HomeMy WebLinkAboutCOM 0314.010 1996-1998 r. r
'97 JU, 20 Pi, 2 CO
CGU, , ,
Janet Publico COUM Y U} HA~NAIf
Papaikou
June 13, 1997
Deaz Council Chairman and members,
I would like my testimony to be part of the record of the Council and placed on the Council
agenda for discussion. I feel that the benefits of marijuana aze many, and that it is being
demonized to a great degree. I do not believe it is the gateway drug because mast people have
tried mazijuana, and most people did not go to hazdet drugs. Truthfully, making marijuana illegal
has only pushed more of our people into hazder drugs because they aze inexpensive and available.
I am very worried about our people accidentally getting hooked on crack or ice, because it leads to
thievery and violence. Marijuana leads to peacefulness, unless someone keeps ripping off their
plants. Anyone would get mad if they put the time and love into growing a little herb, and then it
gets stolen again and again. The police talk about booby traps, but I have never personally known
anyone who has booby trapped their plants, but I know of a lot of nice people who have tried to
grow over and over only to get their plants stolen.
I think it is time to listen to what the people really aze saying. Most of us shake our heads that
alcohol is legal and marijuana is not. We tell our horror stories of violence which was caused by
alcohol. Personally, I don't enjoy alcohol because it makes me uncoordinated, loud and sloppy;
but it is supposed to be good for you to drink occasionally to relieve stress. Mazijuana, on the
other hand, does actually relieve stress. It can actually break through chronic depression and
lethazgy, and add meaning to lonely, workaholic lifestyles. Still the police continue to thrive on
eradication efforts, focusing our attention on booby traps and away from reality.
I think it is time for a change of thinking, and a lobbying of the Legislature to change bad laws.
Based on President Clinton's Executive Order making hemp a strategic plant, we should at least
amend the Hawaii Revised Statutes to allow for the growing of industrial hemp. I have seen
beautiful materials made from hemp, I have heazd of strong boazds made of hemp, I have heard of
the oil which is superior as a food, which is superior as a lamp oil, superior as the wick in the
lamp, superior as roap, canvas. I have heazd it is useful in medications; and I can attest it is also
useful as a cure for chronic depression and lethazgy. Possibly people who aze never depressed
will never need to smoke mazijuana because they aze not lethazgic in the first place; but for those
of us who feel stress and depression, mazijuana is the only thing we ever want. You don't have to
worry about it being a gateway for me because, as I said, I don't even like alcohol because it
makes me [oo drunk, and I don't like getting my brains scrambled.
People that go to hazder drugs like crack and ice either have serious emotional problems, or they
accidentally try it out of curiosity and get hooked. I am very worried about school children trying
it because it is so available, and accidentally getting addicted, and ruining their lives. I am not
womed that they will try booze because most of us adults remember the thrill of trying alcohol
when we weren't old enough to drink, but doing it because it was a party, and it was sort of fun to
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Ret. JllN 2 p 1997
get loose and silly. I don't worry about kids experimenting with a little pot smoke because it really
isn't addicting as much as it is enjoyable and relaxing. But I really worry a lot about kids trying
crack and ice at parties, liking it, and getting hooked. We should stop lumping marijuana and
crack and ice as equally dangerous, because doing that is dangerous. Doing that is minimizing the
dangers of crack and ice in the minds of young people. On the other hand, continuing to
demonizing mazijuana to children through programs like D.A.R.E. are making children skeptical
of the honesty of the program. A great majority of parents enjoy smoking a joint once in a while,
and most pazents do not wnvey a negative message to their children about dangers of marijuana
because they themselves don't believe it is dangerous. So when children go to school and heaz
about the dangers of marijuana, crack and ice, they aze skeptical to some degree about the honesty
of the claim.
The dangers of crack and ice seem to be downplayed as the police and DEA seem obsessed with
mazijuana, which is regazded as quite hamiless by most experts, and even in the minds of most
citizens who conclude that crack and ice aze much worse. Our drug rehabilitation facilities are
woefully inadequate and useless for most addicts of addicting crack and ice who are left to roam
the streets until arrested for some crime. Yet the friendly pot smoker is mercilously attacked.
