001[Music] good evening my name is Donna critter and I am a member of the League of Women Voters of the Ann Arbor area I welcome you to tonight's debate featuring members of the high school debate team from Saline high school the students will be presenting for and against arguments on proposal 1 which pertains to the legalization of marijuana and this proposal proposal 1 will be on the voter ballots in the general election on Tuesday November 6 the League of Women Voters is very pleased to be sponsoring these debates the league is a nonpartisan civic and political organization that encourages informed and active participation of all citizens and government works to increase understanding of major public policy issues and seeks to strengthen and broaden knowledge about our form of government and democracy the league does not
002support candidates or parties but we do take stands on issues that we have studied one of the league's important goals is to assist voters in making informed choices at the polls and thus we bring you tonight's program we are broadcasting from the studio's of CTN of Ann Arbor under the direction of the network's production professionals volunteers from the League of Women Voters are managing tonight's debate our moderator this evening is John Chamberlin John will now introduce the participants and explain the debate format and guidelines John thank you Donna good evening to viewers we are pleased to once again have the debate team from Saline high school participating in these debates organized by the League of Women Voters tonight for students from Saline will be debating ballot proposal 18-1 which if approved by voters would amend
003the Michigan Constitution to legalize and regulate the possession use distribution production of marijuana by individuals 21 years of age or older the Saline debate team began in 2013 an English teacher shelley venomoth the teachers coach has been with them ever since their public forum debate team has won the state championship for the last three years the varsity team is placed in the state quarterfinals and finals four of the last five years and the team has earned the George ziggo Miller award in 2015 as the top debate team in Michigan Shelley venema has won a number of awards for her debate coaching including two Coach of the Year awards in recent years nine members of the debate team have participated in preparations for tonight's debate although only four of them will be seen on camera during
004the debate at the conclusion of the debate Shelley will introduce the other members of the team the four students you will hear from tonight are on my right arguing in favor of proposition 1 are not only the I air and Madeleine horny ACK and arguing in opposition at the proposal one on my far left knee Shan Bhattacharya and next to me Michael equal Co the rules or the debater as follows each side will have six minutes to present their opening argument beginning with the four side then each side will have four minutes to respond to the other side's arguments beginning with the four side I will then direct questions to the teams beginning with the against side and alternating who responds first to a question each team will have 90 seconds to respond to a
005question we will spend about eight minutes on QA in closing each team will have two minutes for a closing statement beginning with the against team timekeepers from the League of Women Voters will keep us on schedule by reminding speakers how much time they have left in each segment with that let's begin let me first read the ballot wording for the proposal proposal 18-1 a proposed initiated law to authorize and legalize possession use in cultivation of marijuana products by individuals or at least 21 years of age older and commercial sales of marijuana through state licensed retailers in my opening statement I mentioned that it was a constitutional amendment it's not it's a legislative initiative the proposal would allow individuals 21 and older to purchase possess and use marijuana and marijuana infused edibles and grow up to
00612 marijuana plants for personal consumption impose a 10 ounce limit for marijuana kept at residences and require amounts over two and a half ounces to be secured in locked containers create a state licensing system for marijuana businesses and allow municipalities to ban or restrict them permit retail sales of marijuana and edibles subject to a 10% tax dedicated to implementation costs clinical trials schools roads and municipalities where marijuana businesses are located and finally to change several current violations from crimes to civil infractions with that we begin the debate with the opening statement from the team supporting passage of proposal one good evening I am Madeline horny ak a sophomore at Saline High School and part Ana I am part of the saline high school debate team My partner Ron Allen eaier and I would like to
007thank the League of Women Voters for inviting us to partake in this event today we are debating proposal one which is about the legislation of recreational marijuana on the pro side we are going to show you a few of the many benefits to legalizing marijuana in the state of Michigan recreational marijuana has already been legalized in nine states as well as Washington DC marijuana used for medicine purposes has been legalized in an additional 21 states including Michigan the first point we would like to address is the economy legalizing marijuana would increase our economic stability first marijuana will be a new industry from Michigan and legalizing recreational use would create a positive economic trend a 2015 report from the ArcView group found that legal cannabis had become the fastest growing industry in the US with the
