As a part of its marijuana legalization initiative passed in 2012, I-502, Washington state is required to issue periodic reports on how its ‘experiment’ with cannabis is going.

Changes to marijuana policies may extend much deeper than popularly publicized medicinal and economic benefits, according to a new UW study.

Katarina Guttmannova, Ph.D. in experimental and developmental psychology and principal investigator in the Social Development Research Group at the UW, along with fellow researchers and the Center for the Study of Health and Risk Behaviors, recently published a study titled “Impacts of Changing Marijuana Policies on Alcohol Use in the United States.”

A Washington state House bill wants to create a pilot program for a legal marijuana home-delivery service in Seattle. 

Here’s how it would work. 

The pilot program proposed by state legislators would allow five existing licensed recreational marijuana stores in Seattle to offer delivery services to Washington state residents over the age of 21, according to Mayor Ed Murray’s office. The pilot program would also provide a framework for delivery requirements, employee training and enforcement. 

The bill’s first reading was January 12.

Here’s the reason behind it, according to the mayor.  

Seattle's medical marijuana dispensaries are scrambling after receiving a 14-day notice from the state Liquor and Cannabis Board.

The CPC in Georgetown has served thousands of patients since 2010. It works with hospitals, specializing in hard-to-find treatments for chronic disease, cancer, seizures and PTSD.

"We were always going to do this stuff anyways," founder Jeremy Kaufman said while pointing to new security cameras.

Kaufman is making a lot of changes to his building, adding new security cameras, constructing new walls, removing doorways, and clearing out his basement filled with cannabis plants. It's all part of applying for a new marijuana retail license, required by legislation that's combining medical and recreational pot under one regulatory system.

SEATTLE -- Seattle City Attorney Pete Holmes is vowing to crack down on illegal, black market marijuana businesses that he says are undercutting licensed retailers.

The Washington state Liquor and Cannabis Board estimates the black market makes up around 28% of the entire market. Legal retailers feel that estimate is low.

"I'm not free to say all of the enforcement steps that are being engineered now. But Seattle is going to crack down," said Holmes.

Currently, 577 producer/processors and 228 retailers have been licensed by the state. That's produced around $65 million in taxes. Legal retailers say in order for legalization to be successful, the illegal sales must be addressed.

WASHINGTON’S landmark effort to legalize and tax marijuana, now three years old, is finally gaining steady footing. Without federal interference, 197 retail marijuana stores are operating statewide, and state regulators are running checks for underage sales. Finally, the unregulated medical-marijuana market is being folded into the licensed, regulated system.

But the goal of crushing the illicit market — the one that readily sells to kids — is still a pipe dream. In fact, the black market is open and thriving in Seattle, in the form of marijuana-delivery services.

TACOMA, Wash. (AP) — The Justice Department says a 37-year-old man who tried to hide illegal drug dealing behind a medical marijuana dispensary was convicted on two federal drug charges.

U.S. Attorney Annette L. Hayes says Lance Edward Gloor was convicted by a jury Friday in Tacoma of conspiracy to distribute marijuana and manufacturing marijuana.

The jury was unable to reach a verdict on conspiracy to commit money laundering and acquitted Gloor of possession of a firearm in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime.

Court records say law enforcement agents have been investigating Gloor and a business associated since 2010, when they searched Gloor’s home and found over 70 pot plants and a firearm.

Seattle will reduce buffer zones in some places while trying to keep the stores from clustering in some neighborhoods. The plan to allow additional shops, however, may not work as intended.

Legal pot businesses would be allowed in more parts of Seattle under rules approved Monday by the City Council.

Mayor Ed Murray proposed relaxing state-imposed buffers between pot shops and some sensitive areas, such as parks and arcades. As required by state law, the buffers would remain at 1,000 feet between pot businesses and schools and playgrounds.

When perusing our Marijuana archives, we made a simple yet profound discovery:

A lot of the cannabis-related posts we published in 2015 were, for want of a better word, weird.

And definitely worth sharing again.

Below, find excerpts five of the strangest pot stories from last year, complete with photos and links to the rest of the story. Enjoy.

The test could help reduce the number of intoxicated drivers on the road—or it could turn up too many false positives to be useful.

Mike Lynn is cau­tiously ex­cited. A 49-year-old fam­ily man who lives in the Bay Area, Lynn has been an emer­gency-room doc­tor at High­land Hos­pit­al for most of two dec­ades. His com­pany, Hound Labs Inc., has just de­veloped the tech­no­logy to pro­duce a breath­alyz­er that can de­tect marijuana, but its fu­ture is un­cer­tain.