70 Comments - Al - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 3:52 pm: Land of the free? - Bubblehead - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 3:53 pm: I think your homebrew analogy is on point. I’m not brewing 5 gallons of pale ale and selling it out of my garage. - DuPage Bard - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 3:55 pm: Growing yourself wouldn’t be a problem if it was only for your personal consumption and you had to report or license your growth. Giving folks the opportunity to do homegrown without any restrictions or licensing opens them up to sell on the off market. This will hurt the business model that is trying to be created. If we’re going to grow and sell marijuana in this state it should be regulated and licensed as with alcohol. There is a three tier system in Illinois to prevent abuse. A three tier system makes sure the state has a handle on the flow of alcohol, the creation of alcohol and the sales of alcohol. All needed components in the process. - Truthiness - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 3:59 pm: =“If the bill has home-growns, it’ll make any type of regulation impossible,” said Wojcicki.= This is just wrong. Regulations will never eliminate a black market completely, but being able to grow 3 plants in your own house isn’t going to make you some drug king pin. It just gives the grower piece of mind that they know what fertilizers, pesticides, methods have been used. Home brewers haven’t caused our society to crumble. If anything they are giving rise to all this new business excitement in micro breweries. Let people experement at home with personal stock and in 10 years we will have new micro-groweries coming up with their own seed to joint products. - Last Bull Moose - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:07 pm: What is the reason for fear here? Do the cartels use home grown as cover for large distribution networks? More explanation is needed. My major concern is that lawmakers are focusing on revenue and not on breaking the cartel distribution networks. Job number one must be to break the cartels. - Rich Miller - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:10 pm: ===it should be regulated and licensed as with alcohol=== And beer can be brewed in your home. You can make your own wine. Take a breath. - Make it So Dude - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:10 pm: Just get on with it. The bill should allow the current med providers to immediately sell off the shelve to anyone of age. - wondering - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:14 pm: I have to wonder if the Chief’s main purpose is the continuation of employment in their industry. MJ enforcement is low hanging irresistible fruit, home grown could keep them employed and fiefdoms secure. - PoliChi - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:17 pm: I expect that price differential/ease of access to shops would be much more important factors in eliminating a black market than whether homegrown marijuana is allowed. In other words, if you want to eliminate the black market, don’t overtax it and don’t be too stingy with retailer licenses. - DuPage Saint - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:17 pm: Get a piece of the pot. Clever - Rich Miller - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:18 pm: And now I can’t get this song out of my head https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PXwReL2JJO0 - Rich Miller - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:20 pm: Plant that bell and let it ring! - Vote Quimby - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:25 pm: About 5 minutes ago I pondered this and agree… I do drink but am too lazy/unskilled to make my own. If I ever get the urge to try a little bit of the cannabis (only if/when it’s legal, natch) I would prefer someone who knows what they’re doing. - Anon - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:28 pm: Let’s do what they did in MA. Up to 6 plants per resident, no more than 12 plants per domicile, but they’re not allowed to sell it. Can’t have a cartel when anyone can have a small farm. - Kayak - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:31 pm: Simple fix: Require home growers to get a license, much like wild ginseng requires. That license costs $7.00 in Illinois. - TheInvisibleMan - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:33 pm: This guy is non-elected. I sincerely hope all the elected officials take a large sampling of their constituents on this issue, and give this one man no more weight than any other individual person. - Illinois Resident - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:35 pm: At the end of the day this is about freedom. Why should alcohol connoisseurs be able to home brew but cannabis users cannot do the same? Are the police concerned about the dangers of home brewing and advocating against it? Hypocrisy, bias, and propaganda. What is wrong with growing a plant at home that is legal to consume? - Illinois Resident - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:41 pm: Frankly, policy regarding the drug war should not come from the police. It should come from 66% of our citizens that want cannabis legalized. Instead of wholesalers and dispensaries making all of the money, new industries supporting home growing supplies can thrive as well. - Earnest - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:41 pm: The gardener in me objects to a complete restriction on home grown. I think of my seed catalogs and the carrots I want to grow that I won’t see at my local store, or the unusual variety of pea or arugula. I’m not interested in growing cannabis and don’t know if it’s a plant with lots of heirloom varieties, but I would support people having the opportunity to