Poll: 82 Percent Favor Medical Marijuana In Florida

If a medical marijuana initiative makes Florida’s ballot next year, it could pass with an astonishing 82 percent of the vote, according to a new Quinnipiac University poll released Thursday that finds voters also favor outright legalization as well.

Support for the proposed constitutional amendment is strong among voters of every political stripe, age and income level, with independents lending the most support: 88 percent, the poll shows.

The overall 82-16 percent support for medical marijuana is the biggest to date. The previous high-point for Florida approval was about 70 percent in a poll taken earlier this year by the medical-marijuana advocacy group, People United for Medical Marijuana.

There are some differences in wording between the initiative and the Quinnipiac poll; the amendment says doctors can "recommend" marijuana, the poll asks if a doctor should be able to "prescribe" it.

Still, medical marijuana is clearly popular. And marijuana legalization is becoming more-liked as well, albeit narrowly.

Nearly half of Florida voters favor it — 48 percent — while 46 percent oppose pot legalization for personal use. That’s within the margin of error, but it’s a leading indicator of a shift in public opinion. Support for legalization is again strongest among independents (57-37 percent), and then Democrats (55-39 percent).

But Republicans are opposed 30-64 percent. Contrast that with GOP voter support for medical marijuana is solid: 70-26 percent.

One early poll and analysis from People United found that medical-marijuana was so popular that it could alter the course of the governor’s race.

Republican Gov. Rick Scott opposes medical marijuana; Democrats Charlie Crist and Nan Rich support the initiative, which is funded and led by Crist’s employer, trial attorney John Morgan, a Democratic donor. A major Florida Republican donor, former ambassador Mel Sembler, is opposing the measure through his Drug Free America Foundation.

In the race for governor, the Quinnipiac poll found Scott trailed Crist poll by 7 percentage points, 40-47 percent. That’s an improvement for Scott, however, compared to the last Quinnipiac Poll in June, when the governor trailed by 10 percentage points.

Since Quinnipiac’s last poll in June, Crist has lost some standing among independent voters. One possible reason: As soon as the former governor announced he was running for office, Scott began attacking him in television ads that began running a full year before the election.

As for medical marijuana’s fate, the proposed amendment — which takes 60 percent voter approval to pass in Florida — appears to be on an easy path to victory at the moment. But only if it makes the ballot.

The Florida legislative leaders and the state’s Attorney General want the state Supreme Court to block the measure from the ballot, saying the ballot summary is misleading and that it violates a rule that limits the scope of a constitutional amendment to a single subject. People United for Medical Marijuana, the advocacy group pushing the measure, say the criticisms are false.

“This poll shows yet again that Floridians overwhelmingly support a compassionate medical marijuana policy in Florida, despite the continued opposition of out-of-touch, Tallahassee politicians like Pam Bondi,” said Ben Pollara, treasurer for People United.

The Florida Supreme Court will hear the matter next month.

Even if it passes constitutional muster, People United needs to collect 683,149 verified voter signatures by February. People United has gathered 200,000 so far, of which more than 110,000 had been verified last month.

In November, Miami Beach voters approved a non-binding straw poll calling for medical marijuana by 64 percent.

A number of critics are starting to more actively denounce the measure in Florida.

Grady Judd, Polk County’s sheriff and the head of the Florida Sheriffs Association, likened marijuana to more dangerous drugs and pointed criticisms about the effectiveness of marijuana as medicine from the Florida Medical Association, American Cancer Society and the American Academy of Ophthalmology.

“Lawmakers and law enforcement have worked tirelessly to get Florida’s crime rate to its current 42-year low,” Judd said in a statement. “Let’s not roll back that progress by legalizing a drug with no accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse.”

Legalizing Marijuana: The Winners and the Losers

After toiling for decades in relative obscurity, the fight to legalize marijuana for recreational use in the United States is finally having its moment in the sun.

For the first time ever, a recent Gallup poll found a solid majority of Americans in favor of legalizing the drug—a 10-point swing from 2012. The Department of Justice recently said it won't interfere with Colorado and Washington , states whose citizens voted to legalize pot last year. Earlier this month, the city of Portland, Maine, as well as a trio of Michigan municipalities, followed suit and voted to permit recreational pot use.

Four decades after President Nixon declared the War on Drugs, the government's battle against marijuana may be beginning to subside. If the trend continues, it presents a massive business opportunity for people looking to get into the weed business without worrying about pesky drawbacks like getting arrested.

