Third California City Moves To Decriminalize Psychedelics As Reform Movement Expands

Another California city has effectively decriminalized a wide range of psychedelics, with the Arcata City Council unanimously approving the reform on Wednesday.

The 5-0 vote means that the possession, cultivation and distributions of entheogenic substances like psilocybin and ayahuasca will be among the city’s lowest law enforcement priorities.

The measure further calls on the Humboldt County District Attorney “to consider the spirit and intent of this resolution when evaluating whether to prosecute persons involved in the use of Entheogenic Plants and Fungi.”

It explicitly states that the commercial sale and manufacturing of psychedelics, as well as driving under the influence, will remain prohibited.

Danielle Daniel, lead organizer of Decriminalize Nature Humboldt, told Marijuana Moment that this reform represents “a pivotal point in history by reclaiming our sovereign right to explore our consciousness, and to choose the path of healing that we see best fit for ourselves.”

“With decriminalization, Arcata residents will be able to ingest, gift, gather, grow, and share entheogens without fear of arrest,” she said. “By destigmatizing entheogens, the community will have more openness to conversing about the healing potential of psychoactive plants and fungi.”

This marks the third California city to decriminalize psychedelics, following similar reforms that lawmakers have enacted in Oakland and Santa Cruz.

In Oakland, the first city in the country where a city council voted to broadly deprioritize criminalization of entheogenic substances, lawmakers approved a follow-up resolution in December that calls for the policy change to be adopted statewide and for local jurisdictions to be allowed to permit healing ceremonies where people could use psychedelics.

A bill to legalize psychedelics in California advanced through the Senate and two Assembly committees this year before being pulled by the sponsor to buy more time to generate support among lawmakers. The plan is to take up the reform during next year’s second half of the legislative session, and the senator behind the measure says he’s confident it will pass.

California activists are separately collecting signatures for a ballot initiative to legalize psilocybin mushrooms in the state.

But reform efforts concerning entheogenic plants and fungi are hardly limited to California.

Seattle’s City Council approved a resolution on Monday to decriminalize noncommercial activity around a wide range of psychedelic substances, including the cultivation and sharing of psilocybin mushrooms, ayahuasca, ibogaine and non-peyote-derived mescaline.

In Massachusetts, the Northampton City Council passed a resolution in April stipulating that no government or police funds should be used to enforce laws criminalizing people for using or possessing entheogenic plants and fungi. Somerville and Cambridge have also moved to…