Marijuana Parties at the X Games: Aspen Says Yes, Snowmass Village Says No

Whether it's officially acknowledged or not, marijuana has long been part of the X Games.

But with X Games 2016 slated to take place January 28-31, Aspen and Snowmass Village are taking very different approaches toward pot events.

The latest version of an Aspen party that turned heads last year is a high-profile go. But Snowmass Village has refused a request from a local club owner to stage a vaporizer party in conjunction with the games.

First up, the event that will happen: Native Roots' Tree House bash, a nightly after-hours get-together whose 2015 version at the Crystal Palace featured DJ Snoopadelic.

You know him better as Snoop Dogg.


This year, Tree House will be taking place at 534 East Cooper Avenue — an Aspen landmark that a Native Roots spokesman can't mention (but look it up and you'll figure it out) — and will include a slew of name performers.

Here's a video of the 2015 spectacle, which maintains that the Cultivate Your Roots Tree House dinner was "the first time in history that a company actually worked with a municipality to allow consumption of cannabis at a building in downtown Aspen."


The folks at Turks, a music club in Snowmass Village, were reportedly hoping to serve as the setting for something similar.

But it's not to be.

According to the Aspen Daily News, a promoter approached Turks to host a marijuana vaporizer party during the X Games.

Weed enthusiasts were supposed to gather on Turks' patio, which offers a great view of the Village.


However, the Snowmass Village Police Department, after consulting with the Marijuana Enforcement Division in Grand Junction, turned thumbs down, 

Snowmass Village has a moratorium on retail pot sales until next year and an ordinance against smoking in any public place, the Daily News points out.

These weren't the only factors in the turn-down, though.

“There’s no way to make the scenario non-public. And you can’t smoke marijuana in public,” Snowmass Village Police Chief Brian Olson told the paper. “You can’t create a private scenario in there and that’s what they were trying to do with the one-day membership."


As we've reported, Denver NORML has announced its plan to introduce a social marijuana use initiative for the 2016 ballot in the Mile High City.

And a number of other communities already allow pot clubs and the like.

However, Amendment 64, the measure that legalized limited recreational marijuana sales in Colorado, grants local control, meaning that cannabis laws differ from place to place throughout the state.

The result in this case is one community that's just saying yes to a marijuana event during the X Games — and another that's just said no.

Here's an X Games video preview.