Tracy Blevins earned her doctorate degree in pharmacology from the University of Texas Houston Medical School in 1999. Inspired by the US escalation of the drug war since passage of Plan Colombia, Tracy has been campaigning full time for the legalization of marijuana for medical use. She created a character, Medical Marijuana Barbie, and is working to de-stigmatize the use of marijuana as a medicine by presenting the idea to the public in a positive and humorous way. She joined the Marijuana Reform Party in a citywide effort to gather support for marijuana legalization.

With the recent anti-medical marijuana Supreme Court decision it is clear that the Federal government is not the best venue for political change at this time. The MRP is organizing a campaign to lobby the incoming New York City Council to pass a resolution calling on the state legislature to reactivate and expand New York’s medical marijuana program. This program, known as the Antonio G. Olivieri program, distributed marijuana to enrolled patients from 1980 to 1989. However, it was shut down in 1989 when THC became available in pill form and authorities used that pharmaceutical alternative as an excuse to discontinue the program. Action is urgently needed from our elected state and city officials to provide protection for ill people who could benefit from the medical use of cannabis.

In 1988 Francis Young, the Administrative Law Judge of the Federal Drug Enforcement Agency, stated that marijuana is the “safest therapeutically active substance known to man.” The fact that sick people may not legally use marijuana as medicine is proof positive that the drug war is absurd. The drug warriors resist making an exception for people with legitimate medical needs for fear of undermining their “house-of-cards” drug policy. The fact that their policy is so indefensible and inflexible is direct evidence that we must end the drug war once and for all.

If elected, one of Tracy’s goals will be to conduct a comprehensive audit of the costs of Mayor Giuliani’s war on marijuana smokers.

For more information visit our web site, www.MarijuanaReform.org, or call 212-439-4860.

(Statement reprinted as supplied by the candidate.)