do so if they wish. - Homer J. Quinn - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:43 pm: what about people who need it for a medical condition and want to grow to save money? surely their illness is more relevant than some cop’s need to keep his job. legislators, please have the courage to cut police out of these negotiations. they have no interest in the public’s freedom, they only want to make sure they can still throw someone in prison. they are not our parents or our babysitters and they are not moral arbiters; we don’t need them to protect us from ourselves. - Grandson of Man - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:43 pm: For crying out loud, for the gazillionth time, marijuana is less dangerous than alcohol and firearms. Some or many of the people who are anti-legalization have no problem with and actually want few or no gun regulations. The proposal is five bloody plants per household. It would be illegal to grow more. I want people to stop prohibiting me from doing something far less dangerous than certain legal things. - Anonymous - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:45 pm: I don’t understand their concern on this at all, I think they need to better elaborate and communicate the issue they have with how someone growing a plant in their home is helping cartels. The jump is logic (or lack thereof) is just too much for me. - Rabid - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:49 pm: “it will make any type of regulation impossible” that’s the point, you don’t have to make yourself important - Kayak - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:50 pm: “If the bill has home-growns, it’ll make any type of regulation impossible“. If the police can’t count to 5 (plants), I think we have bigger problems. - dbk - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:51 pm: Five plants has probably been calculated for personal use throughout a growing/harvesting season, and may have folks who won’t be able to afford legal cannabis products in mind. Just spit-balling here, but it seems to me that the IL Association of Chiefs of Police might find some other (more) serious issues to address - Illinois Resident - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:51 pm: There are upwards of 1,000 strains of cannabis and it is increasing by the day. Dispensaries will only have a fraction of what is available to grow. There are medical reasons for folks to be able to seek out and grow what they feel is most beneficial to them. - Mirola - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:52 pm: Prosecute trafficking same as before. Depriving lower-income is wrong and elitist. - Annonin' - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:53 pm: Wow the stoners are really racing to comment on this pot plan. Somehow we wonder if we want to follow the chiefs on this one. - RNUG - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:58 pm: == Just spit-balling here, but it seems to me that the IL Association of Chiefs of Police might find some other (more) serious issues to address == Like helping Chicago on illegal possession of firearms cases? Or tracking down shell buyers of firearms? - Illinois Resident - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 5:06 pm: Annonin - Nice way to minimize a very serious topic where upwards of 600,000 US citizens get arrested each year for consuming a plant. - ChicagoVinny - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 5:11 pm: Some small plants per household limit and no resale seems like reasonable compromises. - Lefty Lefty - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 5:12 pm: First, from what I learned during a recent tour of a recently opened distillery (not a brewery or vintner), making hard stuff is still regulated like crazy. That could be a more appropriate analogy. Can you make your own moonshine? Second, I’m for easing the state into this. For all of the freedom stuff, the market needs to be created and supported, and if many consumers can get it for free, Illinois will lose quite a bit of revenue. Third, growing a good harvestable supply is difficult (I’ve heard) so this may leave a window open for the bad guys to stay in the game. Five plants is a lot of usable growth (from the photos I’ve seen). If/when the market and “new normal” (NORML?) has matured, maybe then personal growing can be legalized. Just spitballing here. - Blue Dog Dem - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 5:15 pm: PhilipMoris,Altria have done an excellent job in showing how regulation protects the masses. - Kentucky Bluegrass x Featherbed Bent x Northern California Sinsemilla - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 5:18 pm: So i can buy weed legally but as soon as a seed gets a little water on it and sprouts i am breaking the law again? That doesn’t sound like legalization to me. Illinois has some of the best farmers and farm land in the world and we are going to cut them out of this from the start…and there are some excellent growers and breeders in Illinois who never came above board with the MCPP because of how regulated it is and this will just keep them in the shadows. And as i have commented before there won’t ever be equity in a legal market place without homegrow. People want and need to be able to provide for themselves and homegrow allows that. Legalization without homegrow forces people to buy from the legal or illegal marketplace and that can be too expensive for some. Zip ties with RFID worked in the Emerald triangle as a way to regulate homegrow. And if the cartels are growing more than 5 or in the case of HB 902 twenty four plants then they are breaking law and Mr. Wojcicki can get his people some work. Freedom to purchase, possess and consume without being able to produce is simply a handout