will have to decipher the thousands of tax codes in the U.S. and file tax returns up to several times per year for each of them.
And the end of this paragraph stands out:
The change does not affect deliveries to outside of the state, wholesale sales, services, sales of vehicles, aircraft, mobile homes or boats or towing companies. Florists also are exempt.
Why are books taxable and flowers not? No logical reason, florists just happen to have a well-connected lobby. That’s the kind of random exception that’s bound to creep into local tax laws, making life hell for retailers trying to keep track of them all.
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Old Spice has released a “scientific” ranking of the nation’s sweatiest cities, based on simulations of how much people would sweat walking around in the summer months. Phoenix tops the list. The good news for me is the bottom three: Portland at 98, Seattle at 99, and San Francisco at 100. The case for the Pacific NW looks better and better.
Houston ranks predictably high at number 7, while Washington comes in surprisingly low at 48. Having lived in both cities, I can say that Washington deserves a much higher score. The difference is in adaptation. In Houston you step out of your air conditioned home into your air conditioned car and park right next to your destination, which of course will also be air conditioned. Even in the denser parts of downtown parking isn’t better than in DC, and if you have to walk you can do so along the extensive underground tunnels.
In DC, in contrast, you have to walk more. If you do drive odds are you won’t be able to park very close to your destination. Taking the Metro involves significant waiting time in balmy tunnels. And our buildings, being older than Houston’s, often feature much less effective AC systems. People who tell me that since I grew up in Houston I must find DC’s humidity easy to deal with have no idea what they’re talking about. Aside from playing sports or doing yard work, it’s not something you have to deal with nearly as much there. In this aspect, at least, Houston has the advantage.
[Via the Capital Weather Gang.]
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Forget Slutbucks. Cowgirls Espresso, the Washington chain of coffee shacks that features attractive young female baristas in skimpy clothing (previously mentioned here), is *ahem* under scrutiny of the Bonney Lake City Council:
The City Council has set aside 30 minutes at a workshop tonight to discuss concerns that the employees at the coffee stands “offend the public decency.”
At the council’s May 13 meeting, 18 citizens complained about the display of skin at the two coffee stands.
“This Saturday I was pumping gas across the street when my children looked over and said, ‘Mom, I see a naked girl,’” said Tawnya McLavey. “Here we have it right in our city and our community people barely wearing clothes that are serving coffee. I was so disturbed by that.”
Councilman Mark Hamilton said the council has asked the city attorney to review the law to see if anything can be done, but he’s not sure whether the city can regulate coffee stands. That’s what the council will be discussing tonight.
“It seems to be the crux of the problem, that these ladies can be viewed from a public street,” Hamilton said. “We know we can’t regulate the establishment or what the girls are wearing, but we’re hoping something can be done about them being visible from the drive thru. We know it’s a stretch.”
I don’t have a strong opinion on this, but with me likely going back on the job market soon I hate to see any work possibilities closed off…
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Jacob Grier is a freelance writer, barista, mixologist, and magician in Portland, OR. He writes, eats, and drinks a lot. His articles have appeared in The Washington Post, Reason Online, The Oregonian, and other publications.
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