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Here is an image from a marijuana legalization ad featuring Richard Harris, the retired director of the state's Division of Addiction and Mental Health.

Officials running the marijuana legalization measure on the Oregon ballot say they have reserved $2.3 million in TV advertising for what they say will be the most expensive pro-marijuana campaign in the state's history.

Voters two years ago rejected a marijuana legalization measure that received little funding and ran almost no advertising of any kind.

In contrast, New Approach Oregon's campaign director, Liz Kaufman, said the $2.3 million is a "base television buy" and could be added to in coming weeks. Purchase reports disclosed by two Portland TV stations, KGW and KATU, show the campaign has reserved $750,000 in ad time between Sept. 22 and the Nov. 4 election.

The campaign also released a commercial featuring Richard Harris, the retired head of the state's addictions and mental health division, praising the measure. Kaufman said the ad will also run on TV, perhaps within days.

Harris, who was also executive director of Portland's Central City Concern, before retiring in 2008, praises the measure for providing money for drug treatment and prevention, which he said is now "overwhelmingly underfunded" in the state.

He also called marijuana is a "relatively benign drug" and that its illegality is fueling violence and the drug cartels.

New Approach Oregon has not yet revealed how it will pay for the ads. So far, though it has had a well-funded effort that relies heavily on out-of-state money. Much of the group's money has come from a political fund connected to New York-based Drug Policy Alliance, which says it wants to change the law so that "people are no longer punished for what they put into their own bodies but only for crimes committed against others."

-- Jeff Mapes