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The New Hampshire House of Representatives has approved a bill to legalize marijuana for a second time this session, sending it to the Senate.<\/p>\n
The proposal, which is being sponsored by Majority Leader Jason Osborne (R) and Minority Leader Matthew Wilhelm (D), cleared the chamber in a 272-109 vote on Thursday. Earlier in the day the body rejected an amendment that would have added separate legalization language to budget legislation.<\/p>\n
HB 639, the bill that is now heading to the Senate, already got approval from the full House<\/a> in February, but it needed to go to the Ways & Means Committee<\/a>, where it was amended last month, before returning to the floor for final passage.<\/p>\n Osborne said in a press release that he is \u201cpleased to see New Hampshire take a step toward relieving gangsters and thugs from control of this market, keeping dangerous untested products away from consumers, and protecting children from harmful age-inappropriate products.\u201d<\/p>\n Wilhelm said that \u201cwith the decisive passage of HB 639, the New Hampshire House has sent a strong message that this is the year to legalize adult-use cannabis in the Granite State.<\/p>\n that\u2019s a YES from seat 4-20! https:\/\/t.co\/lrhSYpIksv<\/a> pic.twitter.com\/bFPQCGEGKk<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 \u0394manda Bouldin (@BouldinAmanda) April 6, 2023<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n \u201cEvery year we fail to legalize marijuana, the state wastes valuable resources and ruins the lives of many young and poor Granite Staters by enforcing failed prohibition,\u201d he said. \u201cNew Hampshire remains the only state in New England that has failed to legalize cannabis, while our neighbors benefit from increased revenue and their cannabis users benefit from safer testing and regulation of the product. Legalization of adult possession of small amounts of cannabis is the right thing to do for New Hampshire and we must get it done in 2023.\u201d<\/p>\n Rep. Walter Spilsbury (R) said on the floor ahead of the vote that \u201cthe time is long past due to allow legal private enterprise in cannabis and cannabis products to develop successfully in the state of New Hampshire, subject to appropriate regulation and taxation.\u201d<\/p>\n A majority report from the Ways & Means Committee says that it is hard to estimate tax revenues with confidence, but that members assume they will be \u201cnegligible\u201d for the first two years and will build up over time.<\/p>\n \u201cJudging from experiences of other states that have preceded us, prospects for growth are considerable and may rise sharply thereafter, offering some hope that this new source of state revenue can help alleviate the burden of education funding on real property taxes,\u201d it says<\/a>.<\/p>\n Earlier in the session, members of the Commerce and Consumer Affairs Committee had spent weeks working the proposal over a series of meetings<\/a>, going back and forth about a variety of provisions and making amendments to the original measure.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s what\u00a0HB 639<\/a>\u00a0as amended would accomplish:<\/strong><\/p>\n Adults 21 and older would be able to purchase, possess and gift up to four ounces of cannabis.<\/p>\n The newly renamed Liquor and Cannabis Commission would be responsible for regulating the marijuana market and issuing business licenses.<\/p>\n There would not be any statewide cap on the number of marijuana businesses that could be licensed.<\/p>\n Within 18 months of enactment, the state Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) and commission would need to develop regulations allowing existing medical cannabis dispensaries to apply for dual licenses to start serving adult consumers.<\/p>\n Cannabis would be taxed in the amount of 12.5 percent of of products\u2019 value in their final form at the wholesale level.<\/p>\n After the costs of legalization implementation are covered, $100,000 of revenue would fund data collection and reporting on health impacts of cannabis prohibition and cannabis regulation.<\/p>\n Of remaining funds after that, 50 percent would be disbursed to cities and towns to offset the education tax, 30 percent would be credited to the New Hampshire retirement system to offset its unfunded accrued liability, 10 percent or $25 million (whichever is less) would fund substance use programs, 5 percent would be used to hire and train drug recognition experts and 5 percent would support children\u2019s behavioral health services.<\/p>\n Localities could limit or ban marijuana businesses from operating in their area.<\/p>\n There would be employment protections for state or local government workers who use marijuana off the job. Professional and occupational licenses couldn\u2019t be denied or withdrawn because a person uses cannabis.<\/p>\n Marijuana companies could deduct business expenses from their taxes at the state level.