008national market expanding from 1.5 billion dollars in 2013 to 2.7 billion dollars in 2014 both Colorado and Washington have expiry tremendous growth in the cannabis business in the years since each state fully legalized recreational markets according to the website global news in total tax revenues from cannabis increased to over 135 million dollars in Colorado additionally if the state of Michigan were to legalize marijuana before other states then Michigan businesses will have sufficient time to take root as other states legalize it merit Michigan companies will expand into those markets as well and that money will circle back to Michigan the Marijuana Policy group is one example it is a consulting firm based in Denver Colorado they consulted with the Colorado State Legislature on the recreational marijuana proposal in 2012 but since then they have also worked
009with other state governments such as Alaska and Oregon as well as working with individual companies nationwide by being one of the first in the nation to legalize the recreational use of cannabis Michigan could see a similar expansion of our businesses the next point we would like to address is that legalizing marijuana would allow for new jobs to be created the Washington Post rates that in 2015 the legal marijuana industry in Colorado created more than 18,000 new full-time jobs and generated 2.4 billion dollars in economic activity the potential and legislation of recreational marijuana could lead to a boost in our state economy as we show through examples of Washington and Colorado and it could also go towards taxes toward public goods secondly legalizing marijuana will increase the safety of usage as it will be more regulated
010marijuana product testing is a standard requirement for legalized marijuana products market this means consumers are better informed about the marijuana they use if marijuana was legalized in Michigan then the state would set these standards and make the drug safer to the public one of these examples would would be the information on any pesticides fertilizers or any residue low solvents that could remain on the product when being sold another important point to address would be the potential lasing of marijuana which is a prominent issue with unreliable sellers in the black market like we said earlier state laws setting universal standards with limit sellers ability to lace cannabis with other harmful substances lasing is the Prostate process of mixing in another more harmful drug usually an opioid with marijuana forming a drug cocktail lacing is usually done
011without the users knowledge these state laws and regulations could potentially save the lives of people who are trying marijuana for the first time and are unaware if something is wrong this could prevent many opioid overdoses and save many lives if a cannabis product is found to be laced with an illegal or more more dangerous drug the seller will likely have to face repercussions from the state since the sellers will likely not want to lose their license to sell marijuana they are much less likely to lace their products with unknown substances which will increase the safety of consumers and prevent overdoses now here's my partner with some more information third let's talk about societal benefits in Michigan first crime would decrease in prisons would become less crowded if marijuana or legalized in 2012 the states of
012Colorado and Washington became the first in the nation to legalize cannabis for recreational use Colorado's marijuana policy group conducted a thorough investigation although many respects skeptical of this legalization the Marijuana Policy group estimates that the majority of growth in the legal marijuana industry is not coming from new previously untapped demand for cannabis but rather from a reduction in the illegal unregulated black market this shows that there would be a reduction in illicit activity as the demand for marijuana would shift towards legitimate activity with the legalization of recreational use prisons would also become less crowded if recreational marijuana really was legalized a number of marijuana related arrests and imprisonment would decrease and live assume it's that 9 percent of current prisoners are in prison for marijuana related violations since the proposal would change many crimes or
013misdemeanors to civil infractions crime rates and imprisonment rates would drop dramatically for Michigan therefore legalizing marijuana would benefit Michigan society moreover Michigan will use the tax revenue from marijuana for community improvement agenda such as money for research to help veterans schools roads and more additionally minors would also use marijuana less than they are currently opposition to the legalization of marijuana argued that this would lead to a slippery slope of adolescents using cannabis which is not true an institution working for Washington state legislature produced a report showing overall decreases in youth cannabis usage rates the report was based on anonymous survey data from the state's Department of Health which pulled for usage among students grades 6 8 and 12 the results of the survey showed decreased usage by students in all four grade levels this shows
014that although the general populace is weary the facts show otherwise teen years and rates have actually decreased therefore legalizing marijuana will benefit Michigan's society as a whole because our teenagers will be less likely to try marijuana which means they will be safer and have a better chance as a bride at a bright future overall we want to reiterate that you the voter have a choice to make we strongly urge that you vote for the proposal to legalize recreational marijuana it has proven benefits on the body and aiding with mental illness chronic pain and more which is why we urge you to vote for this proposal in November thank you from 2002 to 2013 marijuana use disorder has doubled in its prevalence and 7,000 people try marijuana for the first time every single day hello I
