Oregon Psilocybin Initiative Gets Boost From New TV Ad But Draws Opposition From Unlikely Source

An Oregon ballot initiative to legalize psilocybin for therapeutic purposes is getting a boost from a nonprofit veterans group’s new TV ad. But meanwhile, the campaign is seeing pushback from an unexpected source.

On the one side, the Heroic Hearts Project—which helps connect veterans to entheogenic-based healing and provides complementary counseling—is airing an advertisement in the state that highlights the therapeutic potential of taking psilocybin in a clinical setting.

The 30-second spot doesn’t explicitly mention the reform measure that will appear on Oregon’s November ballot, but it could help inform how voters approach that question when they head to the polls nonetheless. According to the group, it will play on television frequently enough that the average viewer should see it about seven or eight times.

Here’s the script of the ad: 

“As a scientist, I’m impressed by the research. Major universities findings show psilocybin therapy can be effective for depression and anxiety.

It’s plant medicine [the Food and Drug Administration] calls breakthrough therapy, meaning it can be an improvement over available options.

The psilocybin therapy program: Research-based with patient safety top of mind, strictly regulated.

We’re in a mental health crisis. The science is real, the restrictions smart. Psilocybin therapy: Healing, providing hope.”

Heroic Hearts Project is largely focused on the plant ayahuasca. But the group says psilocybin is another treatment option that’s shown promise in mitigating symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.

“In Oregon and across the country there has been a big decriminalization movement, there’s been a big push to do similar to what we’re doing but also allow for access within the U.S. because there’s a lot of people that understand the power and the efficacy of these treatments,” Jesse Gould, founder of the organization, told Marijuana Moment.

“Within Oregon, there is this historic opportunity where they’re trying to create licensed and regulated psilocybin and therapy—and there’s a lot of veterans in Oregon—so just having that availability of it in a place that they can rely on, that they know it’s safe, is a tremendous value to the veterans in Oregon,” he said. “I think it will also be a model for other states and other localities to adopt it.”

Again, the ad doesn’t explicitly promote the psilocybin legalization initiative that will appear on Oregon’s November ballot—but there has been a strong push from a wide range of experts and advocates to pass the historic measure. The Oregon Democratic Party also formally endorsed the psychedelic therapy proposal earlier this month.

“Oregonians are suffering from the most severe mental health crisis in the country,” Sam Chapman, campaign manager for the psilocybin measure, told Marijuana Moment. “We know that if we want to help terminally ill cancer patients, veterans, and so many others who are struggling to combat depression and anxiety due to COVID, we need a licensed and regulated system that people can trust.”

But while these developments could help bolster the campaign, there’s also been surprising dissent from certain psychedelics reform advocates who argue that the proposed legal therapeutic model for psilocybin would threaten equitable access to entheogens.

Decriminalize Nature (DN), the group advancing a localized psychedelics decriminalization movement across the country, is urging Oregonians to vote “no” on the initiative.

“M109 threatens equitable access by not ending the prohibition of personal use and establishing supremecy [sic],” DN said in a tweet.

DN groups in OR are taking a No position on the Oregon Psilocybin Service measure. M109 threatens equitable access by not ending the prohibition of personal use and establishing supremecy. Therefore, in solidarity with our local groups in Oregon, we share this with our DN network https://t.co/Q8cqJF7iPh

— Decriminalize Nature (@DecrimNature) September 30, 2020

The group’s Portland chapter, which said earlier this year that it would pursue psychedelics decriminalization through the City Council, announced last week that it’s now against the psilocybin measure and declining to endorse a separate proposal to decriminalize possession of all currently illicit drugs and fund treatment services that will also appear on the state’s ballot.

