The June 2019 Oakland City Council resolution that made entheogenic plants and fungi the lowest law-enforcement priority — and launched a national campaign that reached 20+ cities.
The Oakland Decriminalize Nature resolution directs the Oakland Police Department to make personal possession, use, cultivation, and gifting of entheogenic plants and fungi the lowest enforcement priority in the city. The council passed it unanimously on June 4, 2019, with an 8-0 vote.
Council member Noel Gallo introduced the resolution after meeting with Decriminalize Nature Oakland — a coalition co-founded by Carlos Plazola — and hearing scientific and community testimony on the healing potential of plant medicines. No council member voted against it.
The resolution also bars the city from spending any money to help enforce state or federal criminal penalties against adults for personal entheogen use. That spending restriction is what gives the policy its teeth beyond a symbolic statement.
Lowest enforcement priority means Oakland police treat personal entheogen cases as the last thing they pursue — below all other public safety matters. Officers are not required to ignore these substances entirely, but the policy signals that no city resources should go toward prosecution of adult, non-commercial activity.
The resolution is not a law and it does not change the California Penal Code or federal scheduling. What it changes is where Oakland police direct their time and budget.
The Oakland resolution covers all entheogenic plants, fungi, and their compounds listed on the federal Schedule 1 — a deliberately broad definition that goes well beyond any prior city policy.
The named substances and their source plants include:
The resolution uses the umbrella phrase "entheogenic plants and plant compounds on the Federal Schedule 1 list" — meaning it can cover other naturally-derived psychoactive plants without the council having to name each one individually. This open-ended language was a deliberate drafting choice that set Oakland apart from Denver's narrower psilocybin-only measure.
Oakland's resolution only covers personal, non-commercial adult activity. Several categories of conduct remain fully illegal under California and federal law, and the resolution does not shield them.
California state law still classifies psilocybin and most entheogens as controlled substances. The resolution means Oakland police will not pursue cases, but state agencies or federal law enforcement are not bound by it.
Denver's May 2019 Initiative 301 was the first US city decriminalization of a psychedelic — but it was limited to psilocybin mushrooms only. Oakland's resolution one month later was explicitly broader and used different policy mechanics. The table compares the two.
| Feature | Oakland (June 2019) | Denver (May 2019) |
|---|---|---|
| Passed by | City council vote (8-0 unanimous) | Citizen ballot initiative (50.6% yes) |
| Substances covered | All entheogenic plants and fungi on Schedule 1: psilocybin, DMT, mescaline, ibogaine, and more | Psilocybin mushrooms only |
| Coverage language | Open-ended: "entheogenic plants or plant compounds on the Federal Schedule 1 list" | Specific: "mushrooms or fungi that contain psilocybin or psilocin" |
| City spending restriction | Yes — bars city funds from aiding enforcement | No explicit spending restriction |
| Sale and distribution | Still illegal | Still illegal |
| Template for national campaign | Yes — Decriminalize Nature used Oakland as its model | No direct national campaign spawned |
When Oakland's approach matters more: if you use ayahuasca, iboga, or peyote in a ceremonial or healing context, Denver's policy gives you no protection. Oakland's breadth was intentional — Plazola and other advocates argued that limiting decriminalization to a single molecule missed the point of plant-medicine healing traditions.
See the full Denver Initiative 301 guide for that measure's details, and the US cities that decriminalized psilocybin for a full list of where each policy stands.
Oakland's unanimous vote gave advocates in other cities a concrete template: a short council resolution, community testimony, and a framing around healing rather than recreation was enough to win unanimous support.
Carlos Plazola and other Oakland organizers immediately founded the national Decriminalize Nature campaign, which distributed the Oakland resolution language to local chapters. Within 18 months, similar resolutions passed in:
One operational detail that rarely appears in coverage: Decriminalize Nature chose council resolutions over ballot initiatives wherever possible. Council resolutions cost almost nothing to pursue, require no signature gathering, and can move in weeks rather than years. Oakland's 8-0 vote — with zero organized opposition — proved the council-resolution path was viable and became the preferred template over Denver's expensive ballot campaign.
