A recent poll shows that a majority of California voters are favoring a section to legalize recreational marijuana on the November ballot, according to the Los Angeles Times.
Medical marijuana is currently legal in California, but Proposition 64, or the Adult Use of Marijuana Act, proposes the legalization of recreational marijuana for adults 21 or older. The ballot insinuates a taxation of 15 percent on sales and cultivation but allows local regulation and taxation, restricts use by minors and consents to an elimination to prior marijuana charges.
The survey reported that 58 percent of California voters support Proposition 64, the LA Times recounted, but only 38 percent would vote against the ballot.
The survey revealed that only 11 percent of those sampled currently use marijuana recreationally, and 86 percent responded that they do not. Sixty-seven percent of voters age 18-24 and 50 percent of voters age 65 and older support the proposition.
“Based on my decades of law enforcement experience,” Stephen Downing, former LAPD deputy chief, who endorsed Prop 64 said, “I believe the Adult Use of Marijuana Act will make California’s communities safer.”
Jon Cohen, an executive for SurveyMonkey, told the LA Times that the shift in opinions stem from Californians having the opportunity to watch results from other states that legalized recreational marijuana use. There are currently four states and the District of Columbia that have legalized recreational marijuana.
In 2010, Proposition 19, the Marijuana Initiative, was refuted by a 53.5 percent to 46.5 percent vote which proposed similar initiatives to AUMA 2016.
The USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times Poll sampled registered California voters through a SurveyMonkey Election Tracking Survey in English and Spanish, randomly split into four forms. The data reflected the California demographic, using statistics from the Census Bureau and Bureau of Labor. The poll took place Sept. 1-8. The survey has a margin of error of 3 percentage points.