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Decrim Nature Oregon Groups Encourage No on M109 Oregon Psilocybin Services Measure . . DN Nature lovers, When Oregon first created it’s statewide initiative, decriminalization language was included and all signatures were accounted for. After a sizeable donation, the #Oregon Psilocybin Service measure removed the decriminalization language thereby continuing the prohibition of psilocybin mushroom gathering, growing, or having an experience in the safety of one’s own home. Negotiations broke down with the key sponsor of this initiative last week to ensure the protection of equitable access to entheogenic plants for the most vulnerable. M109 threatens this due to sections that do nothing to end the prohibition of personal use and also establishes statewide supremacy. Therefore, Decrim Nature groups in Oregon are taking a No position on the Oregon Psilocybin Service measure. In solidarity with our local groups in Oregon, we share this with our DN network.

A post shared by Decriminalize Nature (@decriminalizenature) on Sep 29, 2020 at 7:22pm PDT

DN Portland said they are “advocating that all people who care about ensuring access to entheogenic medicines for all people regardless of financial status, those who care about protecting these medicines from the profit motives of capital, and those who wish to see big money removed from the equation of psychedelic medicines.”

David Bronner, CEO of the soap company Dr. Bronner’s, has helped finance a slew of marijuana and psychedelics reform campaigns for years, including the psilocybin legalization initiative. Private messages that DN decided to release show the executive expressing concern about certain internal politics within the movement, including disputes between DN and the Indigenous Peyote Conservation Initiative about including peyote within the scope of decriminalization measures.

In a blog post, he wrote that Dr. Bronner’s “is fully committed to the Decriminalize Nature (DN) movement, but have recently lost faith in its national leadership.” Regardless, “we still fully support regional DN campaigns such as DC’s effort to decriminalize plant medicines.”

In turn, DN alleged that Bronner “is resorting to divide and conquer tactics to control the Decriminalize Nature movement. ”

Under the Oregon psilocybin ballot measure, adults would be able to access the psychedelic in a medically supervised environment. There aren’t any limitations on the types of conditions that would make a patient eligible for the treatment.

Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) told Marijuana Moment in January that he was in favor of the psilocybin reform proposal and that he would be working to boost the campaign as the election approaches. Last month, he wrote in an email blast that passing the measure is necessary “because it tackles an important issue in our community, mental health, and it does so in an innovative and responsible way.”

The campaign behind the separate drug decriminalization and treatment funding initiative recently released its first ad urging Oregonians to support it.

Montana Marijuana Legalization Initiative Endorsed By Environmental Conservation Groups

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia/Mushroom Observer.

Oregon Advocates Launch Drug Decriminalization And Treatment Ballot Campaign

Get ready to hear a whole lot more about drug policy in Oregon in the lead-up to November’s election.

Reform advocates on Saturday announced the official launch of a ballot measure campaign “designed to establish a more humane and effective approach to drugs.” If approved, the initiative would fund the expansion of access to drug treatment and—in a historic first—decriminalize low-level possession of all drugs statewide.

The measure, titled the “Drug Treatment and Recovery Act,” represents an effort to reframe drug use as a public health issue rather than a matter of criminal justice. The proposal would take money from the state’s existing marijuana tax revenue and use it to establish addiction recovery centers throughout the state. It would expand services focusing on evidence-based treatment, provide housing support for people with substance use disorders and emphasize a harm-reduction approach to overdose prevention and drug education.

While campaign is quick to emphasize that the measure “does not legalize any drugs,” it would decriminalize possession of small amounts of illegal drugs.

Chief Petitioner Janie Gullickson, Exec. Director of the Mental Health & Addiction Association of Oregon announces that the #MoreTreatment campaign already has more than 20 organizational endorsements including @bridges2change, @miraclesclub, @ACLU, @ACLU_OR, & @PoliceForReform. pic.twitter.com/slPAiOjLm6

— More Treatment. A Better Oregon. (@moretreatment) February 29, 2020

State laws around the manufacture and distribution of controlled substances would remain the same, with some offenses carrying felony charges. What would change is how the law would regard possession of small amounts for personal use. Instead of being charged as a misdemeanor crime, possession would be charged as a civil infraction—a class E violation, punishable by a maximum $100 fine and no jail time. The fine could be avoided by completing a health assessment through an addiction recovery center, which would include a screening by licensed health care worker.

