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A Delaware Senate committee on Wednesday approved a House-passed bill to legalize marijuana possession and sharing for adults 21 and older\u2014a move that comes one day after a complementary measure to set up rules for an adult-use market advanced out of a second committee in the House and now heads to the floor of that chamber.<\/p>\n
Rep. Ed Osienski (D) is sponsoring both measures as part of a two-track approach to enacting the reform. He initially tried to pass a bill that included both components, but it failed to get a three-fifths supermajority and was defeated on the House floor in March<\/a>.<\/p>\n The sponsor then devised a different plan, breaking up the measure so that he would have one bill to simply legalize possession for those 21 and older that only requires a simple majority to pass and another to create regulations for the market that still needs three-fifths of members to be enacted.<\/p>\n Osienski reasoned that more lawmakers might be inclined to support the regulatory bill and reach the higher vote threshold if the legislature chooses to legalize for non-commercial purposes. And so far, things have gone according to plan.<\/p>\n Members of the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday took up the simple legalization bill\u2014which already moved through the House<\/a> after going through the committee process<\/a>\u2014and approved it following public testimony.<\/p>\n \u201cThe legalization of recreational marijuana Delaware is long overdue,\u201d Sen. Trey Paradee (D), the Senate sponsor of the bill, said in his opening remarks at Wednesday\u2019s hearing. \u201cA significant majority of Delawareans support the legalization of recreational marijuana.\u201d<\/p>\n He noted the proliferation of other states that have enacted the reform and the sizable economic opportunity that Delaware has missed out on by \u201ckicking around\u201d the issue for year after year.<\/p>\n \u201cThink about all the good that we could have done with [cannabis tax revenue],\u201d he said. \u201cThink about the investments in our schools and helping disadvantaged neighborhoods, just improving the quality of life for Delawareans, whether they be young or old, attacking the opioid addiction problem that we have.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s just really, honestly, kind of sad to think about all the missed opportunities that we\u2019ve had over the past five years,\u201d Paradee said<\/a>.<\/p>\n The director of Delaware Alcohol and Tobacco Enforcement testified in opposition to the bill, claiming that legalization would embolden the illicit market, lead to increased youth use and raise the risk of impaired driving.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, the House Appropriations Committee passed the complementary cannabis sales bill on Tuesday, sending it to the floor.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s what Delaware\u2019s\u00a0HB 371<\/a>\u00a0would do:\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n The bill would amend state statute by eliminating penalties associated with the possession of up to one ounce of marijuana by adults 21 and older.<\/p>\n It would further add a section stipulating that adults 21 and older could share up to an ounce of cannabis \u201cwithout remuneration.\u201d<\/p>\n That section clarifies that marijuana could not be \u201cgifted\u201d as part of a contemporaneous \u201creciprocal transition\u201d or if the gift is contingent on a separate transaction for non-cannabis products or services.<\/p>\n Here are the main provisions of the complementary\u00a0HB 372<\/a>:\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n A marijuana commissioner would be appointed under the state Division of Alcohol and Tobacco Enforcement. The official would be tasked with regulating the industry and overseeing licensing of retailers, cultivators, manufacturers and laboratories.<\/p>\n Licenses would be granted through a scored, competitive process, with advantages given to those who pay workers a living wage, provide health insurance or meet certain other benchmarks.<\/p>\n After 19 months of the bill\u2019s enactment, regulators would need to approve 30 retailer licenses, half of which would go to social equity applicants. Social equity applicants would be defined as entities majority-owned by people with past cannabis convictions or who live in an area disproportionately impacted by the drug war.<\/p>\n Those applicants would also be allotted one-third of the planned 60 cultivation licenses, one-third of manufacturing licenses and two of five licenses for testing laboratories. They would also qualify for reduced application and licensing fees as well as technical assistance from the state.<\/p>\n Retail marijuana sales would be subject to a 15 percent tax. No tax would be levied on medical cannabis sales.<\/p>\n Seven percent of the tax revenue would be used to support a new Justice Reinvestment Fund that would provide grants, services and other initiatives that focus on issues such as jail diversion, workforce development and technical assistance for people in communities that are economically disadvantaged and disproportionately impacted by the drug war. The money would also be used to help facilitate expungements.<\/p>\n Home cultivation for personal use would continue to be prohibited.<\/p>\n The legislation would allow individual municipalities to establish their own regulations for marijuana business operating times and locations, and they would also be allowed to ban cannabis companies altogether from their jurisdictions.<\/p>\n The bill provides explicit legal protections for state employees who work with the state-legal market. And it would also allow marijuana businesses to claim tax deductions at the state level\u2014something they\u2019re prohibited from doing at the federal level under a tax code known as 280E.