.The 2012 Legalization Nation Index

A look back at a glorious, ignominious year — in numbers.

55 percent to 45 percent: the margin by which Washington’s legalization Initiative 502 passed.

55 percent to 45 percent: the margin by which Colorado Amendment 64 passed.

1 ounce: the amount of cannabis that is legal to possess for adults 21 and older in Colorado and Washington.

6: the number of plants that adults 21 and older are legally allowed to grow in Colorado.

0: the number of plants that adults 21 and older are legally allowed to grow in Washington.

5: the amount of nanograms of active THC per milliliter of blood that now constitutes an automatic “drugged driving” conviction in Washington.

$1.8 billion: the estimated amount that Mexican drug trafficking organizations will lose due to legalization of marijuana in one state, according to The Mexico Institute for Competitiveness.

$300 million: the estimated police and court costs of 25 years of pot prohibition in Washington, according to the Marijuana Arrest Research Project.

$60 million: the estimated amount of revenues and savings each year generated for the state of Colorado from regulating marijuana like alcohol, according to the Colorado Center on Law and Policy.

$133: the estimated cost for an ounce of legal marijuana in Colorado.

$12: the estimated cost per gram of legal cannabis, including taxes, in Washington, according to state figures.

100: the estimated number of pot growers that will receive state licenses in Washington.

328: the estimated number of legal pot stores that will open in Washington.

187,000: the estimated pounds of legal pot that will be consumed annually in Washington.

363,000: the estimated number of customers who will buy cannabis each year in Washington.

$1.9 billion: the estimated amount of taxes collected from legal marijuana sales in the next five years in Washington.

64: the percentage of Americans who think pot policy should be left up to the states, according to a Gallup poll released on December 10.

51 percent to 44 percent: the margin by which Americans favor pot legalization, according to a Quinnipiac University poll.

67 percent to 29 percent: the margin by which 18- to 24-year-olds in the United States support pot legalization, according to Quinnipiac.

16.7 million: the number of Americans age twelve or older who used marijuana at least once in the month prior to being surveyed in 2012, according to the National Institutes of Health.

71: the percent of US tenth graders who say pot is easy or fairly easy to obtain, according to the NIH.

2,500 to 5,000: the estimated amount of marijuana in metric tons consumed by Americans per year, according to the RAND Drug Policy Research Center.

$0: the most common price Americans pay for pot, according to RAND.

$2.4 billion: the DEA’s annual budget.

9,236: the number of budgeted Drug Enforcement Administration full-time equivalent positions.

757,969: the number of marijuana-related arrests in the United States in 2011, according to the FBI.

43: the percentage of marijuana-related arrests in the US that were for simple possession.

586,320: the number of New York Police Department arrests for pot possession from 1996 to 2011, according to Human Rights Watch.

8-1: the ratio of blacks arrested for pot possession in New York compared to whites, according to Human Rights Watch.

700 to 1,000: the number of patients per day at Harborside Health Center in Oakland.

112,000: the number of patients registered at Harborside Health Center in Oakland.

1 per 4,000: the average number of pot arrests per days of use in the United States, according to RAND.

1: the number of arrests at Harborside’s location over a four-year period, according to the Oakland Police Department.

$1.8 billion: the size of the US Justice Department’s asset forfeiture fund in 2011, according to the US General Accounting Office.

100: the number of employees who will lose their job if US Attorney Melinda Haag closes Harborside Health Center.

1: the Controlled Substance Schedule level for cannabis under federal law, meaning it has no medical use and a high potential for abuse.

6,630,507: the number for the US Department of Health and Human Services’ patent on “Cannabinoids as antioxidants and neuroprotectants … in limiting neurological damage following … stroke and trauma, or in the treatment of … Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease and HIV dementia.”

81: the number of blunts Snoop Lion (né Dogg) reports smoking per day.

7: the number of days per week Snoop Lion says he smokes 81 blunts.

472: the number of dispensaries in Los Angeles.

25 to 30: the percentage of medical cannabis that fails USDA cleanliness standards, according to The Werc Shop.

70,000: the number of signatures turned in for a ballot measure that would regulate LA dispensaries.

14,991: the number of California juvenile arrests for pot possession in 2010, according to the Center on Juvenile & Criminal Justice.

5,831: the number of California juvenile arrests for pot possession in 2011.

61: percent decline in California juvenile pot arrests, thanks to state Senator Mark Leno’s bill that made possession an infraction, according to the Center on Juvenile & Criminal Justice.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

East Bay Express E-edition East Bay Express E-edition
19,045FansLike
14,611FollowersFollow
61,790FollowersFollow
spot_img