Appleton, WI Public Conduct: Public Marijuana Use (2026)

Section 10-32 of the Appleton Municipal Code adopts Wis. 0107(1)(bm), which lets a municipality make possession of 25 grams or less of marijuana, as defined in Wis. 01(14), punishable as a local ordinance violation instead of referring every case to the county district attorney for prosecution under the state's criminal possession statute. The ordinance carries the state exceptions in Wis. 41(3g)(intro) forward into the city code, and it draws two hard lines that keep the municipal citation path narrow: a person found with more than 25 grams of marijuana cannot be charged under this section at all, and neither can a person charged with possessing any amount of marijuana who already has a prior Wisconsin marijuana possession conviction; both groups are instead referred for state prosecution, which carries criminal penalties the municipal citation does not.

For an eligible first-time, under-25-gram case, Appleton police issue a citation the same way they do for any other Chapter 10 offense, under the citation procedure in § 1-17, and because § 10-32 states no penalty of its own, the applicable forfeiture is the Code's general penalty in § 1-16.