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A top GOP Ohio lawmaker says there\u2019s no need to rush changes to the state\u2019s voter-approved marijuana legalization law<\/a>, despite the governor\u2019s insistence on getting revisions enacted before possession and cultivation become legal next month. Meanwhile, another Republican legislator has already come out with a bill to change the law by redirecting millions of dollars in cannabis tax revenue toward supporting law enforcement training.<\/p>\n Just one day after meeting with Gov. Mike DeWine (R) to discuss potential amendments to the statutory cannabis law that voters passed<\/a> at the ballot last week, House Speaker Jason Stephens (R) said on Tuesday that the areas they\u2019re looking to change don\u2019t come into play for nearly another year, meaning there\u2019s no reason lawmakers need to ram them through before the basic legalization provisions become effective on December 7.<\/p>\n Specifically, the governor, Stephens and Senate President Matt Huffman (R) have been talking about potential revisions focused on mitigating youth consumption, reallocating certain tax revenue and increasing resources to prevent impaired driving.<\/p>\n \u201cTo do that in the next couple of weeks, it\u2019s going to be a real challenge to put forth such a large program that quickly,\u201d Stephens said, as The Cleveland Plain Dealer reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n Another state lawmaker, Rep. Cindy Abrams (R), isn\u2019t wasting any time as she proposes her own changes to the legalization law, however. A bill<\/a> she introduced<\/a> last week, shortly after voters approved the marijuana measure, would use $40 million in cannabis tax revenue annually to support a law enforcement training fund. Any revenue in excess of $40 million per year would then be distributed according to the statutory initiative.<\/p>\n \u201cThe voters did approve Issue 2, and they had their idea of what the tax money was going to be used for,\u201d Abrams said at a press conference on Tuesday. But she questioned if voters \u201creally even know what they actually voted for.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cVoters I talked to had no idea how the money was going to be used tax-wise. All they cared about is they want to be able to legally smoke marijuana and that\u2019s what they were concerned about,\u201d she said<\/a>. \u201cIt\u2019s just another great example, in my humble opinion, why the debate happens here in Columbus. We talk to our constituents, but at the end of the day, we set the budget\u2014the General Assembly does.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOur first responders are going to be the ones who ultimately respond, sadly, to the fatal car crash or the auto accident with injuries or any plethora of 911 calls that are going to come in related to \u2018fill in the blank, you\u2019re, you\u2019re impaired,’\u201d she said. \u201cI believe that training saves lives\u2026 I don\u2019t care what you do for a living, when you\u2019re well-trained it\u2019s a better outcome. So I am very passionate about having every single police officer\u2014whether you work for Columbus, Cincinnati, or a smaller jurisdiction around our state\u2014to have access to the same training so that you\u2019re getting the same outcome, no matter where you happen to drive through in our state.\u201d<\/p>\n Stephens, for his part, said on Tuesday that while the governor and Republican leaders are talking about reallocating certain marijuana tax revenue to support law enforcement, lawmakers aren\u2019t planning to fully disband with the tax policies articulated in the voter-approved initiative.<\/p>\n \u201cObviously, we want to respect the will of the voters,\u201d he said, adding that possible amendments to the law don\u2019t \u201chave to be decided by December 6. They \u201ccan be decided as we move further down the line,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The governor has said on several occasions that he does want to see revisions enacted prior to possession and cultivation being legalized<\/a> early next month. However, he\u2019s stressed that voters shouldn\u2019t expect any \u201csurprises,\u201d and the proposed revisions that are being discussed would still honor the \u201cspirit\u201d of the reform.<\/p>\n Both the Senate president and House speaker have\u00a0already discussed their own independent interest in amending the cannabis law<\/a>, with a focus on THC limits and tax policy. A spokesperson for the Senate GOP majority similarly said that the legislature \u201cmay consider amending that statute to clarify some questionable language regarding limits for THC,\u201d and added that \u201ctax rates are an issue.\u201d<\/p>\n The governor acknowledged last week that \u201cwhat the people have clearly told us is they want legal marijuana in Ohio.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe are going to see that they have that, but we\u2019ve also got to live up to our responsibility to all the people in the state of Ohio, whether they voted for it or voted against it\u2026that we do this in a very responsible way, we do it in a respectful way,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd we do it, frankly, the Ohio way.\u201d<\/p>\n There\u2019s limited time on the calendars of both chambers to introduce and pass legislation to address the governor\u2019s and lawmakers\u2019 concerns before personal possession and cultivation become effective. The Senate is currently only scheduled to meet twice before December 7, and the House has four session days to act.<\/p>\n Rep. Casey Weinstein (D), who has championed cannabis reform in the legislature and sponsored bipartisan legalization legislation, told Marijuana Moment last week that \u201cOhioans spoke loud and clear\u201d at the ballot.<\/p>\n \u201cWe value privacy. We value freedom. We value liberty,\u201d he said. \u201cThe leaders in the legislature should heed the call and uphold the will of the voters.\u201d<\/p>\n In a new interview this week, Weinstein\u00a0said\u00a0it is \u201ca slap in the face to Ohio voters\u201d to now get involved in setting the rules for legal marijuana only after the ballot measure forced the issue when they could have acted on legislation he filed for the past few sessions.