015am Michael nicosia a senior at Saline High School my partner Nisha and Bhattacharya and I would like to thank the League of Women Voters for this amazing opportunity to participate in this debate as the conside we are going to point out flaws in the current proposal and the ramifications of the legalization of marijuana in Michigan in order to educate voters who are voting in this upcoming midterm I'm going to outline the first two points and nishan will outline the last first we'd like to say that we're not talking about the medicinal use of marijuana but rather the effects of recreational usage our first point is the health effects and addictiveness some point a health detriments the protein may argue that marijuana has some benefits to your health however the use of marijuana by individuals will
016actually increase their risk for negative health effects that can adversely affect their lives according to the Center for Disease Control smoking marijuana can lead to an increased risk of heart disease and a greater risk of bronchitis cough and phlegm production marijuana users also have significantly more are significantly more likely than non users to develop temporary psychosis and long-lasting mental disorders including schizophrenia subjecting the common citizen to a drug that can cause an increased risk and life to lifelong illness and the risks involved is something we as the community should avoid users will drastically decrease the overall health of our society as strokes bronchitis and schizophrenia will become more widespread these lasting impacts can destroy the lives of individuals and these problems don't just affect though who chose to use marijuana according to Patrick Condren a
017certified a certified addictions counselor marijuana use can also cause delinquent behavior aggression rebellion and poor relationships with family especially parents families of people suffering will be hurt because of the problems that their loved ones are facing as a result of marijuana use this can really hurt the community overall especially in Michigan and marijuana isn't simply a drug that one can easily stop using so point B addictiveness marijuana usage can be addictive according to CNBC marijuana is currently the leading cause of substance dependence other than alcohol had alcohol in the u.s. in 2008 marijuana use accounted for 4.2 million of the seven million people age 12 or older classified with dependence on or abuse of an illicit drug this means that about two-thirds of Americans suffering from any substance use disorder are currently suffering from marijuana
018abuse or marijuana dependence as stated by the aforementioned study marijuana is an addictive substance if you use it you can get addicted and will be hurt by it as a number of people using this harmful substance increases so will the number of people addicted this means that more and more people will be subjected to the detrimental health effects that come with the use of marijuana this addictiveness can push wedges into families increased familial strife is also something we should avoid as a community and also the terrible effects that marijuana has on its users considering the addictiveness of marijuana and the negative health effects that come with its use then it would not be beneficial to vote YES on this proposal our second point is moving down the H ladder by legalizing marijuana use for individuals
019who are 21 years or older there Blinn increased use of marijuana among younger teens a report titled the legalization of marijuana in Colorado the impact states the latest 2014-2015 results show Colorado youth ranked number one in the nation for past month marijuana use up from number four in 2011-2012 and 14 at number fourteen 2005-2006 with Colorado being a state that legalized marijuana in 2014 this shows that an increase in marijuana access does in fact correlate with an increased usage among teens therefore teens teens can become more addicted to this substance and subjugate themselves to more use later in life leading to a drastic increase in these negative effects on the health 10 years or teenagers are even more susceptible to addiction than adults according to the Center for Disease Control about 1 in 10 marijuana
020users will become addicted for people who begin use before the age of 18 that number rises to one in six this increased risk should be weighed heavily when it comes down to the effect on teenagers especially when it comes down to the age ladder this all stems from the legalization underage marijuana use will increase by legalizing marijuana use for individuals 21 or older this means that there will be more health problems for teenagers and marijuana would not even be the only drug user drug that teenagers will use but instead it would lead to the use of other worse drugs now here's my partner nishan with some more information thank you Michael now I will highlight our third point about marijuana being a gateway drug marijuana used by individuals can lead to the use of other
021harder drugs such as heroin according to the center of Disease Control quote people who are addicted to marijuana are 3 times more likely to become addicted to heroin heroin is one of the major hard drugs and usage the impact of this is that once you legalize a gateway drug such as marijuana then it goes down the ladder in terms of hard usage especially connecting it back to younger ages and the possible increase of usage of harmful substances if marijuana is legalized then it will lead to the use of harder drugs such as heroin across the populace this is a problem these those harder drugs can cause severe health effects as well such as heart infections liver and kidney disease and mental disorders considering the increased use for teenagers and the eventual lead to worse drugs
