The Sacramento Bee has added a new online feature: a marijuana blog called “Weed Wars.” The lead reporter will be Peter Hecht, who has covered California’s burgeoning medical marijuana industry and the state’s escalating debate over legalizing the drug.
Editor Melanie Sill said the blog will continue to cover the key issues of the subject, including the rapid expansion of medical marijuana dispensaries in California communities following the federal government’s decision not to prosecute people for medical marijuana use unless drug trafficking is suspected; efforts by local elected officials to regulate the numbers and locations of dispensaries, and the ongoing disputes, both semantic and legal, over just what it is that medical marijuana dispensaries actually provide (services? products?) and how to define and tax their output.