The goal of IP 44, advocates say, is to ensure that people have access to effective drug treatment rather than try to address the problem through policing and punishment—a strategy that has shown to be ineffective over decades of the war on drugs.

Also on Saturday, the campaign announced its first 20 endorsements, including from ACLU Oregon, United Seniors of Oregon, Oregon Latino Health Coalition, Oregon State Council For Retired Citizens, Human Rights Watch and Drug Policy Action. Other supporting organizations represent victims of violence, rental tenants, concerned mothers and a variety of other communities.

IP 44 can save lives and help so many people who are struggling. <3 if you agree with Brent that it's time for a better approach to drug addiction. pic.twitter.com/p9vfXmRgWe

— More Treatment. A Better Oregon. (@moretreatment) February 22, 2020

A newly released campaign video makes the case for reform through the story of Janie Gullickson, the executive director of the Mental Health and Addiction Association of Oregon and one of the chief petitioners on the proposed measure. Gullickson, who describes herself as “a person in long-term recovery,” was addicted to drugs for more than 22 years, she says in the video, before treatment and recovery taught her “a new way to live.”

“Instead of access to treatment, what we have today is actually criminalization of addiction. That ruins lives,” Gullickson said. “Addiction cost me my kids, my education and my freedom.”

Oregon ranks near last among all U.S. states in access drug addiction treatment, the campaign notes, pointing to the federal government’s own data on patients “needing but not receiving treatment at a specialty facility for substance use.” Though Gullickson was in the system—she’d been in and out of jail multiple times—she says incarceration never addressed her addiction or its underlying causes.

“I started getting in that cycle of incarceration, and in jail there wasn’t access to treatment,” she says. “There wasn’t any social worker or case manager that came in and asked, ‘What is the underlying issue? How can we help you?’ No. I just repeated that cycle over and over and over.”

After finally receiving treatment, Gullickson said, her life changed. “Treatment was the turning point, that key piece that taught me a new way to live,” she said. “Today I have a relationship with my children that had been completely severed. I was there for my parents as a daughter they could feel safe with as they went through the end of their life.”

The proposal to expand the state’s treatment services and decriminalize drugs was first filed in September, and the campaign began limited signature gathering late last year as a test of how viable the measure is. Now that advocates have decided to go ahead with the effort to qualify for the ballot, they need to collect 112,020 valid signatures from registered voters.

The IP 44 campaign is expected to release updated signature numbers next week, but according to state filings, the campaign as of Friday had collected 48,471 signatures, which still need to be validated.

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Chief Petitioner, @anthonyj1977, and Dora the office dog are pretty excited for Saturday! See you there? ••• #pdx #pdxevents #orpol #moretreatment #or #oregon #pnw #dogsofinstagram #dogsofinsta #campaignlife

A post shared by Yes on 110 (@voteyeson110) on Feb 28, 2020 at 8:25am PST

A separate Oregon ballot campaign is attempting to qualify a measure that would legalize the therapeutic use of psilocybin, the primary active ingredient in psychedelic mushrooms. Retail sales would not be allowed, but adults would be able to visit licensed facilities and have the drug administered under medical supervision. That campaign had filed a total of 38,805 signatures as of Friday.

One notable group hasn’t yet taken an official position on the new drug treatment and decriminalization campaign: Oregon’s teachers’ union. The Oregon Education Association last year that it “supports these policy objectives” of the decriminalization measure, but has concerns over how its treatment component would be funded. IP 44 would redirect some cannabis tax revenue away from schools, which the group called “troubling” in a comment filed with state elections officials in October.

The measure “essentially caps the marijuana tax revenue available to fund schools, by requiring the transfer of all revenues in excess of $11,250,000 ($11.25 million) quarterly into the new drug treatment fund,” the union said. That could mean as much as a two-thirds reduction in cannabis taxes going to schools.

