Tweet
A new report from the Vermont Legislature’s Joint Fiscal Office shows that decriminalizing marijuana would result in the state saving roughly $700,000 a year, making it a fiscally conservative move. From WCAX:
Rep. Jason Lorber is pointing to a new study that shows the state spends over $700,000 going after people with less than two ounces of pot.
“And there’s some violent crime out there. There’s murder, there’s rape, there’s serious crime they can focus their attention on. And focusing on and diverting their time away and going after people with one or two ounces of pot doesn’t make a lot of sense,” said Lorber, D-Burlington.
While $700,000 may seem small, it is significant savings when you consider that Vermont only has a population of roughly 620,000. That is a saving of roughly $1.13 per resident of the Green Mountain State.
The recent election of Democrat Peter Shumlin as Governor has significantly increased the chances that Vermont will decriminalize marijuana in the near future. Shumlin has been a vocal supporter of reform. Being able to show that decriminalization should save the state money will likely make the task of shepherding a bill through the legislature that much easier.
15 Comments
If little ol’ Vermont could save $700k, just think how much the larger states could save
it is significant savings when you consider that Vermont only has a population of roughly 620,000. That is a saving of roughly $1.13 per resident of the Green Mountain State.
Well, that’s certainly putting it “bluntly”.
heh.
that’s a really low number and i question it; does it include incarceration expenses, court costs, police hours, and other costs related to enforcement? i suppose it must, but that’s just sort of surprisingly low and i would’ve guessed it more.
decriminalization also would bring huge amounts of money into the state, in the form of pot tourism. i suppose some VT folks wouldn’t want to see DFHs coming and spending a weekend there, dropping lots of money on food and cheetos and hotels while they’re at it, but some small business owners would. advocates of sanity wrt pot should always point out the income, as well as the savings. there could even be a small tax assigned to “personal” quantities. nothing over-regulated, but just a “tax stamp” on every oz of say, 5-20$. dealers would pay it (or rather, pass on the costs to customers) and those who are true hippies and just grow it and give it away would not be overly burdened.
My guess is that Vermont probably does not go as aggressively after marijuana users as some of the other states in the first place, which would account for a lot of the lower costs.
This same scenario plays out in every state.
While there are states trying to address this (however unsuccessfully) there are those who are proud as peacocks that they trample the human rights of those who just possess cannabis. Not to mention the Federal Gov’t hypocrisy – DEA storming into homes, trashing property, assaulting the infirm and handicapped people who legally possess medical marijuana with no remorse or guilt. Stone cold, heartless federal stormtroopers attacking those who can defend themselves the least.
Expect no relief from Obama. He’s sold his soul to McConnell and Boehner for 30 pieces of silver.
Just wanted to point out something:
Vermont, like Minnesota, had a change in governors from Republican to Democratic. This shows that the wave this year wasn’t so much pro-GOP as pro-change, and the main driver was the need to fix the economy. Putting $700,000 back into Vermont’s economy is a non-trivial boost.
finally a topic that I know something about…
Marijuana decriminalization is such an amazing no-brainer cost-cutter for the States. States creating their own banks is too. Given that Bill Clinton is left standing at the podium (“1997 Breaks Out in Washington with President Clinton Press Briefing“), what’s stopping you?
Little ol’ Vermont is actually a pretty progressive place. I’ve driven up to Vermont many times, Brattleboro is a cool Bohemian like village. It’s also the state that Bernie Sanders is from, so that may say a lot about it’s residents.
of course it was. not really surprising, imho. clinton had many flaws, but he was political genius for propagating the idea of “it’s the economy, stupid.” on par with Tip’s “all politics is local.”
i just got done writing a long and very personal email about how some of us are experiencing the economy to…wait for it… a rich economist. who very clearly has no idea why a 300$ “tax cut” next year means next to nothing to people who are busy choosing between having a meal today or keeping the heat on or buying their kids new shoes because their toes are poking out of the old ones. and can’t have all three, but only one.
poor people don’t go away just because they are poor, nor do they just because politicians ignore them. and there is no one more angry than a middle class voter who has realized that they are suddenly in the ranks of the poor and likely to stay there for a long time. imho, that is what the election results were about, and in our duopoly, the only way people have to express their anger is “throw the bums out” no matter who those bums may be.
Book Salon up with Greg Mitchell’s Campaign of the Century: Upton Sinclair’s Race for the Governor of California and the Birth of Media Politics hosted by David Dayen
But beware the myth that we’re all granola treehuggers; our little state has a solid core of die-hard old-time conservative yankees, the crowd that got up in arms a decade ago when Howard Dean was pushing for civil unions. They are a force to be reckoned with — hence the past six years with Governor Jim Douglas, a pathetic loser of a Rove Republican and a painfully tight race this year to at long last replace him w/ a Democrat rather than his even more contemptible sidekick, Brian Dubie.
So, yes, while we’re awfully proud of Bernie and think he represents what Vermont could and should be about, the full picture is a bit more complex.
It’s just too bad that some of the people who get this stuff on the ballot don’t seem to have very good timing. I live in California where this thing would have gone over huge if it had been on the ballot in 2008.But instead, they put on the ballot in 2010 when most of the young people stayed home because the big “O” has turned out to be such a monumental disappointment.
By the way, I just came from the Huffington post site. Man, do they suck. Nearly every comment you make has to be reviewed by one of their nazi censors before it’s allowed to be posted. HP sucks, go FDL.
A guess would be that this number is for law enforcement only.
This will be the way its legalized, state by state. So give it about 20+ years. :-)
correct, about HP.
I agree with your characterization of Huffington-Nazi Post!
I also boycott those scum sucking minions of the powers that be.
Arianna Huffington should be ashamed of what she is perpetuating.
The Anons should wreck that site!