Cannabis billboards to come down in parts of California

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San Luis Obispo calls a halt to big cannabis advertising

Some things were just not meant to last. There are things that may be just weren’t a very good idea in the first place. Advertising marijuana on roadside billboards might fall in that category. After all, those billboards are visible, and readable to all who pass there, of all ages. A Superior Court Judge in San Luis Obispo County in California has ruled this week that the billboards now appearing along interstate highways in the area are illegal, according to California Proposition 64m, which protects children and minors from exposure to cannabis advertising. Proposition 64 also legalized recreational adult-use cannabis in the state.

Two San Luis Obispo attorneys, Stew Jenkins and Saro Rizzo, filed a lawsuit in the public interest in San Luis Obispo County Superior Court on behalf of Matthew Farmer. He recently saw billboards advertising marijuana and felt right away that this type of advertising was wrongfully exposing his two young children to cannabis in such a brazen manner. Attorney Saro Rizzo told the press, “When Mom’s driving on I-5 taking the kids to Disneyland and then you see this big appealing ad, how do you ‘unsee’ it?”

The ban on obtrusive advertising in Proposition 64 is similar to the ban on tobacco advertising, which is not allowed on 4,315 miles of Interstate and State Highways crossing the California border. In 2019, the California Bureau of Cannabis Control adopted a regulation to allow cannabis billboards on highways that cross the states borders. Now, Judge Ginger Garrett has overruled that regulation and the billboards must come down.