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Another North Carolina Senate committee has approved a bill to legalize medical marijuana in the state.<\/p>\n
The Senate Finance Committee advanced the legislation in a voice vote on Wednesday. This action comes one month after the Judiciary Committee passed the North Carolina Compassionate Care Act<\/a>, also via a voice vote.<\/p>\n Under the proposal, sponsored by Rules Committee Chairman Bill Rabon (R), patients would be allowed to access cannabis if they have a \u201cdebilitating medical condition\u201d such as cancer, epilepsy, HIV\/AIDS, Parkinson\u2019s disease, multiple sclerosis. Regulators would have authority to add additional qualifying conditions.<\/p>\n The focus of this latest meeting was on financial issues related to the reform, and members approved an amendment that aims to make the medical cannabis program \u201cself-sustaining\u201d by ensuring that tax revenue it generates continues to cover the costs of regulating the market.<\/p>\n Under an earlier substitute amendment adopted in Judiciary last month, a 13-member Medical Cannabis Advisory Board would be able to \u201creview petitions to add a new debilitating medical condition and have the power to add a new debilitating medical condition,\u201d according to a summary.<\/p>\n Separately, a nine-member Medical Cannabis Production Commission would be established to \u201cprovide a safe, regulated supply of cannabis appropriate for medical use by qualified registry identification cardholders; ensure statewide access to safe and affordable cannabis to registry identification cardholders; establish a system that is well regulated, includes a seed to sale tracking system, and is financially viable for suppliers to ensure the highest quality cannabis and cannabis infused products for patients; and generate sufficient revenue for the Commission to oversee and for the Department to maintain and operate the system.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2014 The\u00a0measure<\/a>\u00a0would further create a North Carolina Cannabis Research Program \u201cto conduct objective, scientific research regarding the administration of cannabis or cannabis-infused products as part of medical treatment.\u201d<\/p>\n Last month, lawmakers approved three additional amendments. One reduces the number of medical cannabis dispensaries that could be licensed from eight to four and also makes clarifications about how violations of the program would be handled.<\/p>\n Another would enhance penalties for unlawful offenses such as trafficking medical marijuana, applying a more severe punishment than illegally dealing in non-medical cannabis.<\/p>\n An additional revision requires physicians to indicate the approved medical cannabis delivery methods for patients and mandate that dispensary employees access that information when conducting transactions.<\/p>\n The bill must still advance through the Senate Health Care and Rules and Operations Committees in order to reach the floor.<\/p>\n A majority of North Carolina adults support legalizing marijuana for recreational use\u2014and three in four say it should be legal for medical purposes\u2014according to a poll released in February<\/a>.<\/p>\n It\u2019s possible that the legislature could see additional action on a variety of cannabis-related bills this year.<\/p>\n A separate medical cannabis\u00a0bill<\/a>, adult-use marijuana\u00a0legalization<\/a>\u00a0measures<\/a>\u00a0and several\u00a0pieces<\/a> of cannabis decriminalization<\/a>\u00a0legislation<\/a>\u00a0have also been introduced in recent months\u2014though they do not currently have bipartisan cosponsorships and would likely face an uphill battle in the GOP-controlled legislature.<\/p>\n While advocates have their doubts about broad reform being enacted in North Carolina this session, Senate President Pro Tempore Phil Berger (R) recently\u00a0acknowledged that opinions are shifting<\/a>\u00a0when it comes to marijuana in the state, and he said that Rabon specifically \u201cfor a long time has looked at the issue.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI do sense that public opinion is changing on marijuana\u2014both medical and recreational,\u201d Rabon said previously. \u201cI don\u2019t know where the members of the General Assembly are at this time in terms of support for the bill, but it\u2019s something we\u2019ll look at and we\u2019ll see how things move along.\u201d<\/p>\n Pressure to end criminalization is also building regionally.<\/p>\n Neighboring Virginia became\u00a0the first state in the south to legalize marijuana for recreational use<\/a> in April and that law took effect this month<\/a>, for example. And the sponsor of a South Carolina medical cannabis legalization bill said he\u2019s received assurances from a top Senate leader that his measure will be taken up as the first order of business<\/a>\u00a0at the beginning of next year.<\/p>\n A task force convened by North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper (D) backed decriminalization\u00a0as part of a series of policy recommendations<\/a>\u00a0on racial equity that were released late last year. The group also said prior cannabis convictions should be expunged and the state should consider whether to more broadly legalize marijuana.<\/p>\n Under current law, possessing more than half an ounce up to 1.5 ounces of cannabis is a class 1 misdemeanor, subject to up to 45 days imprisonment and a $200 fine. In 2019, there were 3,422 such charges and 1,909 convictions, with 70 percent of those convicted being nonwhite.<\/p>\n New York Senator\u2019s Bill Would Let Farmers Get A Head Start On Growing Marijuana<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n Photo courtesy of Mike Latimer.<\/em><\/p>\n The post Another North Carolina Senate Committee Approves Medical Marijuana Legalization Bill<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Another North Carolina Senate committee has approved a bill to legalize medical marijuana in the state. The Senate Finance Committee advanced the legislation in a voice vote on Wednesday. This action comes one month after the Judiciary Committee passed the North Carolina Compassionate Care Act, also via a voice vote.Continue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":458,"featured_media":48992,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18,81],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48991"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/458"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48991"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48991\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":48993,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48991\/revisions\/48993"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48992"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48991"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48991"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48991"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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