022we urge you to vote against the proposal keeping in mind the negative effects achieved with this proposal we strongly urge you the voter to not pass this bill our three major points the negative health effects that marijuana has on its users the increase in use among the teen aged population and it being a gateway drug show how there are major problems in the proposal being presented because of these problems we strongly urge a reconsideration of the proposal in its current state and strongly urge you to vote against it in the upcoming midterms thank you now your responses to the opening arguments and the for team goes first alright I'm gonna begin by pointing out flaws in my opponent's points then going back to reader at my own their first point is on the health effects
023and the addictiveness of marijuana they say that there are long-term health detriments to smoking marijuana however the foundation for a drug-free world says that the long-term effects of smell through marijuana are debated but the negative effects of smoking marijuana are mainly related to prolonged use beginning in adolescence let's talk about how this relates to the Michigan proposal the short answer it doesn't the proposal you will be voting on in November legalized as recreational marijuana only for adults over the age of 21 by 21 the brains of adolescents are mostly forms and the risks of addiction impaired thinking etc are much lower additionally many of the effects on other people that they mentioned could be because of teenagers who frequently take risks or let's be honest are just teenagers they say that those who use marijuana
024have bad relationships with their parents and exhibit delinquent behavior this use of the word delinquent implies young people who if they feel they are turning to drugs to feel fulfilled they may already have negative relationships with their parents this implies correlation not causation meaning that marijuana may not cause these effects but may actually be a result of delinquent behavior and an unruly home life additionally they say it's addictive but they said it themselves its second to alcohol alcohol is legal we have to trust our adults who are over 21 to make choices for themselves their second point is about moving down the age ladder they read you statistic saying that colorado youth are ranked number one in marijuana use I have two responses first their statistics are from the rocky mountain high intensity drug trafficking
025group an anti-drug organization Mark Twain has a lovely quote for the situation which implies the statistics can be taken out of context without knowing much about the study that was conducted which could lead to misinformation this statistic may be one of those examples since their group's purpose is to limit the availability availability of drugs so they would naturally be opposed to legalize marijuana second we gave a counter statistic to this and one that is actually a year after theirs we tell you that Colorado youth have actually decreased their marijuana usage in 2010 they may actually be first in the nation but perhaps they were already first and now their usage is decreasing which could be a cause of legalization of recreational marijuana additionally Deborah Hassan professional professor of Public Health at Columbia conducted a comprehensive
026study and concluded that there appears to be no basis for the argument that legalizing marijuana has increased teens use of their drug this direct the counter is their point their third point is that marijuana is a gateway drug this is again correlation not causation marijuana does not cause a person to use both drugs rather an increase in risk taking behavior especially in adolescents cause both teen marijuana use as well as the use of harder drugs later in life I would like to remind you again that this proposal would in no way allow minors to consume cannabis products therefore this correlation is irrelevant to the topic and should be disregarded now to reiterate my points first the economy legalizing recreational marijuana would have an incredible impact on the economy Michigan would be able to bring in
027millions of dollars in tax revenues and we would have thousands of new jobs additionally this tax revenue would be actually more stable than other kinds of sale taxes as it would not be subject to business cycles because only a minority of people who use the substance second safety hundreds of people die from opioid overdoses caused by opioid addiction every day who knows how many of these addictions are caused by marijuana being laced with other kinds of drugs by legalizing marijuana we could actually help the safety of our consumers third societal benefits there are many societal benefits including a reduced prison population tax revenue that will go towards things like veterans suicide prevention roads and schools and actually a decrease in teen use of drugs in conclusion we believe that a vote for Michigan's proposal 1
