February 25, 2020
Mexican Senate Committees Meeting This Week To Finalize Marijuana Legalization Plan
Marijuana legalization is “on track” in Mexico, a top senator said on Monday, announcing that several committees are convening to tackle the issue this week. Sen. Ricardo Monreal of the ruling MORENA party said that four panels have started the process of reviewing comprehensive legislation that deals with medical, recreational and industrial cannabis reform. The committees are set to meet to go over the draft bill on Wednesday. “There is no limit on the content,” he said, referring to the scope of the legislation, according to a translation. “I think it is worth taking advantage of the political moment to be able to legislate broadly on this cannabis issue.” Monreal said he has “confidence” that the Justice, Health, Legislative Studies and Public Safety Committees will reach a consensus on the bill. He also told reporters that he’s spoken to President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and that he “expressed his respect” for the legislative process and has “no problem with the Senate carrying out a comprehensive legislative exercise” on cannabis issues. While Sen. Julio Menchaca, chairman of the Justice Committee, predicted earlier this month that the full Senate would vote on the legalization proposal by the end of February, it does not appear that the chamber will meet that tight deadline. Monreal previously said that lawmakers are positioned to advance it prior to an April deadline imposed by the nation’s Supreme Court, however. The court, which ruled in 2018 that the country’s ban on marijuana possession and cultivation for personal use was unconstitutional, initially gave Congress a deadline of October 2019 to enact reform. Legislators came close to voting on a committee-approved bill last year, but they ultimately requested a deadline extension that the court granted. While the court only mandated that legislators remove the prohibition on personal possession and cultivation from the lawbooks, leading officials have expressed a desire add a legal sales component as well. “I would like broad, unbounded legislation because if we were strict, it would be enough for us to reform the three articles that the Court has declared unconstitutional,” Monreal said. “But I want to go further.” The senator wants lawmakers to tackle “all items, recreational, medicinal, recreational, sale, cultivation, commercialization, industrialization, everything,” he said. The legislation as currently drafted would allow adults to possess up to 28 grams of cannabis for personal use and cultivate up to four plants. Individuals could apply for a license to possess more than 28 grams but no more than 200 grams. A regulatory body called the Mexican Cannabis Institute would be responsible for issuing business licenses and developing rules for the market. The bill also contains provisions to promote social equity, such as prioritizing cultivation licenses for individuals from communities most impacted by the drug war.
Learn more
President Trump is once again threatening to derail medical cannabis access in the majority of U.S. states that regulate its access and use. In his recently released 2021, the federal budget proposes, the president has called for ending existing federal protections that limit the federal government from interfering in the state-sanctioned regulation of medical cannabis. Doing so would place thousands of medical cannabis providers and the millions of patients who rely on them at risk for criminal prosecution. Some context: since 2014, Congress has repeatedly approved spending legislation forbidding the Justice Department from using federal funds for the explicit purpose of preventing states from “implementing their own state laws that authorize the use, distribution, possession or cultivation of medical marijuana.” Thirty-three states and the District of Columbia regulate the production and dispensing of medical cannabis products to over three million patients. All of these programs, and the patients served by them, would be at risk if the president gets his way. To those following this issue closely, the president ’s latest move hardly comes as a surprise. Despite Trump mentioning during his campaign that he supported medical marijuana and a general states-rights approach to cannabis policy, his presidency has consistently proven these words to ring hollow. Most recently, Marc Lotter, the director of strategic communications for Trump’s 2020 campaign, stated in an interview that the administration is intent on keeping marijuana illegal under federal law. “I think what the president is looking at is looking at this from a standpoint of a parent of a young person to make sure that we keep our kids away from drugs,” he said. “They need to be kept illegal, that is the federal policy. I think the president has been pretty clear on his views on marijuana at the federal level, I know many states have taken a different path.” Let’s be clear — the policy that the administration wants to keep in place is the same failed policy that has existed since 1970, which opines that the cannabis plant should remain classified in the same category as heroin and possesses no accepted medical value. This position doesn’t comport with either public opinion or scientific reality The data speaks for itself. It is not an alternative fact that state-regulated medical marijuana has been proven to possess important benefits to millions of patients while not undermining public safety or health. To date, these regulatory programs are operating largely as voters and politicians intended. The enactment of these policies has not negatively impacted workplace safety, crime rates, traffic safety, or youth use patterns. Additionally, they have stimulated economic development and created hundreds of millions of dollars in new tax revenue. That is why more and more states are enacting medical cannabis laws while existing states are continually expanding them. No state that has passed a medical cannabis access law has ever repealed it. Americans almost universally know that patients are not criminals and that marijuana indisputably has medical value in the treatment of a wide range of ailments. A recent poll from Quinnipiac University found an eye-popping 94 percent of Americans support the legal use of medical cannabis. It makes no political sense for the president to try and put this genie back in the bottle and it up to Congress to see that he does not. Justin Strekal is the Political Director for NORML, where he serves as an advocate to end the federal prohibition of marijuana and to reform our nation's laws to no longer discriminate against its consumers.
