POTLUCK > Did Ya Know Still Illegal in Arizona?



In the great state of Arizona, where many people wonder if reasonable minds in the State Legislature have gone on vacation, throwing a potluck lunch or potluck dinner where everyone brings something to a buffet table at social clubs and church groups - can land you on the wrong side of the law.

That’s largely thanks to an unusual legal technicality -one that some Arizonans are calling “ridiculous.”
To celebrate the Full Moon Festival last month the Mesa Urban Garden invited everyone to a potluck in the late afternoon continuing with a celebration for the 4th year of the community garden on First Avenue. Was it illegal?

Or amazing that our elected state legislators can nitpick potluck, a common practice in social circles and at the same fight against  another kind of pot whose medical use was overwhelming supported by a voter initiative? In states where pot [more properly Cannabis ] has been legalized it has generated over $5.4 billion dollars in revenues and more jobs.
According to this report in Vice News/Munchies on 09 Feb 2016 by Alex Swerdloff Arizona’s anti-potluck law came to light when someone at the Apache Junction trailer park had enough of the potluck dinners that were thrown there on the regular. The unnamed potluck-hater discovered that, technically, you can’t legally throw a potluck in Arizona outside of a workplace.
Have no fear, dear readers, the elected representative from Mesa is following the big stink on this: According to Daily Miner, that’s when Representative Kelly Townsend, a Republican from Mesa, heard about the heat on potlucks. She says she initially thought it was “some kind of a joke."

But do not fear, friends: Arizona legislators are on it. This month, an Arizona House of Representatives panel took the first steps toward allowing community potlucks in non-work situations. (Arizona, by the way, still has some of the harshest laws against marijuana in the country.)

Townsend said she finds the potluck prohibitions “goofy.”