028will help propel Michigan towards a brighter more stable future thank you four minutes I'm going to respond to my opponents arguments before coming back to my own first my opponents talk about marijuana supposed benefits the economy in Colorado quote thirty five million dollars from taxes went directly towards funding the state's education system to the average person thirty five million dollars sounds like a lot of money that's how much money comes into the best capital construction fund from marijuana sales taxes each year but one school for example cost seventeen million dollars and there are 178 school districts in Colorado competing for the same funds this shows that the amount gained in taxes is actually minimal and it does little to alleviate the demand in Colorado contrary to what the pro would like you to believe now
029again to speak to the opponent's economic arguments we said that for one in terms of supplementation Medicaid cost up to upwards of 5.3 billion dollars in Michigan alone adding to our last rebuttal point the tax revenue gained from the additional tax is miniscule in supplementing the cost of programs such as Medicaid in Michigan in terms of job creation sure you can increase jobs in a new industry but isn't it is not worth subjecting the community to a harmful substance such as marijuana as mentioned in our first and second points their second argument is that the usage of marijuana will become safer if legalized however this is not the case glen gash was the agent in charge of the US Drug Enforcement Administration field office in Grand Junction Colorado he said quote our black market has
030increased twenty fold he went on to say that in 2014 he seized a couple hundred pounds of pot but that steadily rose to about 13 tons in 2017 this shows that marijuana does not actually become safer use illegal black market sales of marijuana only increase as a result of legalization as shown in Colorado our opponents second argument also says that marijuana will be safer if legalized which implies that marijuana is already unsafe in its current state therefore it cannot be justified legally speaking for recreational use because of the harm present especially within our first few points about how marijuana has health detriments such as a risk of heart disease bronchitis and phlegm production this harm is not worth the risk in terms of hurting the community in Michigan again we'd like to mention as the
031conside that we are not arguing against the status quo which is legally allowing medicinal usage of marijuana now on to their last argument about societal benefits to Michigan when our opponents mentioned that there was a decrease in violent crime and murdered in Washington they never gave a direct link to how the legalization of marijuana actually caused a decrease in violent crime and murder this is a classic case of correlation but not causation meaning that the decrease of violent crime may have happened at the same time of the legalization but may not have been because of it this is also mentioned that teens are going to be less likely to try marijuana as proven by our statistics throughout our debate this is false Colorado youth ranked number one in this nation for the past month marijuana
032use in 2015 marijuana was legalized for Colorado in 2014 showing that it was a direct cause of the legalization of marijuana this was as the pro stated in their case then Colorado's youth wouldn't have this high amount of use yet they do indicating that the legalization does influence and increase team usage of marijuana now Michael will restate our side and why you should vote against this proposal Thanks news Sean going back to our speech now in general voters should vote against this bill because of the negative health effects that marijuana use have News has on its users the increase in use among the teenage population and it being a gateway drug our first point that we mentioned is the health effects and addictiveness of marijuana specifically the health detriments of it we talked about the
033effects on people under the usage of marijuana in terms of heart disease bronchitis and phlegm production we also talked about in our sub-point be the addictiveness of marijuana specifically quote about two-thirds of Americans suffering from any substance use disorder are suffering from marijuana abuse or marijuana dependence we move on to our second point which we mentioned moving down the age ladder and the effects on the teenage populous and how Colorado Ruth youth ranked number one in the nation for past month marijuana use up from number four in 2012 and number 14 in 2006 thus we urge you the voter to vote con thank you will now turn to some questions I will address the first question to the team arguing against the proposal as I said one of the arguments in favor of legalization here
034and elsewhere has been libertarian argument that individuals ought to be free to consume substances engage in activities unless they're doing so creates you know very large negative effects for society and that argument is certainly you know present in arguments for this particular proposal it also is likely to make marijuana safer to consume because it will be regulated if you buy it at a licensed dispensary you will have some confidence that it's not laced with other things this is likely to move some people from being non users to users because they are now not using marijuana because they have some question about whether it's safe so I'd like you to respond to the BIRT Aryans who argue in favor of passage of this okay so in response to this I talked about the role of government
035in the lives of the people the role of government is to promote the common welfare of the people and I don't think that introducing a drug such as marijuana would fundamentally protect the people which is the government's purpose the government's purpose is to protect the people but also promote a certain form of freedom now we can see we can support a form of freedom through various means however legalizing a drug and allowing the freedom of choice for the people to use such a drug although it be harmful to a community we want to avoid the effects against teenagers and against youths who may be affected by the drug especially when we talk about in Colorado where youth usage is number one in the nation so that would be my response to the libertarian argument side