Legal marijuana, already a $1.4 billion industry, is one of the most rapidly expanding markets in the United States. A recent study by Arcview Market Research predicted the industry has the potential to reach over $10 billion within five years and experience growth outpacing that of smartphones.

Conversely, as with any major economic change, this growing acceptance—and possible full-scale legalization—has the potential to  disrupt a whole host of long-standing industries.

Here then is a guide to the winners and losers in the wild world of pot legalization:

Winners

Marijuana sellers

The most obvious profit center arising from the legalization of marijuana is the cultivation and sale of the product to consumers.

Since pot is currently outlawed at the federal level, it's difficult for economists to pin an exact figure on the size of the black market. However, Harvard economist Jeffrey Miron has estimated the overall size of the marijuana economy, which includes both illicit sales and legal ones made in the 21 states (including Washington, D.C.) that allow medical marijuana, at around $20 billion per year with the majority share going into the black market. A 2006 study out of George Mason University  put annual domestic cultivation at somewhere in the neighborhood of 22 million pounds.

Shifting that demand into the legal market presents an enormous opportunity—one that many people are already taking advantage of.

While Colorado voters approved a marijuana legalization initiative last year, the ban on recreational pot sales won't officially be lifted until the beginning of next year. The state has seen a rush of activity among ganjapreneurs filing for the requisite permits to register their operations. Colorado officials expect to see over 100 legal pot shops  open their doors on Jan. 1, 2014.

As the law stands, doing the actual growing and distribution has both pros and cons. ‟The fastest opportunity for profitability in some states centers on wholesale cultivation, whereas in other states vertically integrated cultivation and dispensary operations take the lead," notes the Arcview report. ‟However, these businesses often have the most restrictions on investors and carry the greatest risk of federal enforcement actions."

Ancillary businesses

Outside of growth and sale of the actual plant, the marijuana industry comprises a range of related products and services designed to assist consumers with everything from procuring weed to putting it in their bodies. For a long time, these ancillary businesses have been relegated to dark corners of the counterculture. The increasing legal acceptance of marijuana has the potential to broaden the demographics of those who regularly ingest the drug while simultaneously creating a more mature consumer market where users can be more discriminating in their choices.

One of the companies cashing in on this shift is Medbox (NASDAQOTH: MDBX  ) , a firm that builds automated weed vending machines. Medbox, which was recently the subject of a bruising investigation by the Southern Investigative Reporting Foundation , saw its stock skyrocket from under $3 to nearly $100 following the marijuana-legalizing votes in Washington and Colorado. The price has since settled to around $20 per share.

Other businesses include the dispensary finder and strain review site Leafly,  and the handheld vaporizer the Pax Ploom. The latter is explicitly designed for tobacco use only, but it has managed to gather a sizable following among pot smokers. A review in Death and Taxes magazine recommended it as an ideal accoutrement  "for the executive stoner."

Wellness products

Over the course of the past 40 years of drug prohibition, black market growers have been under pressure to breed their products to become more and more potent. Stronger pot allows people to smoke less of it to achieve the same high. Therefore, suppliers need less space to transport the same monetary value of product. Operating under a prohibition, space is often at a premium because smaller physical loads make it easier to sneak packages past law enforcement undetected.

The downside of this THC ‟arms race" is that consumers who want marijuana products for reasons other than getting baked out of their skulls have been largely left in the dust. As regulations loosen, there's likely to be a corresponding increase in demand for non-psychotropic marijuana-based products targeted at a much different demographic than the stereotypical young, male pothead.

Take, for example, Seattle-based cosmetics company Cannabis Basics, which offers a line of skincare and beauty products. While the lip balms and body lotions sold by Cannabis Basics have virtually nothing to do with getting high, they can only be obtained through licensed clinics in states with approved medical marijuana. Products like these, ones that take advantage of marijuana's non-intoxicating aspects, are likely to expand into wider use if prohibitions are repealed.

Government coffers

Drug prohibition is expensive. Harvard economist Jeffrey Miron told The Huffington Post that it's costing the U.S. government nearly $20 billion a year to keep marijuana illegal. To put that figure in perspective, NASA's budget for 2014 is $16.6 billion.