Learn more
February 25, 2020
SD Senate next stop for bill to legalize industrial hemp in the state
The state Senate could give final legislative approval Wednesday to legalizing industrial hemp in South Dakota. Forty-seven other states already have some sort of programs. A Senate panel endorsed HB 1008 Tuesday morning. The House already has passed it. It would require hemp to have no more than three-tenths of one percent of THC, the ingredient that makes people feel high. Last year, Governor Kristi Noem vetoed a similar concept. This year she’s on board. Senator Joshua Klumb, R-Mount Vernon, spoke first to the committee Tuesday. Next came Representative Oren Lesmeister, D-Parade, who sponsored the bill last year. Third was Ken Meyer, vice president of A.H. Meyer and Sons, a business at Winfred near Madison that plans to expand if it gets a processing license. Katie Hruska, a lawyer for the governor, explained that Noem blocked it last year. Doug Abraham, a lobbyist for the South Dakota Retailers, said the proposed law would clear a murky situation for businesses on whether they can sell CBD products. Senator Bob Ewing, R-Spearfish, voted against the bill last year but voted for the 2020 version Tuesday. State Public Safety Secretary Craig Price, whose responsibilities include the South Dakota Highway Patrol and motor carrier enforcement, said his department could have handled matters with its current staff if had to oversee only tribal hemp. The Legislature is still working to come up with the approximately $3.5 million that Governor Noem has estimated the program will cost for start-up and ongoing costs for the coming year.
Learn more
February 25, 2020
Smokable Hemp Bill Heads To Virginia Governor’s Desk, And Lawmakers Approve Legal Marijuana Study
Virginia lawmakers sent a bill that would legalize smokable hemp to the governor’s desk on Monday, and they also approved a separate resolution requiring a joint legislative commission to undertake an official study on the broader legalization of marijuana in the commonwealth. The Senate voted 37-3 to pass HB 962, legislation that seeks to clarify that smokable hemp products can be lawfully sold to adults 21 and older. It cleared the House of Delegates earlier this month. The House, meanwhile, approved the Senate-passed SJ 67, which would direct a commission to “study and make recommendations for how Virginia should go about legalizing and regulating the growth, sale, and possession of marijuana by July 1, 2022.” The vote was 63-36. These developments come amid a push to enact a separate bill to decriminalization cannabis possession in the state. Both chambers of the General Assembly have approved similar versions of decriminalization, but reform advocates had hoped that any remaining differences would have been resolved in committee in order to avoid conference so that the bill would go straight to Gov. Ralph Northam (D). The Senate Appropriations Committee took steps to conform the bills on Tuesday, but the matter will still go to a bicameral conference committee before heading to Northam’s desk. While the legalization study resolution might seem like a modest proposal, it represents a significant step in the legislature, Jenn Michelle Pedini, executive director of Virginia NORML, told Marijuana Moment. “The Virginia legislature rarely makes large policy changes without a study,” Pedini said, adding that lawmakers have taken a similar approach to expungements legislation this year. But even though the study resolution passed, a separate, related proposal is facing a hurdle. The study measure had previously been amended to incorporate separate legislation, SJ 66, which would form a joint subcommittee that’d be tasked with reviewing the commission’s legalization analysis and recommendations. This Senate-passed resolution has been referred to the House Rules Committee, but its prospects of passing the full chamber are murky.
