Marijuana Legalization Move Begins (Again) in California

The Marijuana Policy Project, a national advocacy group, took the first formal steps Wednesday toward a 2016 ballot initiative to legalize marijuana in California.

The group officially filed papers with the secretary of state to register a new committee, the Marijuana Policy Project of California. The registration allows the committee to start soliciting and spending funds.

Ballot language will not be drafted until early 2015, but the goal is to regulate pot in a similar way to alcohol, the group says.

"Marijuana prohibition has had an enormously detrimental impact on California communities," said Rob Kampia, executive director of the Marijuana Policy Project (MPP), in a statement. "It's been ineffective, wasteful, and counterproductive. It's time for a more responsible approach."

In 2012, Colorado and Washington became the first states to legalize the sale of marijuana. In November, Oregon, Alaska and District of Columbia voters will also decide on legalization.

A similar initiative, Proposition 19, failed in 2010 in California, 57 percent no to 43 percent yes.  MPP spokesman Mason Tvert said the landscape is different now, pointing to a dramatic increase in support for legalization nationally, from the "low 40s nationwide in 2010, then all of a sudden in 2014 it's polling in the 50s nationally."

So in California, he added, "it stands to reason" that the state would also see an increase in support. A Field Poll last December found 55 percent of the state's voters now favor legalization.

2016 is a presidential election year, which generally means a higher voter turnout than Prop. 19 faced in 2010's midterm elections. Tvert believes that will help the legalization effort. "When more people are voting," he said, "it's a better snapshot of where people are."

More from the Associated Press:

League of California Cities lobbyist Tim Cromartie, whose group opposed the state's 2010 pot legalization initiative and until this year fought legislative efforts to give the state greater oversight of medical marijuana, said Wednesday that it was too soon to say what kind of opposition, if any, would greet a 2016 campaign.

Lynne Lyman, California director of the Drug Policy Alliance, said her group expects to play a major role in the legalization effort and already has started raising money. Lyman said the goal is to have an initiative written by next summer. She estimated that a pro-legalization campaign would cost $8 million to $12 million.

Even though California would be following in the steps of other states if a 2016 initiative passes, legalizing recreational marijuana use there would have far-reaching implications, Lyman said.

"When an issue is taken up in California, it becomes a national issue," she said. "What we really hope is that with a state this large taking that step, the federal government will be forced to address the ongoing issue of marijuana prohibition."