Legalized weed draws cannabis celebrants

A grassy spread along the banks of the Lamoille River in Johnson that once played host to nearly 20,000 rowdy reggae fans in the mid-1990s hosts a gathering this weekend celebrating the new law allowing recreational marijuana use in the Green Mountain State.

Heady Vermont, the state’s leading cannabis advocacy and lifestyle organization, hosts a Legalization Celebration Sunday, July 1, at Willow Crossing Farm in Johnson.

“We already know that people who want to smoke weed are already doing it,” Keith Morris, the farm’s owner, said. “They are already fully functional people who want to move past stigma.”

The event is capped at 2,000 people and is only for people 21 years old and up. There will be food and beer and at least five bands, and activities like disc golf, yoga, river tubing and swimming — and on a humid day where temperatures are expected to flirt with 100 degrees, the river is bound to be a popular draw.

Two dozen cannabis-friendly exhibitors will be on site to sell their products and offer tips to burgeoning growers, cooks, therapists, biologists or anyone with a curiosity about the herb, in all of its forms — recreational, medicinal, agricultural, industrial.

“Genetics swapping” will likely prove to be a big draw, as growers trade seeds, clippings and ideas about growing and breeding techniques. Morris said that, contrary to the “groovy, duder” stereotype of pot smokers, a lot of the discussions will be more about cool crossbreeds and clones.

“The Baby Boomer generation has been hiding for 40 years, asking, ‘Why am I looking over my shoulder?’” Morris said. “As we can be safer in having these conversations now, we want to help encourage people to grow their own.”

Equating cannabis culture to the craft beer scene, Morris said you wouldn’t just throw some beer in a bottle and label it “Porter” or “Ale.” But since pot has long been illegal, purchasing it off the black market was often akin to getting a sandwich baggie with green stuff that might as well just be labeled, “Pot.”

Beer drinkers want to geek out on IBUs and ABVs and an ever-growing universe of hops flavoring their drink. Likewise, Morris said, cannabis growers and traders want to talk about different strains and their various uses and traits.

Despite Sunday’s legalization — up to an ounce of processed marijuana as well as two mature plants and four plants-in-progress are allowed — it’s still illegal to buy or sell pot. But Morris and other pro-cannabis folks think it’s just a matter of time, and not much time, before Vermont passes laws allowing for the retailing and taxing of it, especially when Massachusetts gets its retail operations going and the Vermont government watches all the people in the southern part of the state start spending millions just a few miles away, in another state.

It’s just as illegal to drive stoned as it is to drive drunk, so the event is accommodating people who don’t want to, or shouldn’t, drive. That includes bus transportation between Burlington and Willow Crossing, before and after the event. Camping is encouraged, and that bus will also bring campers back to Burlington Monday morning if they want to stay the night.

In addition, Heady Vermont is offering cash incentives to anyone who arrives via “sustainable” transportation, such as on foot, on bicyle or by canoe or kayak.

The event has its own security detail, provided by Chocolate Thunder, an outfit run by an amiable former Burlington bar bouncer that recently handled security at Stowe’s Craft Brew Races. Outside the venue, Lamoille County Sheriff’s Department will have extra deputies on duty to make sure people aren’t parking along Route 15.

Sheriff Roger Marcoux said the department will also have a drug recognition expert on duty that day to check anyone pulled over for pot impairment.

Marcoux said he mainly wants to make sure ambulances and fire crews have easy access in case of an emergency. His biggest concern right now is the weather forecast, and making sure people don’t succumb to the heat.

He acknowledges that most law enforcement officers have a fundamental disagreement with Vermont’s new marijuana law, but said he’s been in constant contact with Heady Vermont and Chocolate Thunder, and “they’ve been very responsive.”

“On the face of it, I don’t see anything that’s illegal,” he said. “You have to put your law enforcement prejudices aside, and that’s what we’ve done.”