About the Colorado Hemp Initiative Project:

CO-HIP Mission Statement

The Colorado Hemp Initiative Project (CO-HIP) is an environmental and political action group devoted to the re- legalization of the hemp plant for industrial uses, medicinal uses, and personal use. CO-HIP is also dedicated to fighting the erosion of civil rights caused by the "War on Drugs." CO-HIP does not advocate the violation of laws; CO-HIP advocates the changing of unjust laws.

History of the Colorado Hemp Initiative Project

January 1992 - Cannabis and Hemp Re-legalization Amendment

(Petitioning Drive 1992)

The Colorado Hemp Initiative Project (CO-HIP) was formed to petition to get the Cannabis and Hemp Re-legalization Amendment on the state ballot. The amendment would have re-legalized hemp and cannabis for all uses in Colorado. This was the first time a group had attempted to get a legalization issue on the state ballot.

In order to get an amendment on the ballot in Coloradoa, a group must 50,000 valid signatures of registered voters in Colorado in a 6 month period. In reality, a group must collect at least 70,000 signatures because the Colorado Secretary of State's office invalidates many of the signatures for various reasons.

August 1992

  1. End of Petitioning Drive 1992
    Our petitioning period ended in early August 1992. We collected 56,000 signatures total, of which 11,000 were invalidated by the Secretary of State's office, leaving us with only 45,000 valid signatures.

  2. Take a Bite Out of Fascism
    BHIP staged a very successful protest against the DEA. The DEA had recently frozen the assets of the owner of a local sandwich shop because one of his employees had been arrested on a drug felony. Over 800 people attended the protest. Within 2 weeks, the DEA had relinquished control over the business owner's account.

September 1992 - Hemp Awareness 101 (Fall Semester)

BHIP began a series of weekly educational presentations about hemp and legalization issues that we called Hemp Awareness 101. The presentations are held on the CU Campus in Boulder and continue to this day. Topics have included hemp history, hemp's many uses, the War on Drugs, forfeiture laws, hemp food, drug laws and legal rights, medical marijuana, biomass energy, and FDA herbal regulations.

Prominent speakers have included Eric Sterling, Paul Danish, Elvy Musikka, and Senator Lloyd Casey. Attendance at these meetings has always been good. In addition to education, BHIP always provides opportunities for action on the topics discussed.

January 1993

  1. Creation of alt.hemp (Usenet newsgroup on the Internet )
    This may be the single most important thing that CO-HIP has ever done. With the help of a local computer genius, CO-HIP was able to set up a newsgroup on the Internet for the dissemination of information on hemp and legaliztion issues in a world-wide community of activists.

    Alt.hemp has expanded to become one of the ten most widely- used groups on the Internet. It has been an invaluable tool for CO-HIP to keep abreast of legalization efforts in other states and countries, as well as for CO-HIP to keep others informed about our activities.

  2. Hemp Awareness 102 (Spring Semester) BHIP continued its weekly meetings and educational presentations. We had decided to delay another petitioning attempt until 1994.

August 1993 - Re-writing of Ballot Initiative


Meetings of CO-HIP resumed to write the 1994 Cannabis and Hemp Re-legaliztion Amendment. Many long, arduous hours were put in to improve upon the ballot initiative that we submitted in 1992.

September 1993 - Hemp Awareness 101 (Fall Semester)


BHIP continued its educational presentations on campus while promoting the upcoming ballot initiative.

January 1994 - Cannabis and Hemp Re-legalization Amendment


(Petitioning Drive 1994) CO-HIP submitted its re-written ballot initiative to the Secretary of State. The initiative was approved in February. We petitioned from then until July 1994.

July 1994 - End of Petitioning Drive 1994


For various reasons, mostly financial, CO-HIP was only able to collect 22,000 valid signatures througout the state. This fell far short of our 70,000 signature goal.

September 1994 - Preparation for Colorado Hemp Production Act (Senate Bill 132)


We were given the unique opportunity to work with Senator Lloyd Casey (D-Northglenn) on a bill in the Colorado legislature. The bill, the Hemp Production Act, would have allowed the cultivation of industrial (low-THC) hemp by Colorado farmers. It was sponsored by Sen. Lloyd Casey.

The bill was due to be submitted in Janaury 1995. Our preparation included:

January 25, 1995 - Bill introduced to the Senate Agriculture Committee


The introduction of the bill gained wide media attention. CO-HIP began a massive public phone call campaign to the committee members. The campaign was so effective that we were asked by Senator Casey to "call off the dogs" because the Committee members were getting too many phone calls.

February 9, 1995 - Hearing on SB-132, the Colorado Hemp Production Act


All of the testimony was from those who were in favor of the bill, including:

Thomas Ballanco, David Martin, Laura Kriho CO-HIP

Professor Thomas Reed.............Colo. School of Mines

Bob Winter........................President, Weld County Farm Bureau

Chris Conrad......................Hemp Industries Association

Corky Millard, M.D................Expert on Essential Oils

The hearing went very well. The committee members took us very seriously.

Febuary 16, 1995 - Second Part of Hearing on SB-132

All of the testimony this day was against the bill, including:

The letter from the DEA was very threatening and intimidating, and it ultimately killed our bill (see related documents). An amended version of the bill, to set up a hemp study commission, was killed 4 to 3. The bill itself was killed 6 to 1.

However, the bill gave us momentum and connections in the agricultural community. More importantly, it gave us credibility. We continued our outreach and education efforts after the bill was killed, in of the re-submission of the bill in January 1996.

March 23, 1995 - Hemp Presenation to Weld County Farm Bureau

March 29, 1995 - Hemp Presentation at Colorado State University

April 1-2 - North American Industrial Hemp Forum

Bob Winter was a represenative from Colorado at the first meeting of the North American Industrial Hemp Forum in Minnesota. The meeting was attended by represenatatives from Kentucky, Wisconsin, Oregon, Indiana, and Canada.

April 5

Meeting with Colorado Department of Agriculture

April 1995

Meetings with representatives of federal legislators, including represenatives of Senator Hank Brown, Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell, and Represenative David Skaggs.

OTHER ACTIVITIES

In addition to the major campaigns outlined above, CO-HIP has also engaged in the following activities on a continuous basis: