The country will decide who our next president will be on November 8th, but Massachusetts voters will also make decisions on ballot questions that will have a significant impact locally. Here’s why I will vote #NNYY next Tuesday.
No On 1
As a longtime opponent of expanded gambling in Massachusetts, I am opposed to allowing yet another slot parlor to the state. Expanding gambling hurts local small businesses, and increases the number of people falling into crime, addiction, and foreclosures. Additionally, I am deeply disturbed that Question 1 was bankrolled by one wealthy developer who is using the ballot process for his own gain. That is why I am voting no on Question 1.
No On 2
Question 2 is a deeply flawed charter school referendum that is being funded by Wall Street venture capitalists, and has the serious potential to drain significant education funding from public schools across Massachusetts. It’s critical to read this one passage from the summary of Question 2, and think of its consequences:
“New charters and enrollment expansions approved under this law would be exempt from existing limits on the number of charter schools, the number of students enrolled in them, and the amount of local school districts’ spending allocated to them.”
This ballot question is not about whether charter schools are good or bad for students. It’s about whether we can afford Question 2 at a time when the state continues to underfund our public schools, including Chapter 70 education aid, the Special Education Circuit Breaker, regional school transportation, and the charter school reimbursement – state data show that local school districts will lose more than $450 million to charter schools this year, even after state reimbursements. Adding more charter schools will lead to even more funding cuts for all Massachusetts public schools, leaving taxpayers with the responsibility to plug gaps in their local school budgets.
Wealthy out-of-state investors are spending historic amounts of dark money to increase the number of charter school in Massachusetts because they stand to make huge profits from bringing Walmart-style business principles into our public schools. I strongly urge voters to vote no on Question 2 so we can get back to improving all public schools in the Commonwealth.
Yes On 3
This proposed law would prohibit any farm owner or operator from knowingly confining any breeding pig, calf raised for veal, or egg-laying hen in a way that prevents the animal from lying down, standing up, fully extending its limbs, or turning around freely. As society becomes more thoughtful about how we treat our animals, including those for consumption, I think that this ballot question provides reasonable protections and living conditions for confined animals. That is why I will vote yes on Question 3.
Yes On 4
Approximately 800,000 adults use marijuana recreationally in Massachusetts. Yet except for exceptionally small amounts, it is still illegal to possess marijuana allowing drug cartels and criminals to control the marijuana supply in our communities.
It’s time to bring a public health approach to marijuana distribution: legalizing, regulating, and taxing marijuana will bring the use and sale of marijuana out of the shadows, and reduce the crime and chaos in our communities. In addition, as Massachusetts continues to face an opioid crisis driven by prescription painkillers and heroin, we can give ailing residents the alternative of using marijuana to alleviate their pain instead of harmful opioids.
Additionally, racial disparity in policing disproportionately impacts black members of our community. It’s disturbing that black Massachusetts residents are 3.3 times as likely to be arrested for having marijuana than white residents in Massachusetts, even four years after medical marijuana became legal. By legalizing marijuana, Massachusetts voters can strike a blow for criminal justice reform, and take an important, if modest, step towards reducing mass incarceration of non-violent youth.
Finally, legalizing, taxing, and regulating marijuana would generate additional revenue for the state to invest in essential government services such as public education, transportation, human services, and public health. For those concerned about teen use of marijuana, there is no evidence that teen use has increased in states where marijuana has been legalized. If we’re serious about reducing teen drug use, it’s much better to have a public health approach, like tobacco and alcohol, where state resources and strategies have successfully reduced teen use of each drug.
For all of these reasons, I’m voting yes on Question 4.
NNYN
and thank you, Senator Eldridge, for your courageous and bold leadership, not just on the ballot questions but for mentoring and supporting our next generation of progressive leaders.
The good Senator knocked over 800 doors in my hometown of Wakefield last Saturday with 50 volunteers from NARAL, Planned Parenthood, several unions and Congressman Seth Moulton’s office for our 9th Essex District state representative Democratic nominee, Jen Migliore.
Fred Rich LaRiccia
Campaign Manager
The Migliore Committee
This is an act of rare courage from a state legislator.
I voted last week.
I image there are some decent points, these aren’t it.
Oh, boy. “public health approach” is tax revenue. Plus isn’t medical marijuana already legal in MA?
Wait, legalizing marijuana is going to stop racial profiling? Who knew? Plus now we have medical marijuana, could you please tell your earlier point.
“legalizing, taxing, and regulating marijuana would generate additional revenue for the state to invest in essential government services such as public education” that argument sickens me. It’s just so horrible it’s almost unspeakable. Why didn’t you note the drastic rise in people in their 20s, seemed to missed that one.
Use has NOT gone up, deaths have NOT gone up, crime has gone DOWN, and revenues have exceeded projections in Colorado. Teen use has gone DOWN in Colorado and has already gone UP in MA despite the illegality.
And actually medical marijuana isn’t entirely legal here. My friends mother who is undergoing several rounds of chemo and battling for her life is currently ineligible to get any due to quotas on prescriptions and what kinds of cancers are covered. Making it commercially available will actually increase access for medical use, which is what the doctors on tv are discussing.
