Feature Archives

The world premiere screening of La Vie en Verte: The WAMM Movie will take place on Wednesday, May 12th, 6:30pm at the Riverfront Theater, as part of the Santa Cruz Film Festival. La Vie en Verte documents the Wo/Men's Alliance for Medical Marijuana (WAMM), a "collective of patients and caregivers [who have been] providing hope, building community and offering medical marijuana on a donation basis” for over a decade. In the film, we meet Valerie and Mike Corral, and follow their journey as they dedicate their lives to offering compassionate care despite the antagonism of the brutal federal government. Valerie and Mike Corral will be at the screening, in addition to directors Charlie Hall and Bevin-Bell Hall.

In an unprecedented victory for community and environmental groups, the California State Court of Appeals has upheld the majority of findings in a lower court decision that the Environmental Impact Report (EIR) for the expansion of Chevron's refinery in Richmond violated state environmental law. Community members have been campaigning to fight the proposed switch to refining dirtier, heavier oil for several years, and last year, a lower court issued an injunction stopping further work on the refinery expansion.

Wednesday, April 21st was the first day of the expanded Farmers' Market in downtown Santa Cruz. However, it was strangely quiet compared to previous weeks. Notably absent from Parking Lot #4 was the weekly drum circle and the crowd it attracts. And a vendor was selling artisan bread where for years, Food Not Bombs had been distributing free meals to anyone.

The International Cannabis and Hemp Exposition took place at the Cow Palace in Daly City on April 17th and 18th. The expo, which had the first permitted area for the use of medical marijuana, was the largest event of its kind to hit Northern California. Prominent members of the cannabis community discussed a wide-range of topics, however the main buzz, on and off stage, was the initiative to "legalize, control, and tax cannabis in California," which is to be decided by voters in the state during the November 2010 elections.

Roger Mentch, founding member of The Hemporium, a medical marijuana collective in Felton, says that protection for Santa Cruz patients, growers, caregivers, and collectives is long over due. He is helping to form a new chapter of Americans for Safe Access (ASA) in Santa Cruz County to help bring together like minded people to have a voice regarding safe access to medical marijuana. Everyone is welcome to get involved and attend the first meeting on Thursday, April 22nd from 7:15-8:45 at the Louden Nelson Center in Santa Cruz.

Four-Twenty (including 4:20, 420 and 4/20) has long been associated with marijuana use and marijuana activism. 4:20 is a time of day when people smoke marijuana. April 20th has evolved into a counterculture holiday, known for large gatherings of people celebrating and consuming marijuana, a.k.a. cannabis. Thousands of people gather annually in Boston, Boulder, New York, Santa Cruz, Seattle and many other cities in the United States, Canada, New Zealand and elsewhere around the world.

On Sunday, April 4th, Homes Not Jails took over a building in San Francisco's Mission District that had been empty for two years. The occupation lasted for 24 hours until the SFPD and the landlord came battering at the door. The house is the former home of 80-something Jose Morales, who had lived there since 1965 and fought off eviction attempts for 14 years. Morales was finally kicked out of his home of 43 years through the Ellis Act, a state law that caused over 3000 families to lose their homes in San Francisco.