About half of that expenditure comes from direct government spending on law enforcement, but the rest is the result of lost tax revenue. In November, Colorado voters overwhelmingly approved a ballot measure imposing a 25% sales and excise tax on all marijuana legally sold in the state.

The Colorado vote showed the electorate's willingness to tax marijuana at the same time it resoundingly rejected a measure that would have hiked the state's income tax—indicating that levying sin taxes on legalized pot may prove a broadly acceptable solution for increasing government revenue.

The tax rate on marijuana imposed by Colorado may seem steep, but it could serve as a model for the rest of the country. A RAND Corporation study surmised that widespread legalization would result in an 80% drop in pot prices . As long as taxes don't push the cost of legal weed significantly over black market prices, there's little chance high taxes would push consumers into illicit channels.

Weed tourism

"As some states are legalizing marijuana and others there not, I think a lot of people are going to be surprised by the growth of the marijuana tourism industry," explained Betty Aldworth of the National Cannabis Industry Association. Denver-based My420Tours  offers tours of the Mile High City that founder Matt Brown likens to wine tasting tours of Northern California's Napa Valley, except for pot.

Losers

Private prisons & drug treatment centers

The prison-industrial complex is an approximately $3 billion per year industry that houses about one out of every 10 inmates in the country. The biggest private prison firm,Corrections Corporation of America earned $1.7 billion last year.

CCA's business is largely dependent on the number of people the government feels the need to lock up. ‟The demand for our facilities and services could be adversely affected by the relaxation of enforcement efforts, leniency in conviction or parole standards and sentencing practices, or through the decriminalization of certain activities that are currently proscribed by our criminal laws," the company outlined in its 2010 annual report. ‟For instance, any changes with respect to drugs and controlled substances...could affect the number of persons arrested, convicted, and sentenced, thereby potentially reducing demand for correctional facilities to house them."

Even so, the vast majority of the three-quarters of a million people arrested each year for marijuana possession never actually serve time in prison. Most are issued fines or put into some form of community supervision. Often that supervision comes in the form of drug treatment programs, which could also lose out if many of those court-ordered diversions evaporate due to fewer convictions.

Brewers & distilleries

Christian Groh and Brendan Kennedy of Privateer Holdings, a private equity firm operating exclusively within the marijuana industry, explain that legalization has the potential to do greater harm to companies selling certain already-legal drugs than others. ‟We've found that people don't substitute marijuana for cigarettes, but they do often substitute it for alcohol," explained Groh.

He noted that one of the ideas that sparked the creation of Privateer Holdings in the first place was as a means to attract investment from alcohol companies looking to hedge against any possible losses from increased pot consumption.

Since marijuana is still prohibited at the federal level, large corporate and financial players have stayed out of making direct investments in the pot field. However, alcohol producers could still easily make those investments if marijuana were to be made legal. This potential avenue for investment may be why direct opposition on this front has been less than some have expected. "We're not actually seeing the kind of resistance against legalization that many people assume coming from alcohol and pharmaceutical companies," explained Aldworth.

Law enforcement

In an interview with ABC News last year, the executive director of the Fraternal Order of Police, the largest police union in the nation, said that, ‟the law enforcement community is universally consistent in its opposition to legalizing pot, in the interest of public safety and public health."

While, as reason.com points out, there are some notable exceptions to that rule, law enforcement has been just about the largest single group fighting drug legalization in any of its forms.

This opposition is at least partially due to the drug war being a major funding source for local police departments across the country. One way this occurs is through asset forfeiture , where law enforcement officials confiscate and then sell items—such as automobiles—connected to drug crimes. According to the General Accounting Office, the Department of Justice gave almost a billion dollars raised through asset forfeiture to local police departments in 2011.

Critics argue this revenue-generation mechanism leads police departments to prioritize drug arrests over the investigation of other crimes; however, agencies also use the money to increase staffing and 

purchase new equipment that makes the communities they serve safer.

Medical marijuana dispensaries

In many cases, some of the most vocal opponents of full-scale legalization are the operators of medical marijuana dispensaries. The rationale behind this opposition isn't only that recreational legalization would depress prices and eat into medical dispensaries' market share. Medical marijuana dispensaries are, by definition, places where people go to get medicine. By legalizing pot and then slapping a large sin tax on it, the sense of marijuana as legitimate medicinal product that dispensary owners have worked for years to build, could evaporate.

 Politico reports that earlier this year, Medical Marijuana Caregivers of Maine joined a coalition to oppose a bill legalizing the possession of small quantities of marijuana for recreational use in the state.