036um we fully agree that people should be allowed to make their own choices for themselves they should be allowed to say this is what's best for me and I don't think that has anything to do with the government yeah add something ok move on to a question and address it those of you arguing for the proposal and I'd like to return to the question of of marijuana used by people who are not yet 21 whether it's high school students college students there's clearly a good deal of interest in that there's a lot of you know data that suggests that that people in high school and in college do engage in smoking marijuana they also engage in a fair amount of binge drinking so it may well be that that binge smoking or binge eating of
037marijuana brownies may occur and these have serious effects on on people who are not yet adults and I'd like to hear a bit about why why or how this proposal will make it you know sufficiently difficult for teenagers and college students to get marijuana products and why we shouldn't worry about the downside costs of having young people ingest or smoke marijuana I believe there's a lot of penalties that are going to be put in place for in terms of they have to be kept in a locked container out of reach of minors all kinds of things I'm not completely sure on all the specifics of what the exact wording of the proposal is but you know there's going to be a lot of regulations on you know you can't have this kind of stuff in
038the house with a minor or something like that and I mean obviously I don't think you can completely 100% stop it but I do think this will make it less of a far away thing so instead of saying you know I'm never going to be able to smoke marijuana why don't I just do it now it's illegal anyway they'll be able to say you know I'll do it when I'm 21 because I can do it and it's not it's not banned so I guess we're hoping that there's since there's no conclusive evidence that proves that teenagers teenager teenage use of marijuana increases with legalization I guess we're assuming that's going to apply in Michigan as well all right so we would we would argue that that odd the legalization of marijuana won't be completely regulated
039as shown through our study of Colorado of the impact of legalization there because Colorado legalized in 2014 and they found that Colorado Colorado youth ranked number one in the nation for marijuana use and this was compared to number four before legalization in 2011 so this shows is a direct correlation between youth access and use of marijuana and the legalization and we believe that um because of the study because of the specific study that teenagers aren't going to be regulated to the necessity that it's going to be these the addictiveness is still going to occur with legalization there's going to be more access to the general public just because it's not going to be illegal there's going to be greater access for them and also we mentioned the black mark and how the black market will
040only exist and the study that we brought up of General of the measure of the US Drug Enforcement Authority who basically said that the black market still exists specifically to Washington in this case as they also legalized but this shows that black market and trade illegal black market sales can still end up getting in the hands of these teenagers who will still end up getting their hands on marijuana and obviously as shown to our case this is extremely bad because of the addictiveness and how it's a gateway drug okay let me ask you one more question that that goes to the the economic benefits and costs of legalization you've heard you know claims that this will generate jobs it will generate tax revenue thinks that you know society likes to find ways to to do
041that and it could in by one estimate the over a hundred million dollars a year within five years of tax revenue they're also savings on enforcement costs police courts jails probation all of the other kinds of things and the the observation is commonly made that current enforcement efforts fall disproportionately on citizens of color so how do you respond to the positive side on the economic benefits that might accrue to passage of this proposal aunt so in terms of job creation we would talk about this in our rebuttal that introducing a new industry such as marijuana introducing a drug that we have deemed harmful throughout our case with the risk of heart disease and the gateway into heroin and harder drugs then we'd say that despite a new industry being introduced a industry is not good
042for the public in any real fashion for example if we legalized a harder drugs such as heroin for example something that is deemed generally incredibly bad for the public then now we have a new industry that could possibly generate a lot of tax revenue but that does not make it safer for the common citizenry are going a little bit off Whitney Sean said we would also argue that the negative effects of the legalization completely outweigh any tax benefit that Michigan the state of Michigan would be getting because of the access to teenagers and they're a result of addictiveness album and a result of the diseases that we mentioned like heart infections liver and kidney disease and specific mental disorders because of marijuana so we would argue that the legalization and just the increasing access of
