Citiwire.net: Neal Peirce on California's Possible Marijuana Legalization, Mary Newsom on Urban/Suburban Tax Yields

California Might Overturn Odious History of Marijuana Laws

By Neal Peirce

For Release Sunday, July 11th, 2010
© 2010 Washington Post Writers Group

Close to 40 years after Richard Nixon sparked America’s “war on drugs,” California voters this November get to vote on the war’s biggest challenge ever.

It’s a ballot initiative making it legal for any Californian 21 or older to grow or use marijuana. If passed, there will be no more requirement to prove medical need (today’s law in California and 12 other states). Cannabis would be subject to taxes, potentially yielding billions of dollars in state, county and city levies.

California will be voting in the wake of Gallup polling that shows nationwide support for legalizing marijuana up to 44 percent, an eight-point jump since 2005. Support is higher in California: recent polls show the legalization initiative leading by margins of 56 to 42 percent and 49 percent to 41 percent.

But that doesn’t assure passage: historically, a modest poll lead for an initiative can melt away, especially as opponents wage fierce negative campaigns close to election day. Stiff opposition to the marijuana measure is likely from California’s “prison-industrial-complex” including police chiefs, prosecutors and prison guards.

Multi-Use Downtown Development Puts Standard Malls’ Tax Yield to Shame

By Mary Newsom

For Release Sunday, July 11, 2010
Citiwire.net

RED WING, Minn. — As local politicians across the country get scorched by voter anger over recession-induced budget cuts — laying off teachers, closing schools and libraries and slashing services — perhaps they’ll be more receptive than usual to some powerful and surprising tax revenue numbers.

So what follows is about fiscal prudence as much as it is about smart city planning.

Conventional wisdom, of course, says that to prop up the property tax base, a high-end shopping mall is just the ticket. But when Sarasota County, Fla., looked at where the county government gets the biggest bang for its property tax buck, it found some numbers that may surprise a lot of people.

Sarasota County Director of Smart Growth Peter Katz, speaking to a meeting of Citistates Associates here late last month, described a recent analysis of the county’s property tax revenue per acre. He pointed first to residential areas. Not surprisingly, when you work the numbers on a per-acre basis, residential property inside the county’s municipalities offered the biggest revenue per acre — a little more than $8,200 per acre for single family houses within the city of Sarasota. This makes sense, as in-town land values tend to be higher.