Past-year data in England and Wales shows a drop off in drug policing. But, with figures still well above where they were a decade ago, and an abundance of evidence showing that policing possession has little impact on use rates, why is the government still funneling resources into this futile practice? 

No, not California nor Nevada, and not one of the New England states.

It's looking more and more likely that voters in a key battleground state will be voting on marijuana legalization in November, and recent polling suggests it could win. That's thisNovember, not November 2016.

The state is Ohio, where a controversial pot legalization initiative is already well on the way to qualifying for the ballot, and its backers—or should we say investors?--have the cash on hand to make sure it does.

Visit Sedronar, or institutional nomenclature, Secretariat for the Prevention of Drug Addiction and Fight against Drug Trafficking, he has some dazzling nuances. Now it is not the police at the door, or that you need to pass by a metal detector. Instead, there is a friendly receptionist preparing an end between visitor and the office, voices are heard singing a carol accompanied by guitars. Talk to the incumbent, the father Juan Carlos Molina, actually confused. From a distance without glasses he could be mistaken for Rafael Bielsa, who led the secretariat little over a year ago.

Close no doubt that it is the "priest friend of the president", the nickname by which he is known inside and outside the secretariat and he is proud.

cannabis-grower who stowed their cannabis plant away in an air shaft is set to get a nasty surprise.

Not only has their lovingly-tended sapling disappeared, but it has resurfaced on social media - in police custody.

Officers from Greater Manchester Police’s Salford West division discovered the plant hidden in the shaft at Little Moss Court in Swinton, reports the Manchester Evening News.

They seized the sapling and posted a picture of it next to one of their police cars on Facebook, with a comment reading:

"To the person who hid their cannabis plant in the air shaft at Little Moss Court, Swinton.

This paper explores the interplay between the human rights and drug control frameworks and critiques case law on medicinal cannabis use to demonstrate that a bona fide human rights perspective allows for a broader conception of ‘health’.

This broad conception, encompassing both medicalised and social constructionist definitions, can inform public health policies relating to medicinal cannabis use.

The Regional District of Kitimat-Stikine has drafted a bylaw to regulate medical marijuana grow-ops.

The Regional District of Kitimat-Stikine (RDKS) has drafted a medical marijuana bylaw aimed at preventing grow-ops from cropping up near schools, daycare centres and hobby farms.

Prompted by changes to the way medical marijuana is being handled by federal and provincial law, the regional district started reviewing its zoning policies in July 2014.

Growing marijuana is legally permitted in areas within the Agricultural Land Reserve (ALR) and some of that land is close to public facilities, including schools, in Terrace and Hazelton.

The year was 1978: The Bee Gees were on the radio; “Grease” made its debut; Jimmy Carter was doing something or other.

The smell of marijuana was also in the air — and the odds were you wouldn’t get in trouble for smoking it, at least in New York State.

New York made just 514 marijuana-related arrests that year, according to data unearthed by Muckrock. Compare that to 2013, when there were 31,613 marijuana arrests in the state.

A global protest against cannabis prohibition is puffing its way into New Plymouth on Saturday.

J Day is a peaceful protest held overseas and in nine New Zealand cities including New Plymouth and an organiser says this year's aim is to prove cannabis is safer than synthetics.

Cannabis advocate Jamie Dombroski said cannabis use should be treated as a health issue, not a crime.

"The war on drugs is a false war," he said.

"It is fine to have a puff once or twice a year or month but I don't agree with doing it every day.

"Personally when I was younger I did but I have learnt that it is a waste of your life if you do."

He said the amount of people who turn up to the Bowl for J Day will depend on the weather.

The global counternarcotics regime, created and enforced by the United States since the 1950s, now faces profound challenges. An increasing number of countries in Europe and Latin America find that the regime’s emphasis on punitive approaches to drug use and the suppression of illicit drugs to be problematic and are asking for reform. This reaction is hardly uniform throughout the world, however, as critical players such as Russia and China, remain committed to the preservation of the regime’s long-standing punitive approach. Meanwhile, drug policy changes at the national and state level in the United States, including cannabis legalization in some states, are making it increasingly uninteresting, difficult, and inappropriate for it to play the role of the world’s toughest drug cop.

If passed, the proposal would create a Marijuana Control Commission that would license 10 farms around the state to grow the crop.

The three largest Ohio branches of the union representing nearly 70,000 retail workers, endorsed Wednesday the ResponsibleOhio initiative to legalize marijuana.

"The executive board of these locals, which are made up of rank-and-file members, made a decision to support this proposal because we want to make sure that we have good jobs in the new legal marijuana industry," said Laurie Couch, a spokeswoman for United Food and Commercial Workers.

The majority of the local members work in retail stores, Couch said, including Kroger, Meijer and CVS, as well as in food packing and processing.