043it and the negative effects of marijuana as it being addictive and the health effects with the and at being a gateway drug to other drugs such as heroin outweighs the tax benefits um that would be a resolve the 10% tax that would happen in Michigan okay thank you that brings us to closing statements and each team will have two minutes for this and those arguing against go first to remind our audience Nishan and i stand against the legalization of marijuana it's better to vote against this proposal because of the negative effects that will have on a michigan community this is an issue that affects you the voter you have influence on this legislation you have the opportunity to make the best decision for the community and that is by voting against legalization in Michigan this
044proposal poses problems as mentioned such as negative health effects that increase in use among teenage population and it being a gateway drug even though this proposal is for adults ages 21 and older we mentioned the negative effect of marijuana being a gateway drug because even in Colorado where marijuana was legalized only for those 21 and older Colorado youth still ended up ranking number one in the nation for marijuana use after the legalization these health detriments caused by marijuana won't stop as we talked about in our case marijuana has proven to be addictive time and time again across all ages finally marijuana is detrimental to the health of those who use it increasing the risk of bronchitis heart disease and stroke think of those in your family and think of those in your community and your
045friends that can be negatively affected by this bill if you care about your community and wish to avoid the negatives that the legalization will bring with it we strongly urge you to vote no this November thank you in conclusion we believe that the legalization of recreational marijuana would benefit Michigan as a whole we've shown you the benefits of passing this proposal but before we do that let's just go back and see what the negative effects that they said were they pointed out that the health effects in addictiveness of marijuana would cause teenagers to use it more and would cause the detrimental effect on society there's been no conclusive Studies on this additionally they say that moving down the age ladder and would cause teenagers to also use marijuana more there have additionally been no conclusive
046studies about this same with the gateway drug therefore there aren't there is no real proof that any of those things could happen there are statistics but those could be entirely correlation there's no proof overall what this comes down to is choice since there's no proof that marijuana is either a gateway drug or causes drastic negative effects on society we need to be able to trust our adults to make good choices for themselves just as they can with alcohol currently we've also shown you that the economy is going to get a boost from the addition of jobs and a new industry and that we have to jump on the train before it leaves this station we have to let our businesses have the chance to take root before they can expand into other states as those
047states legalize marijuana second safer marijuana would save multiple lives people have died from opioid addiction in opioid overuse opioids have been mixed into marijuana currently dipped through the black market this causes addiction this causes detrimental health effects imagine cocaine in your marijuana third there's also a ton of societal benefits including the decreased crime rate lower prison population tax revenue and lower teen drug use we've shown you the benefits of legalization now you as a voter have one job to do go out and cast your vote at the polls on November 6th thank you to the League of Women Voters for this wonderful opportunity and we hope that everyone watching has a great rest of their night I want to thank our four debaters for their analysis and their presentations on this important proposal to legalize
048marijuana in Michigan I would now like to introduce Shelley then I met and asked her to introduce the other students who have worked to bring this debate to your attention Thank You mr. Chamberlain I'm Shelly venema I'm the proud coach of these kids and I'd also like to introduce to you Jared Webb and Noah Walters who helped them do their research and then also not with us this seemed B it's this evening but also helping with the women and this board were Megan Ben Kowski Brittany Bryant and Molly LaForest thank you again for having us we'd like to say go cast your vote on November 6 thank you thank you all I will say thank you to all of the Saline high school students the presenters here tonight the researchers and teacher coach for participating
049in tonight's debate we also wish to recognize and thank John Chamberlin as your moderator finally thanks to our volunteers and to lead partner CTN for making this live broadcast possible these debates will be rebroadcast on channel 19 a number of times between now and the November elections they are also available on ctn's YouTube channel and through CTN video on demand for screening on your computer or your smartphone you can also go to the league's website at lwv ann arbor org and look for the link to these student debates please urge your friends and fellow residents to watch these debates as well as the many candidate forums that the league has organized for the November 6th election for additional participation in dispassionate information on current proposals and candidates for office please go to vote for one
050one.org the league's voter resource guide covering proposals in local state and federal candidates that will appear in the November ballot can say is make a plan and be sure to vote on Tuesday November 6th good night [Music] you