If you’re in Oregon and passionate about marijuana reform, Wednesday is a legitimately mammoth day.
Starting July 1, adults can possess and use, grow and share cannabis in Oregon. The shops won’t be open just yet — that comes this fall, officials think — but July 1 will represent to many the beginning of a new era in the Pacific Northwestern state.
But how much marijuana will a person be able to legally possess in Oregon? As our handy Oregon Marijuana Guide says: “Anyone over 21 in Oregon can possess up to 8 ounces of usable marijuana, such as dried buds at home, and up to one ounce outside the home.”
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But especially since weed is coming out of a very dark (grow) closet in Oregon, an average Portlander might now know how much cannabis makes up an ounce — or eight. And perhaps they don’t have a laboratory-grade digitally calibrated scale in their desk drawer, either.
Fear not, legal weed aficionados! The Portland Police are here to help. In a very straightforward (and almost sweetly maternal) blog, the department encourages “community members to be responsible and considerate with recreational marijuana.” They tell people that stoned driving is a crime, public consumption could result in a citation and bringing Washington-bought weed into Oregon is a federal no-no — with that last note being a bit of a turnaround from the department’s previous statements.
But the best part of the Portland Police memo: The visual aid that compares a pile of weed to a Voodoo Doughnut, one of the state’s most celebrated (and uninfused) edibles. Yes, seriously.
So how much weed makes up an ounce — the legal amount you’ll be able to have on your person in Oregon? About the size of a doughnut, if not a little bigger. What about 8 ounces — the legal amount you’ll be able to have at home in Oregon? About the size of a pile of doughnuts. It doesn’t completely dwarf the doughnut; He’d be able to climb that pile of weed, if he could climb.
It’s a genius ploy on the police’s part, and the inclusion of doughnuts inside official police marketing materials surely isn’t lost on anyone checking out the truly modern graphic. It takes us back, in fact, to when the Denver Police had some 420-friendly fun of their own — when they dropped a smart hip-hop reference on their official Twitter account on this last 4/20 weekend.
Portland and Denver will share more than just legal weed on July 1. In December 2013, the city’s beloved Voodoo Doughnuts opened its first shop outside of Oregon — in Denver, of course.
