The Psychedelic Election Winners with Noah Potter

This week's episode of the Plant Medicine Podcast offers an overview of the three psychedelic ballot measures which passed this past election cycle. Attorney Noah Potter joins to share his expertise in psychedelic law and describes the details of Initiative 81 in DC and Measures 109 and 110 in Oregon. Noah is a New York-based attorney, media commentator, and psychedelic legalization strategist who has been discussing topics of psychedelic law on his blog for the past decade. Noah has also advised Decriminalize Denver with their successful Denver Psilocybin Mushroom Initiative and is involved in policy reform advocacy in New York for 2021. 

In this conversation, Noah describes the details of these three psychedelic measures, sharing what is accomplished by each. In DC, Noah explains how Initiative 81, Entheogenic Plants and Fungus Measure, follows the example of previous successful ballot measures dealing with psychedelics by focusing on a decriminalization approach that places activity involving entheogenic plants among the Metropolitan Police Department's lowest law enforcement priorities. 

Along with this success on the east coast, Oregon saw two psychedelic ballot measures pass on election day: Measure 109, Psilocybin Mushroom Services Program Initiative, and Measure 110, Drug Decriminalization and Addiction Treatment INitiative. In terms of Measure 109, Noah explains how the broad nature of the ballot initiative leaves many of the specifics to be determined by the Oregon Health Authority, with the measure focusing on determining a legal structure for providing psilocybin-based therapeutics services.

This measure does not, however, legalize or decriminalize psilocybin for personal use. Measure 110, on the other hand, does focus on the decriminalization of a wide array of substances, as well as addiction treatment. In the last minutes of the conversation, Noah describes the interplay between these two intiatives as well as some of the objections given for the particular approaches they take. 

In This Episode:

• Learn the details of the three psychedelic measures which passed this election cycle
• The difference between decriminalization and legalization
• How the DC measure is more limited due to city funding being controlled by Congress
• What Measure 109 in Oregan will allow in terms of psilocybin therapy
• The interplay between Measure 109 and Measure 110 in Oregon.

Quotes:

"Decriminalization is a far narrower approach. You're simply either removing criminal penalties or you're downgrading criminal penalties." [5:24]

"[Measure 109] is a model for clinical, on-site consumption —you don't walk into a dispensary and take your medicine home. It's very narrowly focused on that inpatient clinical model." [13:15]

"The [Oregon] health authority isn't even going to start accepting applications for any of the license categories until January 2nd, 2023." [19:50]

"So you've got a fairly limited decriminalization and it doesn't apply to sale or distribution...that's the very simple version of [Measure] 110." [23:59]

Links:

Noah's Blog on Psychedelic Law

Noah's Website

Psychedelic Medicine Association

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