Palm Springs group hosting event, hoping city decriminalizes psychedelic plants, fungi

Since 2019, six California cities have decriminalized psychedelics such as natural hallucinogenic plants and fungi — and one local group wants Palm Springs to be the seventh. 

The Palm Springs Psychedelic Society is hosting a free event this Saturday, Aug. 9, at 12 p.m. with Larry Norris, co-founder of Decriminalize Nature, to discuss decriminalizing psychedelic mushrooms and plants in Palm Springs. The event will be held at the Mizell Center at 480 South Sunrise Way. 

Decriminalize Nature focuses on “educating people about the benefits of entheogenic plants and fungi and the intention to propose legislation that decriminalizes our relationship to nature,” according to the organization’s website. 

The Palm Springs Psychedelic Society “is dedicated to fostering collaboration and education among healthcare professionals to advance the safe, ethical, and evidence-based integration of psychedelic therapies,” and aims to, “expand awareness, understanding, and the current and future accessibility of psychedelic-assisted care.”

Decriminalize Nature has advocated for the decriminalization of psychedelic plants and mushrooms since 2019, when Oakland became the first city in the U.S. to do so. Since then, five other Bay Area and Northern California cities have followed suit: Santa Cruz, San Francisco, Berkeley, Eureka, and Arcata. If Palm Springs moved to decriminalize the substances, it would be the first Southern California city to do so. 

Colorado voters passed a statewide ballot measure to decriminalize psilocybin cultivation and personal use for those over age 21 in 2022, and some cities in states like Michigan and Washington have also decriminalized the substances. Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed a statewide bill that would have decriminalized the possession and use of psychedelic mushrooms and some other hallucinogens in 2023. 

“We’re saying, let’s remove these criminal penalties, or at least stop arresting people for doing something that’s been going on for millennia,” said Norris. 

Technically, the plants and mushrooms remain listed as Schedule 1 drugs by the federal government (as is cannabis), a designation created by the Controlled Substances Act signed by former President Nixon in 1970. That means psychedelic mushrooms and other substances remain illegal at the federal level, even as cities decriminalize.

“What we do on the city level is deprioritization, so it’s among the lowest law enforcement priorities, and this is actually something that the city does have the power to do. They can set priorities for their enforcement and also set budgetary priorities,” said Norris.

“So (cities) are saying, ‘Why are we wasting our time and energy on this when we can be spending it on other things?”

This combination of deprioritization and defunding creates “de facto decriminalization,” said Norris, who says that in most cities, “there isn’t really a huge amount of people that are getting arrested for these types of things.” 

After the event, the next steps for the Palm Springs Psychedelic Society involve building support for a city council discussion about decriminalization in the city. 

---

Details: A link to RSVP for the event is available here. 

---