<\/p>\n The tax-and-regulate bill is materially the same as the measure defeated in the state House in March.<\/p>\n \u201cWith the Senate Judiciary committee passing HB 371 today, Delaware is one step closer to legalizing cannabis for adults this year,\u201d Olivia Naugle, a senior policy analyst with the Marijuana Policy Project, told Marijuana Moment.<\/p>\n \u201cDelawareans have long supported ending cannabis prohibition in the state, and we urge the Senate to stand with their constituents to swiftly pass HB 371,\u201d she said, adding that for \u201cequity, public health, and public safety, it is important the House also pass HB 372 to set up a regulatory framework for an adult-use market in Delaware.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2014 Vermont lawmakers followed a similar approach to what Osienski is now pursuing by first passing a noncommercial legalization bill in 2018 and then following that up with separate legislation to tax and regulate sales in 2020.<\/p>\n Notably, Delaware House Speaker Pete Schwartzkopf (D), who was the sole Democrat in the House who voted against the earlier legalization bill, signaled that he might be inclined to support a bill providing a regulatory infrastructure for marijuana commerce if the chamber votes to legalize possession and sharing. That said, he still voted against HB 371.<\/p>\n An even earlier legalization\u00a0bill<\/a>\u00a0from Osienski cleared committee last year. However,\u00a0disagreements over social equity provisions<\/a>\u00a0stalled that version, keeping it from the floor. At the time, Osienski pledged to\u00a0bring a revised bill for the 2022 session<\/a>\u00a0that could earn broad enough support to pass.<\/p>\n When the sponsor\u2019s earlier bill was being considered last year, he said he was caught off guard when he was informed that the inclusion of a social equity fund meant the bill would require 75 percent of legislators in the chamber to approve it.<\/p>\n The lawmaker tried\u00a0to address the problem through an amendment, but some members of the Black Caucus opposed the changes, and the measure failed.<\/p>\n Osienski has worked with the Black Caucus in the ensuing months to build support and move toward more passable legislation. And a clear sign of the progress is that Reps. Rae Moore (D) and Nnamdi Chukwuocha (D) signed on as cosponsors to the since-rejected bill after pulling their support for the 2021 version over equity concerns. They\u2019re also listed as cosponsors for the new HB 372.<\/p>\n In 2019, Osienski was the chief sponsor of a legalization bill that\u00a0cleared a House committee<\/a>\u00a0but did not advance through the full chamber. That bill would have allowed medical cannabis dispensaries to begin selling marijuana to adults 21 and older while the rest of the adult-use industry was still preparing to launch, a provision that was removed from later versions.<\/p>\n Four of the state\u2019s six medical marijuana companies came out publicly against that change and\u00a0testified in opposition to last year\u2019s bill.<\/a>\u00a0In response,\u00a0Delaware activists\u00a0mounted a boycott against those operators<\/a>.<\/p>\n Portions of the most recent version of the cannabis regulations bills on expungements were removed this session, as they were made redundant by the enactment of separate legislation last year.<\/p>\n As supportive lawmakers have worked to push cannabis reform through the legislature, they also faced the challenge of winning over Carney, one of the rare Democratic governors who\u00a0remain opposed to legalization<\/a>.<\/p>\n Despite his wariness about adult-use legalization, Carney did previously sign two pieces of marijuana expungement legislation. In 2017 and 2018, a state task force met to discuss issues related to legalization, and the governor hosted a series of roundtable meetings about cannabis.<\/p>\n A legalization bill previously\u00a0received majority support on the House floor in 2018<\/a>, but it failed to receive the supermajority needed to pass.<\/p>\n Carney\u2019s predecessor approved a measure to decriminalize simple possession of cannabis in 2015.<\/p>\n An analysis from State Auditor Kathy McGuiness (D) released last year found that Delaware could\u00a0generate upwards of $43 million annually in revenue<\/a>\u00a0from regulating marijuana and imposing a 20 percent excise tax. The legal market could also create more than 1,000 new jobs over five years if the policy is enacted, according to the report.<\/p>\n Colorado Activists Collect Tens Of Thousands Of Signatures To Put Psychedelics Reform On Ballot<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n The post Delaware Senators Approve House-Passed Marijuana Legalization Bill As Separate Sales Proposal Also Advances<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n
A Delaware Senate committee on Wednesday approved a House-passed bill to legalize marijuana possession and sharing for adults 21 and older\u2014a move that comes one day after a complementary measure to set up rules for an adult-use market advanced out of a second committee in the House and now headsContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":458,"featured_media":54651,"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\/54650"}],"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=54650"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54650\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54652,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54650\/revisions\/54652"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/54651"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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\nRead More: Delaware Senators Approve House-Passed Marijuana Legalization Bill As Separate Sales Proposal Also Advances<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"