We are currently out and about collecting signatures for our Miami Beach decriminalization initiative.  

Miami Beach

     In May of 2010, Alfred Spellman of the film production studio rakontur contacted CSMP founder and Chairman Ford Banister about the possibility of running a marijuana decriminalization initiative in Miami Beach. Spellman had heard and read about the CSMP's efforts in Jacksonville Beach and Tallahassee and with a new film about marijuana smuggling in South Florida, Square Grouper, in the making, pledged support for a Miami Beach effort.  A few weeks after the initial contact, Banister left his home in Tampa and traveled to Coconut Grove where he met Eric Stevens, a recent graduate of the University of Miami, who would become the campaign manager for the Miami Beach canvassing effort. Banister and Stevens soon moved to South Beach and on June 16, 2010, with great fanfare, the CSMP announced its Miami Beach initiative.

    By July of 2011, the CSMP had collected more than 9,000 signatures from residents of Miami Beach.  On July 13, we presented these petitions to the Miami Beach City Commission.  An impressive and distinguished array of speakers appeared to support the initiative and to urge the Commission to act on its own to place the question on the ballot.  Among them was Irv Rosenfeld, one the handful of medical marijuana patients who receives his medicine from from the federal government; Shawn Heller, founder of Students for Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP) and a public interest attorney at the Florida Justice Institute and South Miami Commissioner Walter Harris.