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At this point, picking winners and losers is an act of speculation. No market as large as the United States has ever experimented with full-scale drug legalization, so there's no telling what the ultimate effects will be.

When the United States ratified the 21st Amendment in 1933 ending alcohol prohibition, voters and legislators had some idea of what lay ahed, but they had no way of seeing the wave of boozy innovation—some of it positive, some of it decidedly less so—that would wash over the country in the ensuing decades. If local, state, and federal governments decide to do something similar with marijuana, seeing precisely what businesses and regulators do with it may end up being the most exciting part of the whole endeavor.

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Is it time for the U.S. to legalize marijuana?

Is it high time for the federal government to legalize marijuana?

That's what pot activists are asking a day after Colorado voters approved a historic ballot measure to tax legal marijuana sales, and Portland, Me., became the first East Coast city to vote to legalize marijuana for adults.

In Colorado, about 65 percent of voters approved Proposition AA, establishing a 15 percent tax on the wholesale sale of marijuana for adult use, and a 10 percent sales tax on retail marijuana sales, in addition to standard state and local sales taxes. The Colorado Legislative Council estimates that the initiative will generate $70 million in annual tax revenue, some of which will be used to fund the state's public school construction program.

Meanwhile, voters in Portland, Me., overwhelmingly approved Question 1, eliminating all legal penalties for possession of small amounts of marijuana by adults 21 and older within city limits.

In Michigan, three cities — including Lansing — voted to decriminalize the use or possession of up to an ounce of marijuana on private property by anyone 21 years or older.

The Election Day pro-pot victories come on the heels of a national poll that found, for the first time ever, a majority of Americans favor legalizing marijuana for recreational use.

According to the Gallup survey released late last month, 58 percent of Americans favor legalization, up 10 percent in the last year.

“Whatever the reasons for Americans' greater acceptance of marijuana, it is likely that this momentum will spur further legalization efforts across the United States,” Gallup said.

The Marijuana Policy Project, the pro-pot group that pushed the measures in Colorado and Portland, said it plans to campaign for legalization in 13 more states, including ballot initiatives in Maine, Alaska, Arizona, California, Massachusetts, Montana and Nevada, and bills in the Delaware, Hawaii, Maryland, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont state legislatures.

"It is only a matter of time before voters and lawmakers in other states recognize the benefits and adopt similar policies," Mason Tvert, Marijuana Policy Project director of communications, said on Tuesday.

And those who do won't likely face interference from the feds.

In an August memo, U.S. Deputy Attorney General James Cole said that the federal government would not attempt to interfere with efforts, like the ones in Washington and Colorado, to implement marijuana legalization laws passed by state voters.

The statement, coupled with recent votes, seems to have emboldened the legalization movement.

"It's time to move beyond prohibition and adopt a more sensible approach," David Boyer, Maine political director for the Marijuana Policy Project, said.

"We are grateful voters approved funding that will allow for a strong regulatory environment, just like liquor is regulated," Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper said in a statement. "We will do everything in our power to make sure kids don't smoke pot and that we don't have people driving who are high. This ballot measure gives Colorado the ability to regulate marijuana properly."

Miami Beach backs medical marijuana; is Florida next?

Miami Beach voters became the first in Florida to call for the decriminalization of marijuana for medical use in a Tuesday vote that gives a glimpse of statewide support for the issue.

The 64-36 percent approval jibed with state and national polls that show medical-marijuana support approaching 60 percent or more.

The non-binding straw poll — calling on the city to ask the state and federal governments to allow medical cannabis — was so popular that it garnered about 1,000 more votes than the leading candidate for mayor, Philip Levine.

The group People United for Medical Marijuana, which is backing a proposed constitutional amendment to make Florida the 20th pot-decriminalization state, hopes Tuesday’s Miami Beach vote reflects state sentiment.

“It speaks pretty positively to our chances next November,” said Benjamin Pollara, treasurer of the Orlando-based group.

“This was a very low turnout election in Miami Beach,” he said, “it’s a relatively old electorate, and yet it still got close to 65 percent of the vote.”

But opponents say the small 25 percent turnout election in the Democratic-leaning city undercuts the importance of the 6,683 favorable straw-poll votes. They also draw a distinction between the 24-word nonbinding referendum and the two-page statewide initiative.

