Head of marijuana advocacy group Americans for Safe Access stepping down

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Steph Sherer, who founded the medical marijuana advocacy organization Americans for Safe Access in 2002 and ran it ever since as executive director, is stepping down to pursue a new cannabis career in Europe – becoming the latest high-profile MJ reformer to exit their posts.

Sherer plans to split her time between Washington DC and Prague, the Czech Republic capital, where she’ll serve as president of the International Cannabis and Cannabinoids Institute (ICCI), according to a news release.

The ICCI – which Sherer helped found in 2015 – is a collaboration of patient advocates, scientists and a New York-based investment company Dioscorides Global Holdings. Sherer formed Dioscorides in 2014.

The institute intends to work hand-in-hand with governments, private enterprise and universities to further marijuana and hemp reform around the globe.

“For the last 17 years, I have worked to break down societal and governmental barriers for patients who need access to medical cannabis,” Sherer said in the release.

“Now that these barriers are tumbling down, it is important that industry evolves to provide products for these populations that are safe, standardized and targeted and that there is the scientific infrastructure to support these efforts.”

She will remain as president of the board for Americans for Safe Access, though she’ll relinquish her executive director role.

Sherer’s exit from nonprofit marijuana advocacy follows the departures of other longtime reformers such as Ethan Nadelmann from the Drug Policy Alliance and Rob Kampia from the Marijuana Policy Project.