Colorado’s experiment with legal recreational marijuana — authorized by voters in 2012, with the first storefronts opening in 2014 — continues to charge ahead amid mixed results. At the same time, the question of whether the costs outweigh the presumed benefits continues to nag — at policymakers, even if many don’t care to admit it — as well as at the public at large.

Sure, for state and local governments, there’s arguably a return on the “investment.” Sizable wholesale and retail excise taxes pump pot revenue into public coffers. Meanwhile, for those Coloradans and tourists who had been longing to spend their days in a pot-induced stupor — without inhibition and beyond the reach of the law — well, now they can. So, there’s that.

But on the other side of the ledger are plenty of Coloradans, many of them parents, who, regardless of their views on legalization or their own history with marijuana, are worried about the impact it all could have on their kids. On their schooling and social lives; their mental and physical health; their intellectual and emotional development; their basic safety on the roads.

So, is this brave new reality more problematic than just the annoying skunk odor that engulfs your house every time your next-door neighbor lights up?

The short answer is, yes, and it’s a good thing the national organization Smart Approaches to Marijuana, or SAM, has been assessing and chronicling the collateral damage in Colorado and across the country. Today, SAM released its fourth annual “Lessons Learned” report, a comprehensive review of the wide-ranging effects of legalization in states where it has been tried. As with previous years’ assessments by SAM, the Colorado-specific data is eye-opening and troubling. Among the findings:

• The number of marijuana-related emergency room visits rose 54% from 2013 to 2017. Yearly marijuana-related hospitalizations increased 101% in that period. Calls to the poison control center for marijuana exposures also increased.

• A Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment study found that over 23,000 homes in the state with children ages 1 to 14 years had marijuana products stored unsafely as of 2018.

• Also in 2018, 60% of youth marijuana exposures involved edibles, compared with just 18% in 2016.

• In 2013, marijuana was present in 10.6% of suicide toxicology reports for young people ages 15 to 19 years; in 2017, marijuana was present in over 30% of suicide toxicology reports for young victims ages 15 to 19.

• The state-by-state rates of workers testing positive for pot use on the job, not surprisingly, are led by states like Colorado, where marijuana is legal. The overall increase in pot-positive testing on the job since legalization is especially pronounced in Colorado — 76.5%.

• The percentage of drivers testing THC-only positive in Colorado increased 16.1% from 2016 to 2017. Of those drivers in 2017, 39.4% were under age 18.

• Marijuana retail locations outnumber all McDonald’s and Starbucks locations in the state combined. And those pot outlets are disproportionately located in disadvantaged neighborhood.

• Nationally, there has been a 25% increase in Cannabis Use Disorder among 12- to 17-year-olds since legalization in pot-legal states including Colorado.

In general, SAM finds, “Youth marijuana use has drastically increased over the last few years, with past-month use among teenagers increasing over 72% from 2018 to 2019. An average of 10% of teens reported past-month marijuana vaping in 2019. In 2019, 2.4% of teenagers reported vaping marijuana almost daily, exceeding near-daily cigarette and near-daily alcohol use among this group.”

In a statement released to the media , SAM’s president, Dr. Kevin Sabet, summed up the national state of affairs:

“In pot-legal states, stoned driving is up. Youth use is up. Emergency room admissions are up. We won’t know the full impact of commercialization for years, but these current indicators are discouraging.”

SAM also released a guide on marijuana and legalization-related issues that will be distributed to candidates for office. The report and guide combined, just weeks out from the election, clearly are intended to rouse the public to action in states where pot is still illegal, and to awaken parents and others to pot’s perils in states like Colorado.

Sabet said SAM “aims to break through the narrative being perpetuated by Big Marijuana that legalization is an innocuous policy change.”

Is that narrative muting the misgivings about marijuana in our state? Coloradans and particularly parents ought to read up on the alarming data that is available — and then speak up. For more information, go to SAM’s website at learnaboutsam.org.

The Gazette editorial board