“Florida’s initiative, like efforts in other states, is about the legalization of marijuana cultivation, marketing, sales, distribution, and use,” Calvina Fay, executive director of the Clearwater-based Drug Free America Foundation, said in a written statement.

“It is about creating a ‘Big Marijuana’ industry like the ‘Big Tobacco’ industry,” Fay wrote. “Once voters understand this, they are less likely to support such a dangerous concept.”

The Florida amendment’s language limits marijuana to medical purposes as determined by a licensed Florida physician, but Fay’s group says the restriction is a distinction without a difference because pot could be prescribed for the most-basic of ailments.

Also, medical marijuana has been a precursor to outright legalization in places like Maine.

Maine’s largest city, Portland, became the first East Coast city on Tuesday to legalize personal marijuana possession by adults. Three Michigan cities on the same day decriminalized pot possession, with Lansing removing all criminal and civil penalties in the same way as Portland.

Now, cities in 14 states have decriminalized it.

Also on Tuesday, Colorado voters approved a 25 percent tax on marijuana sales. That state had legalized personal marijuana use last year.

Nationwide, a recent Gallup poll found support for pure legalization has reached an all-time high, 58 percent.

“The movement to legalize marijuana mirrors the relatively recent success of the movement to legalize gay marriage, which voters have also approved now in 14 states,” according to a Gallup analysis.

Two polls taken by Florida’s medical-marijuana group indicated that voters here still oppose outright legalization of marijuana.

But the back-to-back polls showed voters backed medical marijuana use by 78 percent and 71 percent. A more-recent survey taken by Public Policy Polling indicated 62 percent of Florida voters would support it.

Pollster David Beattie, who conducted one of those surveys, said support is increasing for marijuana’s medical use or decriminalization for a variety of reasons, including seniors who became familiar with the drug in the 1960s and don’t see it as the devil weed portrayed in decades-old scare movies like Reefer Madness.

To make a proposed constitutional amendment a law in Florida, 60 percent of voters have to approve of it.

But before voters decide the matter, the Florida Supreme Court has to deem the ballot summary of the measure isn’t misleading. And then supporters have to gather 683,149 verified voter signatures by February.

People United says it has gathered about 200,000 so far, of which more than 110,000 have been verified.

Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi has asked the state Supreme Court to throw the measure off the 2014 ballot, saying the summary is misleading. People United denies the charge.

Bondi’s fellow Republican, Gov. Rick Scott, also opposes the measure. So do the GOP leaders of the Legislature, Senate President Don Gaetz and House Speaker Will Weatherford, who say they plan to join Bondi’s opposition in court.

The Legislature has refused to put medical marijuana initiatives on the ballot. Legislators have repeatedly refused to give the issue a hearing, even ignoring the 2010 request of the city of South Miami commissioners to consider it.

The two leading Democrats who want to challenge Scott next year, Charlie Crist and Nan Rich, say they support medical marijuana. Crist’s boss, trial lawyer John Morgan, is leading the People United initiative.

But Morgan has said the effort is nonpartisan and is about one thing: medicine for sick people.

In Miami Beach, the straw ballot question grew out of the making of the Square Grouper documentary by local production company Rakontur in 2010.

“With Miami Beach being a leader in progressive laws, we thought a decriminalization effort would be a good idea because it was happening around the country,” said Billy Corben, who founded Rakontur with Alfred Spellman.

They helped start a petition drive that was eventually taken over by the group Sensible Florida, which gathered about 8,000 voter signatures in an effort to stop Miami Beach police from jailing people with personal amounts of marijuana of 20 grams or less.

The City of Miami Beach balked at the initial proposal, the two sides negotiated and, eventually, Miami Beach put the nonbinding straw poll question limited to medical marijuana before voters.

For 35-year-old beach resident Michael McAllister, it was an easy vote.

“If you can prescribe dangerous opiates, why can’t you do it with something less dangerous like marijuana?” he asked. “It’s common sense.”

Medical Marijuana - How to Regulate the Trade - Tips for Florida

Florida's Attorney General Challenges Medical Marijuana Initiative

TALLAHASSEE, Florida (Reuters) - Florida's attorney general told the state's high court on Thursday that supporters of medical marijuana want to mislead voters into approving a proposal to legalize the use of pot for anyone who can convince a doctor they might benefit from it.