Since June 2019, no confirmed arrests specifically for personal entheogen possession or use have been documented in Oakland — a result that Carlos Plazola noted publicly in 2021 when he stated the campaign had not heard of a single arrest for entheogens under the resolution.
The most significant test came in August 2020, when Oakland police raided the Zide Door Church — a religious organization that was exchanging cannabis and mushrooms for members under a cooperative model. The raid was primarily targeted at the cannabis operation. Notably, OPD omitted "psilocybin" from the arrest warrant specifically to respect the decriminalization resolution, even in a case involving an organization the city considered to be operating outside the personal-use scope. That omission is the clearest documented example of the resolution shaping police behavior in a real enforcement situation.
This real-world detail — police actively working around the resolution even in a commercial-adjacent context — rarely appears in summaries of Oakland's policy. It illustrates that "lowest priority" translated into an operational norm within the department, not just a symbolic statement.
Oakland did not create a regulated market, a licensing program, or any formal city infrastructure for entheogen access. The resolution changed enforcement posture only. For Oaklanders who want regulated access to psilocybin in a supervised program, the nearest options are Colorado's licensed healing centers or retreats abroad — see our retreat finder for legal options.
All entheogenic plants and compounds covered by Oakland's resolution remain Schedule 1 under federal law — illegal to possess, sell, or distribute under the Controlled Substances Act, with no accepted medical use and no federal exemption for personal use.
Oakland's resolution does not change federal law, and federal agents operating in Oakland are not bound by the city's enforcement priorities. In practice, the DEA has not pursued individual personal-use entheogen cases in Oakland, but the legal risk is not zero for anyone on federal land or carrying across state lines.
California state law also still schedules psilocybin and most entheogens as controlled substances. State law enforcement agencies — such as the California Highway Patrol — are not bound by Oakland's resolution. For a current picture of where California stands on reform, see the California SB 58 guide.
For the full national picture, see our guide to where magic mushrooms are legal, the full US psychedelic legal status guide, and the legal status by state tool.
The Oakland City Council voted 8-0 on June 4, 2019 to make the personal possession, use, cultivation, and gifting of entheogenic plants and fungi the lowest law-enforcement priority in the city. It covers psilocybin mushrooms, ayahuasca, peyote, iboga, and related plant medicines. It is a policy resolution, not a law — it does not legalize or permit the sale of these substances.
Magic mushrooms are decriminalized in Oakland, not legal. The 2019 resolution directs police to treat possession and personal use of psilocybin mushrooms as the city's lowest enforcement priority. Sale, distribution, and commercial activity remain illegal under California and federal law.
Denver Initiative 301 (May 2019) covered only psilocybin mushrooms. Oakland's resolution (June 2019) covered the full range of entheogenic plants and fungi — psilocybin, ayahuasca, peyote, iboga, and any plant on the federal Schedule 1 list. Oakland also passed by an 8-0 unanimous council vote, rather than a narrow 50.6% citizen ballot in Denver.
Decriminalize Nature is a national campaign co-founded by Carlos Plazola that uses Oakland's 2019 resolution as its template. After Oakland's vote, local chapters organized in cities across the US and passed similar lowest-enforcement-priority policies in over 20 jurisdictions, including Washington DC, Ann Arbor, Detroit, Santa Cruz, and Seattle.
No confirmed arrests for personal entheogen possession or use in Oakland have been documented since the 2019 resolution. In August 2020, Oakland police raided the Zide Door Church — but OPD omitted psilocybin from the arrest warrant specifically to respect the decriminalization resolution, even in that commercial-adjacent context.
No. The resolution applies only to personal, non-commercial activity: possession, personal use, cultivation, and gifting between adults. Sale and commercial distribution remain illegal under California state law and federal law, and the resolution offers no protection for those activities.
Oakland's resolution changed enforcement — it did not create a regulated access pathway. If you are looking for supervised, legal psilocybin sessions or legal retreat options, our tools can help you find them.
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