Learn more
February 25, 2020
Industrial hemp bill heads to Senate for final vote
The bill legalizing industrial hemp in South Dakota is headed to its final vote of approval in the Legislature. The Senate Agriculture and Natural Resources unanimously approved the industrial hemp bill, House Bill 1008, on Tuesday, and it'll now go to the Senate for a vote. It has already passed the House. Bill sponsor Sen. Joshua Klumb, R-Mount Vernon, said he doesn't believe hemp is going to save anyone's farm, but it'll provide farmers with another crop option. He said he wants farmers to take it slow and carefully with hemp. Klumb said this year's bill has been a collaboration between the Legislature and the Governor's Office. Committee chair Sen. Gary Cammack, R-Union Center, noted that the bill has been a "monumental effort" between legislators and the state agencies. Sen. Bob Ewing, R-Spearfish, said he opposed legalizing hemp last year because of the state agencies requesting to delay it. "I still had heartburn about it until this morning, but then I got to thinking about the different variables here," Ewing said. He pointed out that people are already using CBD products in South Dakota, and the bill will legalize that. One of the ballot questions in November will ask voters to decide on legalizing marijuana and industrial hemp. Ewing said he hopes that voters will defeat the ballot question if legislators legalize industrial hemp during the 2020 session. The bill contains three of four of Gov. Kristi Noem's guardrails of reliable enforcement, responsible regulation and safe transportation, Klumb said. Legislators have said they're working on the fourth guardrail of funding needed to implement a hemp program, but legislators have questioned the estimated costs the state agencies have proposed. Noem said she'll consider signing the bill if it contains all four of her guardrails.
Learn more
February 24, 2020
Marijuana legalization could be on Ohio ballot in 2020
Ohio medical marijuana growers are among a new coalition working to legalize recreational sales and use through a statewide ballot measure in November. The proposed constitutional amendment would allow anyone 21 and older to buy, consume and possess up to 1 ounce of marijuana and grow up to six marijuana plants, according to photo of a petition page obtained by The Enquirer. Ohio's existing medical marijuana businesses would have first dibs on the recreational market beginning in July 2021. State regulators could decide to issue additional licenses. Working with supporters are Tom Haren, a Northeast Ohio attorney who has represented several Ohio marijuana businesses, and Mike Hartley, a Columbus-based Republican consultant. Hartley referred comment to Haren. Haren declined to answer questions about who is backing the effort and how it would be funded. "We will have more to share when we file petitions with the attorney general's office this week," Haren said.
Learn more
February 24, 2020
Tricky Technicalities Inhibit Shipping Medical Marijuana
More than half of the 50 states and the District of Columbia have legalized marijuana for medical use in some form, though each state has a different set of laws and restrictions when it comes to things like what counts as a qualifying medical diagnosis and how patients can receive and use their THC products. As the demand for both medical and recreational marijuana increases, it becomes more challenging for dispensaries and farms to keep up with it, especially since growers and providers must contend with several tricky technicalities. What makes medical marijuana shipping so challenging, in spite of the high demand?
Learn more
February 24, 2020
Marijuana Decriminalization May Soon Be a Reality in Virginia
Virginia is on the verge of decriminalizing marijuana, and bills to make that happen have already passed the House and Senate. Both the House and Senate have passed bills to decriminalize marijuana, and now the lawmakers who introduced both of those bills have struck a deal to make them identical. That’ll keep the effort out of a conference committee and speed up the process of sending the bill to the governor’s desk. One remaining concern, though, is marijuana odor. During a Senate committee hearing, Richmond Senator Joe Morrissey asked House Majority Leader Charniele Herring if the compromise bill prevents officers from searching a car if they smell pot. “No. No it doesn’t," Herring responded. "And honestly until it’s legalized I don’t think we can constrain law enforcement on their observations until we legalize it. But that’s just my opinion.” A separate bill to legalize marijuana was set aside, at least for this year. But the bill now under consideration creates a work group to look into how legalization might happen. Here’s Senator Bill Stanley asking Herring about the work group in a committee hearing: "With regard to this marijuana decriminalization work group, will there be samples? And if so, will snacks be served,” Stanley asked to laughter. Herring responded, “Not until it’s legal.” “Asking for a friend,” Stanley said back. The bill is slated for a final vote in the House and Senate in the next few days.
