Pro-marijuana spot running in Times Square

This ad is now shown on the CBS “Super Billboard” (26 foot by 20 foot) in New York City’s Times Square through May 31, 2010. The message “Money can grow on trees” is from the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws Foundation (NORML).
The ad—15 seconds long, with no sound—is based around NORML’s assertion that legalizing the drug could raise more than $30 billion annually in new tax revenue, while saving an additional $15 billion in law-enforcement costs.

“Regulating the adult use of marijuana in a manner similar to alcohol could raise over $30 billion annually in new tax revenue, while saving an additional $15 billion per year in law enforcement costs,” NORML Foundation Executive Director Allen St. Pierre said. “This tax season, why not ask your elected politicians why the federal government continues to spends billions of tax dollars enforcing this failed and archaic public policy.”

Fifty-three percent of Americans now support legalizing marijuana, according to the results of a December 2009 Angus Reid survey of over 1,000 adults nationwide.

The NORML Foundation’s ‘Money Tree’ ad will appear eighteen times per day on the CBS’s digital billboard, located on 42nd Street. Approximately 1.5 million people walk by the billboard each day.

In January, CBS and the NORML Foundation entered into a contractual agreement to air the NORML Foundation ad, beginning on February 1, 2010. However, representatives from CBS and Neutron Media abruptly pulled the ad prior to its scheduled air date, stating that its content did not comply with the network’s outdoor advertising standards.

Last month, representatives from the political advocacy organization Change.org organized an online petition targeting CBS Broadcasting and demanding the network to reverse their decision. Nearly 10,000 people signed and sent the petition.

CBS formally changed their position shortly after receiving the petitions.

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