When recreational weed was first legalized in CO in 2012, I had no plan that things would evolve at the rate that they have over the ensuing decade.
A giant number of states soon followed suit, with some legislatures making swings in state law while others passed amendments or ballot initiatives in statewide elections. My beach house state just recently legalized recreational cannabis in addition to they’re already seeing a lot of tax money from the legal sales. Portions of the tax money were allocated for education, while others were set aside for statewide infrastructure in addition to health care. It’s reassuring to see these legalization efforts taking off without any drastic complications to dissuade anyone who is on the fence regarding cannabis. I live in Tarzana in Los Angeles, CA in addition to our friends in addition to I all thought that CA would undoubtedly be the first state to legalize cannabis for recreational use because they were the first state to implement a medical marijuana program in 1996. Although the people I was with and I famously failed to legalize recreational cannabis in the 2010 election, CA was the first state to vote on cannabis legalization when it did so in 1978, garnering over 30% of support in a time when the Drug War was actually taking off. However, CA ultimately passed a recreational cannabis law in 2016 in addition to now the people I was with and I have joined the ranks of other western states in having recreational marijuana available. Being in Tarzana, I have to pay both state in addition to county taxes on all of our recreational marijuana purchases. West Hollywood in addition to Los Angeles are even worse, with combined taxes well over 20% on all sales.