In a court filing, Attorney General Pam Bondi challenged a proposed ballot initiative seeking to put the issue of legalizing medical marijuana on a state ballot next year.

A petition drive called People United for Medical Marijuana, organized by Florida lawyer John Morgan, is trying to round up the nearly 700,000 voter signatures required by February 1.

The Florida Legislature earlier this year refused to take up a statutory change proposing to allow doctors to prescribe marijuana under controlled conditions.

Bondi is required by law to ask Florida's Supreme Court to review proposed ballot initiatives, called the medical marijuana initiative deceptive.

"The ballot title and summary suggest that the amendment would allow medical marijuana in narrow, defined, circumstances, and only for patients with 'debilitating diseases.' But if the amendment passed, Florida law would allow marijuana in limitless situations," Bondi wrote in a letter filed to the court.

"So long as a physician held the opinion that the drug use 'would likely outweigh' the risks, Florida would be powerless to stop it," she said.

Ben Pollara, the campaign manager of People United for Medical Marijuana, said Bondi is "out of touch" with the plight of desperately ill patients.

"Attorney General Bondi wants to deny Floridians the opportunity to even vote on this issue," Pollara said in a statement.

A poll commissioned by People United found support in Florida for medical marijuana at 70 percent. To win approval, constitutional amendments require 60 percent support from voters.

Organizers of the campaign so far have 94,541 valid signatures, according to paperwork filed with the court.

California was the first state to legalize pot for medical purposes, and nearly 20 other states and the District of Columbia have enacted similar statutes, although marijuana is classified as an illegal narcotic under federal law.

Florida's Supreme Court does not endorse or oppose constitutional amendments, but rules on two factors - whether they deal with a single subject and whether the written summaries appearing on the ballot are clear enough to let people know what they are voting on.

The proposed amendment states that its passage would not authorize recreational pot use or any violation of federal drug laws.

Bondi, a Republican, said that is deceptive because no state law or constitutional amendment could override any federal act.

"Because of how the amendment is presented, its true scope and effect remain hidden," Bondi wrote.

"And because Florida voters deserve the truth, this court has long rejected proposals that 'hide the ball' as to the amendment's true effect," she argued.

Poll: 7 in 10 Back Florida Medical-Marijuana Plan, Enough to Possibly Affect Governor’s Race

As many as seven in 10 Florida voters support a state constitutional amendment legalizing medical marijuana – more than enough to ensure passage and possibly affect the governor’s race — according to a new poll from a group trying to put the measure on the 2104 ballot.

Medical pot’s sky-high approval cuts across party and demographic lines, with Republican support the lowest at a still-strong 56 percent, the poll conducted for People United for Medical Marijuana, or PUFMM, shows.

The outsized support of Democrats and independents brings overall backing of the amendment to 70 percent; with only 24 percent opposed, according to the poll obtained by The Miami Herald.

Regionally, voters from the Miami and Orlando areas, among the most socially liberal in the state, want medical marijuana the most.

Non-Hispanic white women, blacks and Hispanics — all Democratic leaning — are the most-likely to back the measure and could be more likely to turn out to vote in two years if the medical marijuana makes the ballot.

“Supporters of the proposed amendment are less certain to cast ballots in the 2014 governor’s race,” David Beattie, Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson’s pollster, wrote in an analysis of the poll of 600 registered voters taken Jan. 30-Feb. 3 by his firm, Hamilton Campaigns.

If it made the ballot, the measure would draw even more attention to Florida’s nationally watched 2014 election in which Gov. Rick Scott will fight for his political life.

“The proposal to allow the medical use of marijuana could provide a message contrast in the Governor’s race,” Beattie wrote, “heightening its effectiveness as a turnout mechanism.”

But, Beattie warns PUFMM in a memo, “don’t frame turnout efforts on the passage of the ballot initiative in a partisan way.”

To that end, former-Republican-operative-turned-Libertarian Roger Stone is planning to join PUFMM’s efforts to give it a bipartisan feel.

A longtime backer of marijuana legalization, Stone, a Miami Beach resident, is seriously considering a run for governor, where he’ll likely advocate for the initiative called “Right to Marijuana for Treatment Purposes.”

On the Democratic side, former Nelson and Hillary Clinton fundraiser Ben Pollara, of Coral Gables, is signing up as the group’s treasurer. Pollara said they’ve had discussions with Eric Sedler, managing partner at Chicago-based ASGK Public Strategies, which he started in 2002 with former White House advisor David Axelrod, still a President Obama advisor.