for big business. - Blue Dog Dem - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 5:22 pm: Somehow i think this all leads to money. Or lack of. I wonder what law enforcements cash take on pot arrests are, statewide, in a given year. - Anonymous - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 5:23 pm: - Homer J. Quinn - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 4:43 pm: what about people who need it for a medical condition and want to grow to save money? surely their illness is more relevant than some cop’s need to keep his job. legislators, please have the courage to cut police out of these negotiations. they have no interest in the public’s freedom, they only want to make sure they can still throw someone in prison. they are not our parents or our babysitters and they are not moral arbiters; we don’t need them to protect us from ourselves. Will Illinois decide based on listening to The Public…or…The Chief?…I wonder? Is The Chief’s opinion representative of The Public? Is denying The Public’s right to grow an example of The Justice their talkin’ about?…I often wonder. Money ruins everything. - Al - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 5:38 pm: Sick people should have a right to produce their own medicine. Five plants is too small a garden to supply the needs of those dealing with epilepsy, fibromyalgia, neuropathy and the side effects of radiation and chemotherapy. Plant five seeds and maybe some will grow but not all five. Then half on average will be males, which will not produce any medically useful flowers at all. A lucky novice gardener I have read in High Times magazine in an article by Ed Rosethal once stated a half ounce to an ounce is about what they could expect. Using a modest 1 gram a day a plant would not even provide a moderately sick person enough product to last a month. It takes three months to grow it, or something close to that. There are mold issues, mite and other insect and disease issues. There are unexpected times at the Hospital when daily watering can not occur. Sick people need this plant and the homegrowing rules should not require licensing and the plant limit is absurdly low. It is just not serious when we are talking about providing medicine to the sick. Also what is with this one ounce rule relating to possession? When a harvest comes in very sick people often load up on good product from a known supplier. Six ounces or 200 grams would be more realistic. - Al - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 5:41 pm: 25 plants would be more realistic. - Illinois Resident - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 5:42 pm: Al - Agree the one ounce rule is silly. Michigan has much higher limits. I believe that if Illinois allows home grow, the amount of cannabis specific to the home grow does not fall in the one ounce category that will be bought at dispensaries. - Illinois Resident - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 5:48 pm: -25 plants would be more realistic.- Or just unlimited for cannabis period. We can have a 100 bottles of Jack Daniels, 300 cases of beer, 500 cartons of cigarettes, 500 cigars, and multiple firearms in our houses and that is not a problem but a little cannabis and it needs to be regulated to the max to make the police happy. - Anonymous - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 6:05 pm: In addition…bottles full of opiods…benzodiazepines…anti-inflammatory drugs…and a host of other medications…that Big Pharma knows will cost their owners/investors mountains of dough. The Chief probably has a list? - E. Clapton - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 6:31 pm: Looking for a reason to check out of my mind Trying hard to get a friend that I can count on But there is nothing left to show Plant your love and let it grow Let it grow, let it grow Let it blossom, let it flow… - Homer J. Quinn - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 6:56 pm: The police are only able to get away with demanding absurd restrictions because of the public stigma that still exists, and was conveniently created by the police. They told us for so long that this is a bad plant, and using it is bad, and growing it is evil, and giving it to someone else is a felony, that now the public just accepts that the police get to restrict it even when writing the law that will make it legal. They’re insisting that some amount of illegality has to still exist around this plant because… Well just because they say so. I have a relative who died last year from an overdose of poppy tea. The seeds it was made from are 100% legal, the flowers they grew in also legal. Your house would never be raided for your poppy garden even if you grew thousands, enough to OD the whole neighborhood. But cannabis is the scapegoat we’ve got to limit. - Generic Drone - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 6:59 pm: Can you imagine the contact buzz from farmers burning off their weed fields? - Generic Drone - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 7:04 pm: Also, would a weed in a weed field be called a weed? This just brings up all kinds of conundrums - Al - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 7:05 pm: Just stuck my head in the Lincoln room at the library. Given the weather I was surprised, the place was full. - Harvest76 - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 7:45 pm: You know what allows cartels and black markets to thrive? Piecemeal legalization. It’s time for the feds to tackle this and legalize nationally. We will never create a crime-free system, but we can certainly put a dent in it. - norml fan - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 7:52 pm: I don’t think the Colorado experience can be replicated here. For starters, they had plant limits per adult so multiple