Welles: Legalized marijuana would hurt Alaska

  • By Stan Welles
  • Wednesday, October 1, 2014 8:23pm
  • Opinion

How do you destroy a State in one easy lesson? Vote in marijuana!

Drugs are definitely not family friendly are they?

Have you ever had an employee on drugs? Just like the $600 Wagon Wheel theft the other day in Homer, the Homer police found one of our first employees of our Pizza restaurant at home with our cash drawer and drugs on the table.

Our last trip to Colorado in April was the most depressing trip we have ever had to Colorado. Drugs are now placed in food. One kid knowingly ate a laced cookie, went nuts and jumped out a window to his death. A fourth grader stole his Mother’s ‘medical marijuana’, took it to school and sold it!

My wife’s sister and husband live in Nederland. They say that 80% of Nederland is on drugs. The smell is nearly always in the air.

My wife is from Colorado. I went to college there. Over some 20 years, we have lived and/or worked in Englewood, Cascade, Colorado Springs, Boulder and Broomfield as well as on a ranch at 9,000 ft above sea level with an address of Tenth and Plumb: Ten miles south of Parshall, Colorado Plumb at the end of the road! Deer and elk were plentiful. The first elk I shot from my porch using the tractor to put it in the barn! We loved Colorado. Had the international steel market not gone flat in the early 1980’s taking the molybdenum demand down with it; we would probably still be there.

While the politicians are jumping for joy over the tax revenues — though they have not been as high as anticipated — they don’t see the phase lag of the tax burden freight train coming at them due to the:

— destroyed lives of the kids

— destruction of the families

— inability of employers to find drug free employees

Just like Washington State where Boeing has moved a lot of its production out of the State and moved its headquarters, Colorado employers will be bailing out also.

Phase lag taxation is one of the stealth tax forms commonly over looked. Phase lag taxation is that form of stealthy taxation that strikes after a foolish, emotion-appealing policy has been implemented. A suburb example was Saturday, September 13th Alaska Dispatch News’ Commentary “Break up Alaska’s economic monopoly by legalizing and taxing marijuana.”

In Colorado an attorney friend tells me non-violent crime is accelerating. Here in Alaska drug abuse is already epidemic even without legalization! Take the September 26-27 edition of the Clarion’s article, “Nikiski residents fight back against rampant property theft”. Non-violent crime is accelerating here in our State and I bet it is in your area as well? The State Patrol has a real challenge meeting the need. They are having great difficulty filling vacancies. There are currently 16 State patrol vacancies Statewide.

As a potential steward of your resources and property rights, I would strongly recommend rejection of this Ballot initiative.

More in Opinion

Quinhagak resident Sarah Brown holds a mask attachment she found on the beach on Oct. 24, 2025. This item might represent a hand or fin of an animal or spirit being. Photo courtesy Alice Bailey
Faces on a beach in Southwest Alaska

Walking a storm-scoured Alaska beach, archaeologist Rick Knecht knelt to pick up… Continue reading

Larry Persily. (Juneau Empire file photo)
Opinion: It’s my own fault, but that doesn’t make it easier

I use a tablet to read newspapers. It started maybe a decade… Continue reading

A voter fills out their ballot at the Kenai No. 2 Precinct in the Challenger Learning Center of Alaska in Kenai, Alaska, on Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2024. (Jake Dye/Peninsula Clarion)
Opinion: Protecting the value of citizenship in Alaska’s elections

As Alaskans who care deeply about the future of our state and… Continue reading

Logo for the Alaska Department of Commerce, Community and Economic Development. Photo courtesy of the State of Alaska Department of Commerce, Community and Economic Development
Opinion: Nurse licensure compact can strengthen Alaska’s health care workforce

Alaskans value resilience. We know what it means to work together in… Continue reading

Larry Persily. (Juneau Empire file photo)
Opinion: Governor’s early Christmas spirit is misplaced

“I told the president, it’s like Christmas every morning,” Gov. Mike Dunleavy… Continue reading

“Hair ice” grows from the forest floor in Fairbanks, Alaska. Photo courtesy of Ned Rozell
‘Hair ice’ enlivens an extended fall in Interior Alaska

Just when you thought you’d seen everything in the boreal forest, a… Continue reading

Larry Persily. (Juneau Empire file photo)
Opinion: Crime deserves punishment, not well wishes

Years ago, while Juneau friends were house hunting in Washington state, they… Continue reading

A vintage Underwood typewriter sits on a table on Tuesday, Feb. 22, 2022, at the Homer News in Homer, Alaska. (Photo by Michael Armstrong/Homer News)
Opinion: A place government doesn’t need to stick its nose

I’ve spent much of my career advocating on behalf of Alaska’s small… Continue reading

Dr. Edson Knapp is a radiologist from Homer.
Breast cancer screening: What Alaskan women need to know

Approximately 550 women were diagnosed with breast cancer this year in Alaska

Statement on Peninsula Clarion and Homer News

Carpenter Media Group is committed to strong local journalism

(Juneau Empire file photo)
Opinion: Scoring political points from murder is killing the country

Far too many are eager to turn murder into a motivating sound bite for their own purposes.

Items at a makeshift memorial for Charlie Kirk, who was fatally shot last week, on the campus at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah, Sept. 16, 2025. (Loren Elliott/The New York Times)
Opinion: Criticizing Kirk doesn’t mean you condone his murder

We will not be denied our First Amendment rights under the guise of false moral superiority.