“The poll numbers were very encouraging,” Pollara said. “But it’s still a Herculean effort.”

That’s because Florida’s Legislature and voters have made it tougher than ever to get measures on the ballot by citizen petition. PUFMM needs to collect the valid signatures of 683,149 Florida voters. That could cost up to $3.5 million.

Right now, PUFMM has raised just $41,000 and has collected only 100,000 signatures, not all of which are valid. Some might be too old because they were collected as far back as 2009.

PUFMM’s Florida director, Kimberly Russell, said the group hopes that this poll and the top-notch campaign minds could turn things around.

“If we get this on the ballot, we have a great chance of getting this passed,” Russell said. “The more these pass in other states, the more people support it everywhere else.”

So far, 18 states plus the District of Columbia have medical-marijuana laws, including Republican-leaning states like Arizona.

Support appears to have increased in Florida since 2011, when a pollster for Republican Gov. Rick Scott — who opposes medical marijuana — surveyed the issue. Pollster Tony Fabrizio found support was strong in Florida, 57-38 percent.

But passing a constitutional amendment in Florida is tougher than in many states, in large part due to the 60 percent threshold.

“If there was organized opposition and $5 million, you could beat this thing,” said John Sowinski, a long-time Florida citizen-initiative consultant. “Absent that money and organized opposition, this would have a good chance of passing.”

Sowinski noted that the proposal might be perceived as too broad. While it specifies certain ailments — from Alzheimer’s to Crohn’s disease to HIV/AIDS — but it also allows marijuana for “other diseases and conditions when recommended by a physician.”

Indeed, when the amendment is summarized without specifying the diseases, support falls 8 percentage points to 62 percent, when the ballot language is summarized for voters. Still, that’s 2 percentage points above the threshold needed to approve a Florida constitutional amendment.

“The weakness in the proposed amendment isn’t helping AIDS patients get medicine to cope with pain,” he said. “It’s the language that’s so broad it could allow doctors to simply recommend marijuana for almost anything. Many people still want drugs controlled.”

A plurality of Florida voters, about 49, percent say pot should remain illegal while about 40 percent say it should be legalized, the poll shows.

The pollster, Beattie, warned in his memo that the campaign should frame the effort in medical and personal terms; don’t say “legalize” and don’t say “drug.”

But, in another question, voters tacitly favored outright legalization when asked if marijuana should be regulated and taxed like alcohol and cigarettes; 68 percent favored it and 27 percent opposed.

Asked if marijuana should be a “ticketed offense like speeding or running a red light,” 48 percent approved and 42 percent disapproved, which is on the cusp of the poll’s 4 percent error-margin.

By a 41-34 percent spread, voters said pot was safer than alcohol. Those who said marijuana was a “gateway drug” to hard drugs like cocaine and heroin narrowly edged those who thought it wasn’t, 44-46 percent.

Potential opponents like the pharmaceutical industry, could be a good foil for the amendments backers.

When asked if they believed the pharmaceutical industry wants to keep marijuana off-limits to sell prescription drugs, “though marijuana could be a safer and cheaper alternative to some treatments,” 52 percent agreed. Only 30 percent disagreed.

Support for medical marijuana is weakest in the GOP-controlled Legislature.

For two years, the Florida House refused to hear a proposed constitutional amendment that would have allowed people to vote on the issue.

The plan’s sponsor, Democratic state Sen. Jeff Clemens of Lake Worth, said he plans this week to release conventional legislation — instead of a measure designed for voters — to decriminalize marijuana for medicinal purposes.

Clemens said legislators didn’t like the proposed amendment because it wasn’t specific enough. So now he’ll present specifics by way of a bill with fellow Democrat, Rep. Katie Edwards of Plantation.

Edwards said the bill, with extensive regulations, will be called the Cathy Jordan Medical Cannabis Act, named for a Sarasota activist who has Lou Gehrig’s disease, or ALS.

Another reason to avoid a constitutional amendment: “We’re coming off an election season where the Legislature put 11 proposed amendments on the ballot. And I didn’t want to add to the noise,” Clemens said.

Only three of the Legislature’s amendments passed. Many were printed in full, which helped create long early voting and Election Day lines that made Florida an election laughingstock.