<\/p>\n There are no provisions to allow home cultivation or annul prior cannabis convictions.<\/p>\n \u2014 \u201cYear after year, legalization bills have died in the Senate after passing the House, leaving New Hampshire as the only state in New England that hasn\u2019t legalized and regulated cannabis for adults,\u201d Karen O\u2019Keefe, director of state policies for the Marijuana Policy Project, said. \u201cHB 639 is informed by the lessons of the 21 states that have already legalized cannabis and reflects the priorities and values of New Hampshire. It\u2019s past time for the Granite State to live up to its \u2019Live Free\u2019 motto and finally end their status as an island of prohibition by passing this bill.\u201d<\/p>\n Last month, the New Hampshire House approved a separate bill to allow medical marijuana patients to grow their own plants<\/a> for personal use.<\/p>\n The floor vote on home grow came about a week after the House\u00a0approved a second cannabis legalization bill<\/a>\u00a0for the session, one that contains virtually no regulations or limitations on cannabis.<\/p>\n On Thursday, as the House was considering the budget, the same representative who sponsored the no-regulations bill that passed last month filed an amendment to add its provisions to the large-scale spending legislation.<\/p>\n \u201cIf we\u2019re going to spend all these greenbacks today, shouldn\u2019t we send some green back to our constituents?\u201d Rep. Kevin Verville (R) said. \u201cIsn\u2019t it high time we put some common sense cannabis reform laws into place into this state? Isn\u2019t it time that we do what the vast majority of our constituents in poll after poll after poll, year after year after year are begging us to do?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cPlease join me in sending some green back to our constituents by pressing the green button,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The amendment failed in a vote of 160-214, however.<\/p>\n While there\u2019s optimism about the prospects of legalization finally moving in the Granite State this year, advocates still have work cut out for them.<\/p>\n Republicans held on to the both the House and Senate after last year\u2019s election, and the latter chamber is where marijuana reform has faced its toughest obstacles in past sessions even as the House has repeatedly approved legalization bills.<\/p>\n The Senate\u00a0rejected two House-passed reform bills last year<\/a>, including one that would have created a non-commercial cannabis program and another providing for commerce under a state-run model.<\/p>\n In the Senate, there were some shifts that favor reform, however. For example, a Democratic senator who opposed legalization efforts was replaced by a Republican who voted in favor of ending prohibition during his time as a House member.<\/p>\n Gov. Chris Sununu (R), who was reelected last year, remains opposed to legalization\u2014but his more recent comments on the issue seem to show a softening of his position. He said during a debate last year that reform \u201ccould be inevitable,\u201d but he added that states need to \u201cbe patient about how you do it.\u201d<\/p>\n After the Senate rejected two reform bills last year, the House included legalization language as an amendment to separate criminal justice-related legislation\u2014but\u00a0that was also struck down in the opposite chamber<\/a>.<\/p>\n Germany Marijuana Legalization Bill To Be Released \u2018Immediately After Easter,\u2019 But Details Remain In Question<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n Photo courtesy of Philip Steffan<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n The post New Hampshire House Approves Marijuana Legalization Bill For Second Time, Sending It To Senate<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n
The New Hampshire House of Representatives has approved a bill to legalize marijuana for a second time this session, sending it to the Senate. The proposal, which is being sponsored by Majority Leader Jason Osborne (R) and Minority Leader Matthew Wilhelm (D), cleared the chamber in a 272-109 vote onContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":458,"featured_media":63560,"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\/63559"}],"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=63559"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63559\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":63561,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63559\/revisions\/63561"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63560"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63559"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63559"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63559"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
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\nRead More: New Hampshire House Approves Marijuana Legalization Bill For Second Time, Sending It To Senate<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"