adults in a home could grow x each. While 5 plants won’t produce much excess to diver to black market, 40 or 50 definitely can. Especially if it can be grown outside (whereas ours talks about indoors). They also had growing with medical use whereas here our medical users cannot currently grow. It is really hard to say its legalization if it doesn’t allow one to grow their own plants. It’s not merely semantics. The prices in our dispensaries are currently above fair market value. Some provides charge 66dollars for 3.5grams or over 8k a pound. That is robbery when they have giant warehouses full. Speaking of which, how does it look if a 250k permit lets me grow 20,000 plants but without said permit I can go to jail or prison for growing a handful myself? Chiefs of police had lots to say about the dangers of passing medical here. Most if not all of their predictions were false. There is not carnage on the roads. Dispensaries are not hotbeds of crime and people are not taking what they get at the dispensary and selling it to children. We have one chance to get this right. If this bill that passes does not include personal cultivation it will be very hard to add it later. Corporate cannabis is what we have now with the medical program. If we continue with this current model the black market will never disappear. - norml fan - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 7:57 pm: I should note: the rules provided in the Colorado link are not the rules as originally implemented. They did make adjustments to cut back on the so called ‘gray market.’ We can learn from what they did originally, why they changed it (scaled it back) and go from there. Also should note: despite people being able to grow their own, CO still sells hundreds of millions dollars of cannabis every year in their legal shops. The homegrowers are not denting retail sales or the tourists/visitors make up for it. Growing 6 or 10plants cannot compete with a dispo with 100varieties at any given time. Convenience will trump most people’s desire to grow their own. Just like with alcohol. Yes, people will hobby brew their own beer. But those same people also buy beer at the store. - Dcmbr83 - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 7:57 pm: If its legalized I would want to be able to grow my own personal because we dont know if the experts will spray stuff on it why would anyone want to smoke something that’s been tampered with I’m not saying they will its just that there is a possibility of it - Harvest76 - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 8:02 pm: I vote for norml fan to be in charge of implementation. - Illinoisboi - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 8:16 pm: I don’t like weed. It smells nasty, it’s terrible to smoke, and it gives a weak watery buzz like lite beer. So it should be regulated at the level of lite beer. - User - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 8:38 pm: “It is really hard to say its legalization if it doesn’t allow one to grow their own plants. It’s not merely semantics”. Homegrow keeps individuals from being forced into either market,one dictated by the state or cartels. This is the only true way something is legalized and legitimized. In my eyes if this doesn’t make it in it’s just one more way Illinois is trying to collect from its citizens. - A Jack - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 9:13 pm: Hemp is now legal to grow anywhere in the US. I doubt that most police can tell the difference just by looking. And if they arrest someone for growing a legal plant, they had better be lawyered up. The reason hemp was originally illegal is because of its similarty to the marijuana plant. Hey officer, I plan on making my own rope with them there hemp plants. Personally I don’t like the smell of Marijuana growing indoors. It has a very strong smell as its growing. - The Guy - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 9:39 pm: Illinoisboi, out of curiosity, when was the last time you smoked weed? The strains today are way more powerful than when I partook in college back in the 70s, not the @weak watery buzz@ you described. You might want to consider edibles. Just don’t do a MoDo (Maureen Dowd). - Homer J. Quinn - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 9:39 pm: A Jack - it’s easy to tell hemp from other varieties on sight. hemp would not have the large fluffy buds that people smoke. it’s also very tall and planted close together. - Anonymous - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 9:44 pm: “It’s dangerous and we’re not trying to be alarmist. It’s just what’s happened in other states,” said Wojcicki. Three lies in a row. - Anonymous - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 10:12 pm: High potency strains of marijuana were available in the 70’s…just not commonly available. Mexican brickweed was most common…and relatively “weak”. Thai sticks Hawaiian BigBud (Sticky Sticks) Colombian RedBud Oaxacan Gold Santa Marta Gold (Colombian) All of the cultivars listed above were super potent stains grown by experienced knowledgeable growers. Marijuana is marijuana…is marijuana… potency depends on plant genetics and on the grower’s skill/knowledge of plant agriculture…It’s not rocket science…fairly simple deal. It is a plant almost anyone can learn to grow…even people with physical challenges…I’m positive. - wordslinger - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 10:20 pm: –I don’t understand their concern on this at all, I think they need to better elaborate and communicate the issue they have with how someone growing a plant in their home is helping cartels. The jump is logic (or lack thereof) is just too much for me.