14-year old pushing lawmakers for stricter pot advertising laws
14-year old pushing lawmakers for stricter pot advertising laws
KATU News
Chris Liedle
A Portland-area middle school student started an online petition pushing local and state lawmakers to create stricter guidelines on marijuana-related advertising in public spaces.
Eddie Herzig, 14, says marijuana billboards and banners may encourage marijuana use in minors.
While Herzig acknowledges there are no credible studies linking marijuana advertisement to minors’ use of marijuana, he says the big, flashy, colorful billboards are being noticed by his peers.
“These are things that are made to attract attention,” Herzig says of the billboards. “It’s attracting the attention of kids too.”
Herzig says he got the idea last year when his younger sister asked her family about marijuana after she saw signs and posters in Downtown Portland.
“That’s not something that she needs to be exposed to quite yet,” he said. “If she is seeing it, I’m trying to imagine who else has also seen it, or even being persuaded by it at a younger age.”
Herzig would like to see marijuana advertising laws more closely aligned to those in the tobacco industry, where signs can only be displayed in certain areas, text must be a certain color and can’t be advertised on billboards.
Read more: http://katu.com/news/local/14-year-old-pushing-lawmakers-for-stricter-pot-advertising-laws