Wash towns and cities consider marijuana-friendly name changes

Washington cities and town have been considering
name changes they hope will attract more agri-tourism.

The recent passage of Initiative 502 that legalizes marijuana in Washington state, has created some unintended consequences that are already being felt at the local level.  Among other challenges have been the recent move by local cities to make their jurisdictions more friendly to those willing to explore the newfound public freedoms introduced by this voter approved legislation.

Part of the effort to attract marijuana users to their communities has been an effort to rename cities.

Tokeland is an area located in Pacific County in southwest Washington.  Tokeland resident, Andrew Garcia, said, “We may not be a formal city, but according to the census bureau we are a census-designated place.  We don’t need to change our name where we live.  I don’t think people should be changing the names of their cities. Our name is pretty 420-friendly as it is, and we can really use some tourism at this place.”


In Rochester, Washington a local ad-hoc citizen’s group is pushing to change the name to Roachester in an effort to jump on the legal pot bandwagon.  “We are really talking about just adding one letter to the town name.  Most local people won’t even notice.  We are also close to the State Capital, and our local businesses could become destinations for lobbyists and lawmakers taking a needed break from the hard business of legislation during the session,” claimed Rochester resident Lenny Weedeater.

These are not isolated locations.  The town of Waterville is considering changing the 100-year-old town name to “Waterpipe,” and the City of Camas, WA is considering changing their name to “Cannabis.”  “It has a nice ring to it,” said one local Camas resident who supports the proposed name change.

However, not everyone supports this trend in local name changes.  In Potlach, citizens are collecting signatures that require cities to retain the names by which they have been incorporated.  “We think the name of our city is perfect, and we don’t believe others should change their names in some kind of trendy, short-sighted effort to conform.” Stated Felix Kush, “we just want things to stay the way they are right now.”

Others take a little more nuanced view of the situation.  At a recent City Council meeting in Sammamish, during the public comment period, some residents had suggested changing the name to “Sammamhashish” would be more appropriate considering the recent initiative, and that this name would actually reflect more accurately the original Native American tribes pronunciation of the area.  However one city employee reflected that, “adding those four extra letters would require us to purchase new letterhead, signs, and repaint our police cars. It would probably cost more than the prospective tourism dollars would justify.”

However, regardless of the outcome of these various re-naming efforts, it is clear that passing the recent initiative will change the culture of Washington State, even if the names stay the same.