Philadelphia

Philly Apparently Has a Marijuana Mascot & It's Promoting Pop-Up Pot Garden on City's Two-Year Decrim Anniversary

Pot activists are going to celebrate the two-year anniversary of Philadelphia's marijuana decriminalization Thursday by holding a "pop-up pot garden" outside Philadelphia Art Museum.

The pro-pot lobby will also hold a press conference at City Hall in Center City to release statistics about the number of citations issued for small amounts of marijuana.

Decriminalization changed city police policy when officers find less than 30 grams of pot on a person. Officers no longer detain individuals, instead issuing a citation that comes with a fine instead of an arrest and trip to city lockup. Possessing less than 30 grams comes with a $25 citation while smoking pot in public is $100.

The pop-up pot garden is a hat tip to Philadelphia's relatively new-found love of pop-up beer gardens, according to Chris Goldstein, one of the region's longstanding marijuana legalization advocates and official with the Philadelphia chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML).

"We’re joking around on the beer people who drink wherever it seems these days," Goldstein said. "It's a play on that. We’re going to do it just like a beer garden, except this is a BYOW -- bring your own weed."

He added that activists are hopeful it'll be a legal trend soon.

"Two years from now, there’ll be more pop-up pot gardens than beer gardens," he said.

Another well-known legalization activist, N.A. Poe, is touting the pot garden in green garb. He stars as a marijuana leaf mascot in a Youtube video posted Monday.

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