COLUMBIA, MO (KBIA) - A group of University of Missouri students rallied on campus Thursday in support of bringing the school's marijuana policies in line with its alcohol policies. The university's chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws handed out fliers at Speaker's Circle and presented an initiative to MU Chancellor Brady Deaton.

The so-called Emerald Initiative calls for the university to equalize its marijuana policies with alcohol policies. The group's president Scott Lauher says marijuana and alcohol are the top two most popular recreational substances in college. As such, the university should not punish people more severely for using marijuana than alcohol.

"I just think we need a little sanity in our marijuana policies. Being involved with this, I've heard so many people who have been kicked out of the dorms, who have been arrested in the dorms for not much of a reason but for owning marijuana. Yet when I lived in dorms, the people who were causing problems were the people puking in the halls or urinating down the stairwells. Those were the drunk people."

The group also says the stiffer penalties for marijuana, but not alcohol, is pushing college students to drink dangerously. © Copyright 2010, KBIA

Student group says it backs 'responsible use' 

It's spring, and a young man's fancy turns to, well, marijuana at Kent State.

Freshman Dave Goldstein and other students in a pro-marijuana group will rally Thursday to coax university officials to be more lenient to the student use of cannabis.

''We condone the responsible use of marijuana. We don't think you should get high and go to class, just like you shouldn't get drunk and go to class,'' said Goldstein, a political science major from Highland Heights who said he smokes pot daily.

The nationwide organization Safer Alternative For Enjoyable Recreation of Denver has sponsored nationwide rallies at 80 colleges and universities in April to promote debate on pot.

SAFER believes that pot is safer for the user and for society and should be put on an equal footing with alcohol.

Marijuana advocate Mason Tvert, founder of SAFER (Safer Alternative For Enjoyable Recreation), notes that the Camera left out one other community: Denver. Indeed, Tvert helped lead successful initiative campaigns in the Mile High City in 2005 and 2007.

Tvert wasn't part of the Nederland movement, but he hardly feels left out. "It was a totally citizen-led effort," he notes, "and it demonstrates that citizens around the state are becoming increasingly fed up with irrational marijuana policies that steer people toward drinking and away from using a less harmful substance."

This message is the same one Tvert and hundreds of supporters delivered at campuses around the country on April 1. He judges the effort a success.

Voters in the town of Nederland voted on Tuesday and approved a ballot measure that removed all local penalties for private adult marijuana possession, making the mountain town the third Colorado locality to legalize marijuana in the past five years.  

Denver voters adopted a citizen-initiative to do so in November 2005, and voters in Breckenridge approved a similar measure in November 2009.

More than 54 percent of Nederland voters supported the measure in what Town Clerk Christi Icenogle said was a high turn-out election.  

Voters also ousted incumbent Mayor Martin Cheshes, who had vocally opposed the measure and referred to it as "foolish," replacing him with Trustee Sumaya Abu-Haidar. 

Prior to the announcement of the vote, the Boulder District Attorney Stan Garnett told The Daily Camera: "I'll pay attention if it passes.  Marijuana enforcement is a sensitive issue, and it's important to gauge public sentiment.”

Last week, UCF’s Golden Rule Review Committee voted on a new policy that would equalize the consequences of marijuana and alcohol use among students. The Future has supported this cause with endorsements in our paper since 2008.

Despite the work of several student organizations lead by the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, UCF has yet to change school policies.

Since the cause won the vote of the Golden Rule Review Committee, it can advance to administration for approval. The next step is to move the proposal to the desk of Dr. Maribeth Ehasz for approval at the end of this semester. We are hoping that the constant support of this cause will motivate Ehasz to get these changes into effect as soon as possible.