July 24, 2002

KEN RITTER, Associated Press Writer

sfgate.com

(07-24) 13:38 PDT LAS VEGAS (AP) --

The White House's "drug czar" called on Nevada residents Wednesday to reject a state ballot initiative legalizing possession of up to 3 ounces of marijuana.

"I don't think Las Vegas and Nevada want to become the center for drug tourism," said John P. Walters, the head of the federal Office of Drug Control Policy.

Walters cast Nevada as a pawn in "a nationally funded campaign with plenty of money" aimed at legalizing the possession and use of marijuana and said the battle has implications in the global war on drugs.

The leader of the campaign to approve the initiative called Walters' trip to Las Vegas -- including an appearance at a police Drug Abuse Resistance Education convention and a visit to a Clark County Drug Court -- "a disinformation campaign funded by U.S. tax dollars."

"Nevadans are sick and tired of the federal government telling them what to do," said Billy Rogers, of Nevadans for Responsible Law Enforcement, which collected well over the 60,000 signatures needed to put the decriminalization initiative on the Nov. 5 ballot.

"Most Nevadans think it's a waste of their tax dollars to arrest people for small amounts of marijuana," Rogers said.

A statewide poll conducted for the Las Vegas Review-Journal shows voters split over the initiative -- 46 percent are against it and 44 percent in favor with a 4 percent margin of error.

Walters, in an interview at the Las Vegas Hilton hotel-casino, spoke for the Bush administration and echoed a message that federal Drug Enforcement Agency Director Asa Hutchinson delivered July 12 in Reno.

"We don't believe that decriminalization eliminates the drug problem," Walters said. "What you will get is more drug use."

Until last year, Nevada had the strictest marijuana law in the nation. It made smoking a single marijuana cigarette a felony, punishable by a prison term of a year or more. Now, possession of an ounce or less of marijuana is a misdemeanor.

The initiative would tax marijuana like cigarettes and other tobacco products, and allow it to be sold only in state-licensed shops. Public use would be banned and driving under the influence would be illegal. Minors would be prohibited from possessing the drug and private individuals would not be allowed to sell it.

Backers argue that it is a waste of taxpayer dollars and law enforcement time to prosecute minor drug offenders.

Walters called the push to legalize marijuana "a great con," and said it's fiction that prisons are jammed with "teenage boys caught with a baggie of marijuana."

He said decriminalizing marijuana in Nevada would encourage drug use, increase the number of people dependent on other drugs, "and feed the criminal organizations that are a dangerous threat to democratic institutions in the Western Hemisphere."

"Look at Amsterdam and parts of Switzerland where there's been decriminalization," Walters said. "People come from all over those countries and other countries to use drugs."

He pointed to the billions of dollars spent by federal and state governments to deal with the health and social costs of alcohol and tobacco use, and said governments should increase awareness of the ill effects of marijuana possession and use.

The Bush administration projected that it would spend $64 billion in the war on drugs in 2000 -- a figure that has dropped from $154 billion in 1988.

"The argument beneath legalization is that nothing works," Walters said. "But it's not true that nothing's working, and it's not true that it can't get worse."

He pointed to statistics compiled by the National Institute on Drug Abuse showing that the number of illicit drug users dropped from 25.4 million in 1979 to a low of 12 million in 1992. The number has since increased to 14 million.