Word: arcata
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...Arcata (pop. 16,000) lies in the heart of the Emerald Triangle, the three lush California counties of Humboldt, Mendocino and Trinity, 275 miles north of San Francisco as the spotted owl flies. In the '80s, capitalist hippies defended their marijuana plantations here with booby traps and shotguns. George Bush sent in U.S. Army troops to battle the domestic druglords. And even now, early fall is signaled less by migrating geese than by helicopters swooping over redwood forests and dropping camouflaged, machete-wielding agents into any telltale patch of sparkling green. Last year state and local officials eradicated...
...Arcata, however, where 74% of voters approved the state's marijuana measure, Chief Brown considers his policy one of common sense. "Out of self-preservation," he says, he set up his own system. Now about 100 local residents have sat for mug shots, agreed to let Brown talk to their physicians, and walked away with a "City of Arcata Proposition 215 Identification Card." Flash it as you are toking up and you won't be arrested, unless you've got more than 10 marijuana plants--a limit imposed to distinguish users from illegal dealers...
Other jurisdictions, including Mendocino County, plan to follow Arcata's example, and a task force appointed by Bill Lockyer, California's new attorney general, is looking at Arcata as a possible statewide model. Although other communities might be less mellow about the idea, no dissenters showed up at public hearings when Arcata's city council--composed of two Green Party members, a Libertarian and two Democrats--approved Brown's ID system. That's to be expected, perhaps, in a town that has declared itself a "Nuclear Weapons Free Zone"; that in 1991 passed a resolution--albeit quickly rescinded--offering sanctuary...
...Mexican-American aunties used marijuana poultices for their arthritis," says Arcata Mayor Bob Ornelas, a ponytailed electrician. Ornelas boasts of running marathon races while high on the weed but insists, "I don't get stoned that much...
...activist Thron spent his day making photos, then hiked back down the trail after dark. Last fall Hurwitz's lawyers threatened to sue Thron unless he ceased his photographic raids and stopped giving the Headwaters show. He and Ingrey kept on trucking. The two were married last week in Arcata and plan to hit the road with fresh slides...