Learn more
February 24, 2020
Ohio recreational marijuana legalization measure could appear on November 2020 ballot
Another effort to legalize recreational marijuana in Ohio through the ballot box is afoot, with backers of a proposed constitutional amendment now targeting the November 2020 ballot. Tom Haren, a Cleveland attorney who also serves as an official with a trade group representing industrial hemp growers, declined to publicly discuss his group’s plans. “We will have more to share when we file petitions with the Attorney General’s Office later this week,” Haren said. Mike Hartley, a Republican political consultant in Columbus working on the effort, declined to comment for this story, referring comment to Haren. Submitting petitions is just the first step in the complex and expensive process through which the public can seek to amend the state constitution. If Attorney General Dave Yost and the Ohio Ballot Board approve the group’s proposed language, the campaign then would have until July 1 to submit roughly 443,000 valid voter signatures collected from 44 of Ohio’s 88 counties if it wants to make the November ballot. The first — and last — time Ohioans were asked to vote on marijuana was in 2015, when voters rejected State Issue 3 by 64%-36%. Even though the issue failed badly, the threat of renewed attempts in part prompted the state legislature and then-Gov. John Kasich to pass a law legalizing medical marijuana the following year. But it wasn’t until January 2019 that medical marijuana was available for sale in Ohio. By the end of the year, 48 dispensaries had opened, and 55,617 Ohioans had purchased $60.6 million in flower, edibles, oil and other product. Thomas Rosenberger, associate director of the Ohio Medical Cannabis Cultivators Association, an industry trade group, said his organization isn’t backing the latest legalization effort. “The Ohio Medical Cannabis Association is focused squarely on bettering Ohio’s medical program, and we at this time are not backing an adult-use initiative," Rosenberger said. Three other potential state constitutional amendments are in the mix for the November election. Organized labor groups are collecting signatures for a measure to raise the state’s minimum wage to $13 an hour, while campaigns backing two other proposed amendments — one that would expand early-voting and voter-registration laws, and another that would modify term limits for state lawmakers — are waiting for state approval before moving to the wider signature-collection phase.
Learn more
February 24, 2020
Louisiana licenses issued allowing farmers to grow hemp
Louisiana started handing out its first licenses to farmers to grow industrial hemp this month, after lawmakers legalized the crop in a bid to start a new agricultural industry in the state. “Our industrial hemp program administrators worked hard to ensure the regulatory framework was in place as soon as feasibly possible and in time for the 2020 planting season,” Agriculture Commissioner Mike Strain, a Republican, said in a statement Thursday. Strain’s office told The Advocate that it gave the first hemp grower’s license to Nanette Noland, the president of the Powell Group, an investment firm that owns several agricultural businesses. The prospect of hemp as a new crop has excited farmers in Louisiana, especially after many suffered through rough weather and a trade war that stymied the market for some crops. Hemp is a member of the cannabis plant family but contains only traces of the THC chemical compound that causes a high for marijuana users. Louisiana’s hemp legalization came after Congress’ 2018 Farm Bill removed the crop from the list of federally controlled substances, giving states an opportunity to develop a hemp-growing program. It also coincides with the increasing popularity of Cannabidiol, or CBD, the non-psychoactive compound in the cannabis plant that is often extracted from hemp. The state law that authorized hemp production in Louisiana also created a regulatory framework for sales of CBD products. Records from the state Alcohol and Tobacco Control board show nearly 1,500 businesses have received the paperwork required to sell products containing CBD, which is sold in a wide range of products including lotions and other personal care products. Those businesses span the state and range from gas stations to chiropractic clinics to pharmacies to CBD shops. The growing market for CBD has driven much of the demand for hemp, though the crop can be turned into a wide range of industrial products as well, including rope, fuels and textiles.
Learn more