Activists in other states, meanwhile, are working to put a host of marijuana-focused reform measures before voters this fall. State voters in South Dakota will vote on both a medical marijuana and an adult-use measure this year, and Mississippi advocates collected enough signatures to qualify an initiative to legalize medical cannabis. In New Jersey, the legislature approved a resolution late last year that will put full legalization on the ballot.

Ohio Marijuana Legalization Measure To Be Filed For November Ballot This Week

Photo courtesy of Markus Spiske.

U.S. Senators Push Federal Bank Regulators To Clarify Rules For Hemp Businesses

A bipartisan duo of top U.S. senators sent a series of letters to federal financial regulators on Tuesday, imploring them to provide guidance to banks on the laws governing servicing hemp businesses.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR), chief proponents of a hemp legalization provision that was included in the 2018 Farm Bill, sent the requests to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), the Federal Reserve System and the Farm Credit Administration (FCA).

“As authors of the Hemp Farming Act, McConnell and Wyden are committed to listening to the concerns of hemp farmers and producers and to urging federal agencies to properly implement the law,” the senators’ offices said in a press release.

The letters all share a section that discusses how the senators’ home states of Kentucky and Oregon have “been on the forefront of hemp production ever since the authorization of industrial hemp pilot programs” in 2014 and how hemp farmers and cultivators are “excited to explore the full economic opportunities for hemp after the passage of the 2018 Farm Bill.”

#Kentucky and #Oregon have been on the forefront of #hemp production ever since the authorization of industrial hemp pilot programs established by the 2014 #FarmBill. https://t.co/N21RsZ7WMn

— Senator McConnell Press (@McConnellPress) April 2, 2019

“Unfortunately, the hemp industry continues to face challenges with regulatory uncertainty as federal agencies work to implement this significant change in federal law,” the letters read.

Some of the letters vary in content. The FDIC, OOC and Federal Reserve each received letters that stressed the need to provide access to “capital and traditional lending services” that are needed in order to operate hemp businesses. The senators wrote that they’d heard from farmers and producers about the lack of access and said many “have faced difficulty securing financing and credit products to start or expand their businesses, and difficulty establishing accounts to manage cash flow and business expenses.”

“While some financial institutions have agreed to offer financial products to the growing hemp industry, many of them have not due to confusion over the legal status of hemp. However, as hemp is no longer a controlled substance, financial institutions should feel secure in engaging with this industry.”

The senators asked the federal agencies to provide guidance on these issues “to ease any concerns financial institutions may have with providing services to legal hemp businesses.” Legitimate hemp businesses “should be treated just like any other businesses and not discriminated against,” they wrote.

#Hemp farmers, producers in KY & OR are excited to explore the economic opportunities for hemp but still face barriers despite passage of the @senatemajldr@RonWyden language in the 2018 #FarmBill, which legalized hemp + removed it from the federal list of controlled substances.

— Senator McConnell Press (@McConnellPress) April 2, 2019

The FCA was also asked to provide similar guidance. The senators wrote that while hemp “is no longer a controlled substance, financial institutions still seem hesitant to engage with this industry, and confusion remains regarding the availability of credit options for hemp farmers and processors.”

The federal legalization of industrial hemp and its derivatives has put pressure on multiple federal agencies to develop guidances plans for prospective hemp businesses. The U.S. Postal Service recently clarified its rules about mailing hemp-derived CBD products, for example, and the FDA announced details of a public hearing it’s holding on CBD regulations.

McConnell and Wyden also sent a letter to the U.S. Department of Agriculture last month, urging the agency to develop regulatory plans for hemp “expeditiously.”

Last week, the House Financial Services Committee approved a bill that would increase access to banking services for cannabis businesses more broadly—those that deal with hemp but also those involved in the marijuana trade.

FDA Announces Details On CBD Public Hearing

Photo courtesy of Brendan Cleak.