<\/p>\n \u201cHopefully this teaches them a lesson that bills that have overwhelming bipartisan support deserve hearings,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u2014 The Ohio Department of Commerce was quick to publish an FAQ guide\u00a0for residents to learn about the new law and timeline for implementation<\/a>, though regulators repeatedly noted that the policies may be subject to change depending on how the legislature acts.<\/p>\n Prohibitionist organizations that campaigned against Issue 2, meanwhile, are set on a fundamental undermining of the newly approved law, with some describing plans to pressure the legislature to entirely repeal legalization before it\u2019s even implemented.<\/p>\n For what it\u2019s worth, a number of Ohio lawmakers said in September that they\u00a0doubted the legislature would seek to repeal a voter-passed legalization law<\/a>.<\/p>\n Voters were only able to decide on the issue after lawmakers declined to take the opportunity to pass their own reform as part of the ballot qualification process. They were given months to enact legalization that they could have molded to address their outstanding concerns, but the legislature ultimately deferred to voters by default.<\/p>\n For his part, the governor has previously said he believes \u201cit would be a real mistake for us to have recreational marijuana,\u201d adding that he visited Colorado following its move to legalize in 2012 and saw what he described as an \u201cunmitigated disaster.\u201d<\/p>\n As early voting kicked off late last month, the GOP-controlled Senate passed a resolution\u00a0urging residents to reject measure<\/a>.<\/p>\n Unlike the top state Republican lawmakers, one of the state\u2019s GOP representatives in Congress\u2014Rep. Dave Joyce, co-chair of the Congressional Cannabis Caucus, said in September that\u00a0he would be voting in favor of the initiative in November<\/a>. He encouraged \u201call Ohio voters to participate and make their voices heard on this important issue.\u201d<\/p>\n Senate Banking Committee Chairman Sherrod Brown (D-OH) said late last month\u00a0he voted in favor of the legalization ballot initiative<\/a>, calling it a \u201chard decision\u201d but one that was based on his belief that the reform would promote \u201csafety\u201d for consumers.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Vivek Ramaswamy, a 2024 Republican presidential candidate, said\u00a0he voted against a ballot initiative to legalize marijuana in Ohio<\/a>\u00a0because he\u2019s concerned the federal government could \u201cweaponize\u201d criminalization against people who are engaged in state-legal cannabis activities under the \u201cfake\u201d pretense that they\u2019re protected from federal prosecution.<\/p>\n Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), for his part, said last week that Ohio\u2019s vote to legalize marijuana at the ballot is\u00a0one of the latest examples of how Americans are rejecting \u201cMAGA extremism,\u201d<\/a>\u00a0and he added that he\u2019s committed to continuing to work on a bipartisan basis \u201cto keep moving on bipartisan cannabis legislation as soon as we can.\u201d<\/p>\n Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-OR), co-chair of the Congressional Cannabis Caucus, told Marijuana Moment last week that\u00a0\u201cthe vote in Ohio was a great big exclamation point on the things we\u2019ve been talking about.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve been saying for years how this issue has crested, how it\u2019s got broad momentum, how it is inclusive. It\u2019s sort of like the success with the [Ohio abortion rights] issue\u2014except this was more pronounced,\u201d he said. \u201cWe got more votes than the abortion issue. We get more votes than anybody on the ballot.\u201d<\/p>\n The White House has separately said that\u00a0\u201cnothing has changed\u201d with President Joe Biden\u2019s stance on marijuana<\/a>, declining to say if he supports Ohio\u2019s vote to legalize this week or whether he backs further reform of federal cannabis laws.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, as Ohio voters approved statewide legalization, activists also chalked up a series of little-noticed wins to\u00a0decriminalize larger amounts of cannabis in three Ohio cities<\/a>, according to preliminary county election results.<\/p>\n Health Benefits Provider Will Cover Psilocybin-Assisted Therapy In States Where It\u2019s Legal<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n Photo courtesy of WeedPornDaily<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n The post Top GOP Ohio Lawmaker Says There\u2019s No Need To Rush Changes To Voter-Approved Marijuana Legalization Law, Despite Governor\u2019s Call For Quick Action<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n
A top GOP Ohio lawmaker says there\u2019s no need to rush changes to the state\u2019s voter-approved marijuana legalization law, despite the governor\u2019s insistence on getting revisions enacted before possession and cultivation become legal next month. Meanwhile, another Republican legislator has already come out with a bill to change the lawContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":458,"featured_media":70175,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[81],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70174"}],"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=70174"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70174\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":70176,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70174\/revisions\/70176"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70175"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70174"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70174"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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\nRead More: Top GOP Ohio Lawmaker Says There\u2019s No Need To Rush Changes To Voter-Approved Marijuana Legalization Law, Despite Governor\u2019s Call For Quick Action<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"