I have yet to see reality based/data based arguments against legalization that are not just fear mongering about potency and child access, nitpicking about elements of the proposed law lawmakers don’t like despite passing on the opportunity to craft a better law, and imposing personal moral objections to recreational use on others via the law, a highly illiberal position.
John, I wanted to respond to your critiques of my arguments for voting yes on Question 4.
First, a public health approach isn’t simply about revenue. That’s like saying that the cigarette tax, which of course raises revenue, wasn’t used to run advertisements encouraging young people to stop smoking, expanding access to healthcare, or funding tobacco control programs in Massachusetts communities. A public health approach is recognizing that there are a significant number of people who use a drug that is rather benign, allowing people to use that drug, and then crafting policies to ensure that the drug is used responsibly. It’s what we do with alcohol, and it’s been a success, especially over the past 30 years.
Second, legalizing marijuana will help reduce the disparities of arrests of African-Americans and other people of color compared to white residents, because it removes an easy way for police to arrest people in a car, in their home, or on their persons. Right now in Massachusetts, there is evidence that racial profiling exists, including in motor vehicle infractions. If a police officer sees a significant amount of marijuana in a car that he or she has pulled over for speeding, etc., those individuals can be arrested. Or, if police in a majority-minority neighborhood are practicing stop and searching a significant number of black or Latino youths, finding a certain amount of marijuana that a police officer can claim is being sold, is cause for arrest. There are very strong arguments that the “War on Drugs” (see: Tupac Shakur (“Instead of a war on poverty, they got a war on drugs so the police can bother me”), or Michelle Alexander’s “The New Jim Crow”) was created to incarcerate black people, after the end of Jim Crow laws and de jure segregation. The fact that marijuana is still illegal (except for under one ounce under decriminalization) is an example of this flawed War on Drugs.
Finally, which jconway already stated in his post below, statistics so far in states like Colorado show that teen use has either stayed the same, or had a slight increase, post-legalization. Remember, Question 4 is about regulating,, taxing and legalizing marijuana for adults over age 21, and it’s my belief that an increase in teen marijuana use will be negligible. Meanwhile, the status quo is literally forcing grown adults who use marijuana to buy the drug from drug dealers, criminals, only contributing to chaos, unsafe communities, and in some cases violence in Massachusetts.
Portugal decriminalized ALL drugs 15 years ago, and has seen no increase in drug use, by teens or anyone. They have seen a reduction in drug overdoses, which is not really germane to the current topic, but worth keeping in mind.
The current round of scare ads opposing Q. 4 are really ridiculous, and hearken back to Ansliger’s “Reefer Madness” campaign that got us into this mess.
BMG is a great resource on things like the ballot questions.
My positions will be:
1. NO. Anything the casinos want, I oppose. Anything they oppose, I want.
2. NO. Not because I oppose charter schools, which I do not, but because too much of a good thing is a bad thing.
3. NO. I am inherently skeptical of these sort of things that attempt to blur the distinction between agricultural animals raised for food, and cute puppies. I note that there has been a suspicious lack of information about just how many farms located in Massachusetts will be affected. It seems like the market has been moving in this direction anyway, and so I conclude that the overall result of the measure will be to require the affected Massachusetts businesses to complete additional paperwork with respect to something that they are already doing anyway. Which is a waste of time and money by a government that will, forthwith, tell me that it requires more of same from me and others to complete its appointed tasks.
4. YES. The war on drugs is a stupid failure. The vast majority of the ill effects of drugs to which our appointed law enforcement officials ominously describe are effects not of the drugs but of the war on drugs. Anything step in the direction of ending the war on drugs, no matter how small, is a step worth taking.
Question 3 does prohibit “any farm owner or operator from knowingly confining any breeding pig, calf raised for veal, or egg-laying hen in a way that prevents the animal from lying down, standing up, fully extending its limbs, or turning around freely.” – but it “would also apply to business owners who knowingly sell pork, veal, or eggs from animals held in this way, even if the source is outside of Massachusetts.”
That is very different from how this law has been sold to voters. We are told that it will impact just one chicken farm in the state, but it sounds to me like it will ban veal from being served in any restaurant in the state. It sounds like it could result in certain popular brands of foods being removed from our grocery store shelves.
This sounds like a law that the legislature should craft, not one the voters should pass.
but I have a suspicion that that “outside Massachusetts” part is quite unenforceable. There are “reverse commerce cases” about oleomargarine, maybe? that cover this.
Rendered idle by the legalization of pot, will be gainfully employed conducting raids looking for illegally smuggled tortured hen eggs.
I buy cage free when I can, this week I didn’t have time to go to Market Basket so I bought regular eggs at Crosby’s instead. Many of the canvassers I have hired to help pass CPA in Chelsea are honestly living hand to mouth and I don’t see this bill making their lives any easier, even if it makes all of us feel like we did something to help the animals. I think the intention is good, the implementation needs work and I will totally support future laws that are better designed.