– They’re transparently concerned about losing the big scores of the un-American asset seizure grifts. I thought most of America was on board that these shakedowns really don’t promote public safety in any way, shape or form. It boggles the mind that it still goes on. Enough, already. Rich beat me to the punch with “Homegrown.” Back in 78, me and my crew were young, dumb and way out of line when the 16-year-old among us drove to the old Stadium to see Neil and Crazy Horse on the “Rust” tour. Youth ain’t always wasted on the young. Or Neil Young. Still the best show, ever. You never forget your first. When Neil gets that head of steam, step aside, son, here it comes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0O1v_7T6p8U - A Jack - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 10:24 pm: Its a lot harder to tell a few pot plants in a field of hemp plants than the way they do it now which is between the corn plants. Besides, the intent is to kill the black market. And if you keep costs high by restricting supply, then you allow the black market to continue to flourish. - Anonymous - Monday, Jan 28, 19 @ 11:09 pm: I am nominally in favor of legalizing pot. The home grow provision, I understand, is seen an analogous to home brewing and bottling. It does make me think though, two things will happen with home grows: under-age kids will use it to circumvent the age requirement. Second, humans live for evading the rules and finding loopholes. Just look at NASCAR. You make it law that the limit for home grows is five plants, you will get five plants, but expect in a year to see them hybridized into 30-foot-high monsters like the record height corn stalks at the state fair. The home brewing analogy may not be applicable directly, in that, we only allow amateur home brewers to produce limited amounts and limited potency. No way to regulate that in home grows. I can’t imagine how you regulate and control home grows on an “honor system”. That’s going to violated so bad it erodes public respect for a law that unenforceable. I think to protect the hemp crops, you make all intoxicating pot and med mar ops indoor, hydroponic, “vertical farming” operations, that can run year-’round indoors and secure. You allow counties or regions to choose hemp production or the hard stuff, but not both, so no pollen drift to contaminate the hemp crop. We should be fast-tracking hemp production for sure. - Homer J. Quinn - Tuesday, Jan 29, 19 @ 5:54 am: Anonymous 11:09pm - cannabis has been hybridized and optimized for indoor growing for decades. we already have a law on the books that did that. your last paragraph is backwards. males produce pollen, that’s why they’re culled for medical. the danger is that nearby hemp fields could pollinate and ruin the medical crops. - 33rd Ward - Tuesday, Jan 29, 19 @ 6:18 am: Unbelievable. After decades of locking up stoners, now you’re going to find a way to keep locking them up? What about at least an “I’m sorry about that,” before finding new ways to lock up non-violent folks. Some people like hobbies. What harm is it? - Rabid - Tuesday, Jan 29, 19 @ 7:49 am: Just say no to Prohibitionist - Paige Newton - Tuesday, Jan 29, 19 @ 8:05 am: Contact Lord Zakuza now for urgent help to get back your EX lover. Email: doctorzakuzaspelltemple@hotmail. com - Peoria Rules - Tuesday, Jan 29, 19 @ 8:10 am: How many people grow and sell tobacco on the black market? How many make and sell booze on the black market? What makes cannabis different from other vices in that sense? - Harvest76 - Tuesday, Jan 29, 19 @ 8:28 am: I’m all for total legalization, but to say it has to happen on the first try isnt necessarily true. Homebrewing wasnt legalized until 1978, nearly 50 years after the end of prohibition. - JS Mill - Tuesday, Jan 29, 19 @ 8:38 am: =They’re transparently concerned about losing the big scores of the un-American asset seizure grifts.= Yes, these guys have been on the wrong side of history before. “Safety Checks” and asset seizure just to name two. My suggestions for the Chiefs is to focus on learning the 4th and 14th Amendments respectively and leave personal cultivation alone. Don’t tread on me….bro. - OneMan - Tuesday, Jan 29, 19 @ 8:57 am: This is going to be long. A couple of years ago I was at an engineering group event where they were talking about RFI (Radio Frequency Interference) and how generically there is more radio ‘noise’ then in the past and the issues it is causing. One of the common causes of RFI is fluorescent light ballasts (bad ones) and how a bad one can toss a ton of noise and make it a problem for other people trying to do things like listening to a radio. So this guy had a light that was generating a ton of noise and it was detected because it was causing a ham radio operator issues, so folks came out and figured out where it was coming from. The politely knocked on the door and told the polite man who answered that he may have a light that is generating enough RFI that it was causing a problem, easy to locate and would be noticeable by law enforcement. They also asked if he would you mind giving them the light so they could study it. He was more than happy to turn over the light, and that light became a big issue on ‘home-grow’ discussion boards because of this problem. This sort of noise might be considered to be probable cause for a search if it is not legal for folks to grow their own. If it is legal for people to grow their the noise of one lighting instrument and a host of other things, smell, water usage, etc might not be probable cause. I have never seen a law enforcement group happy about losing a form of probable cause. - Another Illinois Resident - Wednesday, Jan 30, 19 @ 8:20 pm: I hope the ones we pay for law enforcement make their top priority law enforcement. And I hope the ones we pay to legislate laws are paying attention to these comments. Sorry, comments for this post are now closed.