One of the measures printed in full, which failed 48.5-51.5 percent, was designed as a way to oppose Obamacare, was put on the ballot by lawmakers who said they supported “healthcare freedom.”

This poll suggests that Florida voters support healthcare freedom when it comes to doctors dispensing pot.

A whopping 81 percent of voters said doctors should be able to recommend marijuana to patients without fear of arrest or loss of license, while 14 percent were opposed. The doctor item was the most-popular polled.

Not only does this poll show strong support in Florida, it indicates opposition is weak.

A fifth of those opposed said they’d change their mind and vote yes if a doctor recommended marijuana to a family member suffering from a “serious illness,” the Hamilton Strategies poll shows.

Attitudes might be evolving as Florida continues to draw retirees who came of age in the 1960s. An 18-year-old in 1967’s “Summer of Love” is 64 today.

“It’s like taking a magic pill,” a medical-marijuana-smoking Boca Raton retiree told the South Florida Sun-Sentinel last year for a story on the rise of “senior stoners.”

“I can have a crappy, crappy day and I take one toke and in less than three minutes I’m leveled out and feel wonderful,” the 70-year-old woman said.

“Florida is changing,” said Roger Stone, the libertarian consultant to PUFMM who might run for governor. “But one thing remains the same: We have a lot of older voters. And a lot of those older voters don’t want the government making their healthcare decisions.”

Florida Medical Marijuana Proposal To Be Reviewed By Supreme Court

Thursday, organizers celebrated a big win for decriminalizing medical marijuana in Florida.

United For Care announced they had obtained over 100,000 signatures in one month, which is more than enough to initiate the first step in getting the initiative on the 2014 ballot: a Supreme Court review of the proposal language.

"Floridians deserve the right to medical marijuana if their doctors decide it is the right remedy for their debilitating illnesses," United For Care's Ben Pollara wrote. "It is time for us to do what our legislature should have done - grant access to those who need it."

In the 2012-2013 legislative session, a bill legalizing medical cannabis didn't even get a committee hearing while a bong ban made it to Gov. Rick Scott's desk.

There's still a long way to go. The group still needs 583,149 verified voter signatures needed by February 1 to get the measure on the 2014 November ballot.

It will then need 60 percent approval from voters in order to be made a state constitutional amendment.

A recent poll indicated that 70 percent of Floridians support legalizing medical marijuana.

"This isn't Cheech and Chong," United For Care's John Morgan, who has family members who need medical cannabis, said. "This is people who have ALS, bone cancer where the pain is unrelenting, MS where their body is withering away. It wasn't party lights and strobe music with my dad and brother. It was just peace and lack of pain."

United For Care's proposal allows only "tightly controlled, medically prescribed uses of marijuana," according to the Tampa Bay Times, "prohibiting home growing and and without contributing to recreational use."

Ballot summary:

This proposed amendment is designed to create a new Article I, Section 28 (“Right to Marijuana for Treatment Purposes”) of the Florida constitution so as to permit the cultivation, purchase, possession and use of marijuana to treat Alzheimer’s, cachexia, cancer, chronic pain, chronic nervous system disorders, Crohn’s disease, epilepsy and other seizure disorders, glaucoma, HIV/AIDS, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s, diseases causing muscle spasticity, or other diseases and conditions when recommended by a physician.

Ballot language:

“SECTION 28. Right to Marijuana for Treatment Purposes. –

“(a) No person shall be deprived of life, liberty or property or otherwise penalized for the cultivation, purchase, use or possession of marijuana in connection with the treatment of Alzheimer’s, cachexia, cancer, chronic pain, chronic nervous system disorders, Crohn’s disease, epilepsy and other seizure disorders, glaucoma, HIV/AIDS, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s, diseases causing muscle spasticity, or other diseases and conditions when recommended by a physician.

“(b) This section shall be self-executing. The legislature, however, may provide by general law for the voluntary registration of persons intending to exercise their rights hereunder and for the regulation of the distribution and sale of marijuana to persons intending to exercise their rights hereunder.

“(c) Nothing herein, however, shall be construed so as to prevent the legislature from enacting laws penalizing the operation of motor vehicles, boats, watercraft or aircraft while under the influence of marijuana or regulating the use of marijuana by minors. Similarly, all laws in effect at the time of adoption of this section penalizing the operation of motor vehicles, boats, watercraft or aircraft while under the influence of marijuana or regulating the use of marijuana by minors shall remain in force.”