Oregon’s Measure 110, which decriminalized drug use and ramped up harm reduction, took effect in 2021 at the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic. After barely giving it a chance to have any effect, lawmakers got cold feet and decided to return to the tried – and failed – approach that has made the war on drugs America’s longest and most disastrous war.
Oregon
Oregonians are having second thoughts about their decision to decriminalize drugs three years ago. They blame it for the state’s recent rise in overdose deaths. But a closer look at the data shows that Oregon has fared no worse than other states did when the fentanyl wave breached its borders.
“Oregonians voted in November 2020 to stop incarcerating people for using drugs unapproved by the federal government and instead direct resources to harm reduction programs. The pandemic got in the way. Now, while this project is still in its infancy, a group of Oregonians wants to replace something that hasn’t had a chance to work with something that we KNOW hasn’t and won’t work.”
New legislation might be the key to bringing opposing political parties together in this Pacific Northwest state. The state penalizes drivers — which bicycle commuters cheered. But now officials have created a special tax on cyclists, too, and that has united the left and right in mutual outrage.
Polls are closed and the election results are in regarding the proposals to tax sugary beverages in Berkeley and San Francisco. The verdict? Well, you win some, you lose some.
California s Proposition 37 and Washington s Initiative 522 previously failed at the ballot box, and now Oregon and Colorado will soon be voting on their own GMO-labeling laws Oregon s Measure 92, and Colorado s Initiative 105.
Oregon is now joining the ranks of states trying to pass GMO labeling laws. Advocates for the labeling law collected about 118,000