Wichita city council, police clash over possible decriminalization of marijuana

Wichita council members are in a tussle with the police department over decriminalizing marijuana.

During a workshop on Tuesday, interim chief Lemuel Moore told council members that even if they repealed the city ordinance on marijuana, officers would have to enforce state law.

“We can have discretion when it comes to infractions, but when it comes to the law, the law is the law,” Moore said.

The concern for some council members is that police resources would be better spent going after more dangerous crimes than people who have personal amounts of marijuana.

Wichita citizens have a history of trying to decriminalize marijuana, including a failed 2014 petition to make offenses a civil penalty and a voter-approved 2015 petition that would have reduced the penalty for first-time possession of small amounts of marijuana and paraphernalia. The successful petition led to a lawsuit by Attorney General Derek Schmidt and eventually it was dismissed on a technicality by the Kansas Supreme Court.

The state’s highest court didn’t rule on the constitutionality of reducing penalties.

The Kansas Legislature reduced the penalty for first convictions of marijuana in 2016, according to a city presentation to the council, and the city council the next year adopted a $50 penalty in certain marijuana cases.

The proposed changes some council members are considering could make the penalty even lower or remove marijuana from the ordinance altogether. Currently, police have some discretion, Mayor Brandon Whipple said, and there are plenty of cases where people don’t end up in jail.

City data showed 1,465 marijuana-related arrested in 2018 and numbers in the 1,200s for the three years after that. Close to two-thirds of the arrests are people under the age of 30, according to city data.

Whipple asked the city to look into and provide a more detailed breakdown showing the demographics of the people arrested.

Removing marijuana from the ordinance would force police to book people in jail, police said. It would also force police to present the cases to the Sedgwick County District Attorney, who likely will not take on low-level drug cases when there is already a large log of violent cases, Whipple said.

Not all council members agree with Whipple’s views of decriminalization.

Council member Becky Tuttle said taking away all punishment would send the wrong message. She said she recently heard from construction administrators who had concerns about new hires and current employees being able to pass drug tests.

“Taking away infractions … with a gateway drug is sending the wrong message in our community and I think it could actually have some unintended consequences of making it even harder for our workforce in our community,” she said.

Tuttle also questioned a city statistic that said a majority of Americans favor some sort of legalization. Tuttle said she disagrees with that. Sixty percent of Americans favored medical and recreational marijuana in 2021, according to a Pew Research Center survey.

Whipple said marijuana hasn’t been described as a gateway drug since the 1990s, but gateway drug today applies to legal opioids that can lead to people getting hooked on heroin and other drugs.

Police also argued that the personal amounts of marijuana being considered for decriminalization are often involved in violent crimes. Since 2019, there have been 12 homicides during marijuana sales, with the victims’ ages ranging from 25 down to 14 and the amount of marijuana ranging from $20 worth to 2 ounces, according to Wichita police Capt. Travis Rakestraw.

“These are not big amounts that we are talking about,” he said. “Normally you would think that would be associated with hundreds of pounds, the big kingpin type deals, but oftentimes these are young adults or juveniles.”

Rakestraw said there are concerns about how any change in the ordinance could impact children. He said commercial packing of some weed products already target children. He showed pictures of packaged Rice Krispies Treats and fruit snacks that have had THC added to them. The THC in marijuana is what gets people high.

Council member Brandon Johnson said that he likes peach and apple-flavored candies as an adult, so candies do not just target children.

Whipple asked where the edibles came from and what resources went into the bust. Rakestraw said it came from an adult, involved one officer and no arrest was made.

Whipple also asked a city attorney about the resources that case would take up in municipal court. Chief Deputy City Attorney Sharon Dickgrafe said it could involve a court-appointed attorney, trial, fine, drug and alcohol evaluation and could require jail probation.

The city council is expected to talk more about the marijuana ordinance in the coming weeks.