Photo by clarissa.stark

It’s been a long, arduous battle, but it looks like the D.C. Cannabis Campaign will finally be able to start collecting signatures for their marijuana legalization ballot initiative. When? A mere three days after 4/20.

After the D.C. Board of Elections decided that the language on the Cannabis Campaign’s legalization initiative will be allowed to appear on the ballot in November’s general election, it took some time for the Board to finalize the legislation’s short title and summary statement. But last Friday, the BOE approved the short title and summary statement, and the Cannabis Campaign says in an email that they anticipate the BOE “will issue the circulating petitions on April 23.”

After that, the Cannabis Campaign will need to collect more than 25,000 valid signatures by July 7 in order to get the voter initiative on the November ballot. Speaking with DCist a few weeks ago, Cannabis Campaign head Adam Eidinger said that he felt like the BOE was intentionally delaying the finalization of the short title and summary statement as long as possible. “We submitted the initiative on January 10, and that seemed like there’d be plenty of time to spare,” Eidinger said, “I feel like they’re going to delay us as long as they can.”

With only a few months to collect signatures, the Cannabis Campaign is seeking volunteers to pick up blank petitions when they’re ready and to help collect signatures. They’ll be paying people to collect signatures at a rate of $1 per valid Hancock.