Marijuana Users Not Welcome Here; Neither is Anyone Else

Someone tell the Albuquerque police department that the phrase "public park" means a green space open to the public. According to this week's Drug Policy Alliance newsletter, the local police barred public access to the park for the second year in a row on 4/20 in order to prevent a small group of cannabis consumers from celebrating their holiday there.

Two officers on a hilltop surveyed Roosevelt Park with binoculars as five horse-mounted police patrolled its boundaries. Patrol cars lined the park's east and west borders and a mobile command van was parked nearby. Streets were blocked with orange cones.

The residents rightly questioned the expenditure of manpower and public money on such a trivial matter and neighbors accustomed to enjoying the space complained about the park being kept off-limits.

Cora Kammer who lives across the street from the park sums it up well.

"I'd like to cross the street and have lunch under the trees. If they want to prevent people from smoking pot, they can have a police presence. But this is ridiculous."

Indeed it is, particularly since cannabis consumers are good citizens and -- in contrast to drunken revelers after sports events -- do not riot and cause property damage.