Most of the people I know can't believe that cigazettes are legal but marijuana isn't. For a lot of us,
we don't enjoy the gassy smell of a lit cigazette. Thankfully, I gave up that bad habit because it
caused me to have frequent tonsilitis, smokers cough and bad breath. Mazijuana smoke is much
cleaner, without the additives they put in cigazettes that keep it burning to the end. It actually
breaks up the phlegm in your lungs and is an expectorant. ff we can be honest, cigazettes aze
much more dangerous and addicting than marijuana.
The police aze at the mercy of unfair laws, and it would be wise to consider amending Hawaii
Revised Statutes regazding marijuana so the police will be able to focus on more dangerous dnigs
that aze easy to get and can be hidden because of lack of smell (such as smoking) which make
them attractive to young people who have not been exposed to the truth of crack and ice, who do
not know that it changes good people to bad. More and more people seem to have stories to tell of
crack addicts in their families, and the destruction and damage it does, selling worldly possessions
for the crack and ice habit. Marijuana never was as destructive.
Then there are stories about the alcoholic who lost the urge to drink when he smoked, and became
a nice mellow person rather than the obnoxious mean dnmk he once was. There aze some people
who are really mean, ugly people who I wish would smoke marijuana before they hurt someone.
The majority of people that I know who enjoy smoking marijuana don't drink, don't smoke
cigazettes, and aze nice quiet law-abiding citizens. We want the right to smoke mazijuana as
granted to us by the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act enacted by Congress in Washington
D.C. because according to the Bible, page one, on the third day, God created every herb bearing
seed, and God saw that it was very good. That on the sixth day, "God saw everything that He had
made, and indeed it was very good." Genesis 1.
I ask the Council to be realistic, to ponder why one branch of the Federal Government wants to
prove itself stronger than the President and cause much hype and hysteria in people's quiet lives at
a time when we aze having a hazd time surviving economically, and would be well served by
supporting industrial hemp products--there aze so so many possibilities. Can the County Council
comprehend the possibilities of happy people working in the fields, working in the factories,
proudly making beautiful hemp products from the Big Island? Tourists would be delighted to buy
our wares. What else could make more sense?
Otherwise, besides the brainwashing of many nieve people into believing in the demonizing of the
good marijuana plant, I hope that we will support the Legislature in their attempt to open their
minds to industrial hemp. I hope that we will support the Mayor's Office who supported the
industrial hemp project. I hope that we will listen to the loud hints thrown at the Council by the
proliferation of police who repeated over and over that they must only uphold the Hawaii Revised
Statutes laws that draw no distinction between zero and high THC levels, thereby almost begging
the Council to see the light and change those boring laws by supporting efforts initiated by the
Legislature.
Also it is unlawful that the Federal Government would be interferring in state laws to regulate
people, and to our Hawaii Privacy Laws which were enacted to specifically allow for use of
Cannabis in the privacy of your own home.
The DEA ignored the opinion of its own Judge in the value of mazijuana; the DEA ignores the
testimony of many doctors as to the value of mazijuana, and the American Medical Association,
and British Medical Magazine. Yet the DEA has it's own fenced in "experimental" marijuana
growing operations and sends hundreds of joints to a select few, and test it as they wish. It seems
obvious that it is not the health and safety of people that wncerns the DEA in their mezmerizing
the law enforcement personnel into this mass destruction, but their own selfish greed.
I am a law abiding citizen, but I want to smoke marijuana sometimes. I hope that you will begin to
think about the reality of the God-given herb, that we aze good people. You don't heaz of
someone smoking a joint and making trouble--unless they have also been drinking or doing
something else. Mazijuana, as many doctors aze saying and I can assure you, is a beneficial plant
and not bad for you. I can only look at this waz on marijuana as an attempt to capitalize on the
valuable cannibis plant.
Please try to understand. Thank you for listening.
Janet b