EDITOR’S NOTE: NJ Cannabis Insider will host a two-day business and networking conference from March 9-10, featuring some of the state’s most prominent industry leaders. Tickets are limited.
More than three years after taking office with hopes of legalizing marijuana within 100 days, Governor Phil Murphy signed three bills that jointly legalize marijuana in New Jersey, ending thousands of arrests.
But it took more than a marijuana-friendly governor to bring about reform. There were years of failed legislative attempts, a vote demand that yielded more than 2.7 million votes in favor, and three months of negotiation over tax revenues, licensing rules, and the ultimate hanging almost worth the trouble: penalties for those under 21 who got caught on marijuana.
Murphy signed the bills Monday morning without the usual fanfare, putting his pen to paper just before the deadline for taking action struck. Had he not done anything, two measures to launch a legal marijuana industry and end arrests would have become law without his signature.
From this point forward, the broken and indefensible marijuana laws of New Jersey that permanently stained the records of many residents and short-circuited their futures, disproportionately hurt communities of color and did not do justice to the meaning of justice at every level, social or otherwise. – not anymore, ”he said Monday afternoon during his briefing on the corona virus in Trenton.
The governor signed the bills after both the Senate and Assembly voted last-minute Monday morning to pass a third bill laying down civil penalties for those under 21 who were caught using marijuana. Prolonged debate pulled the voting sessions off, and the bill passed both chambers with just 20 minutes left for Murphy to take the first two measures.
Legalization and decriminalization bills remained on Murphy’s desk for more than two months, pending the bill. The governor said he could sign them until lawmakers cleared the sanctions, but declined to issue his only conditional veto calling for the change.
While the bills awaited action in 2021, police issued more than 2,000 charges for possession of less marijuana.
And a few plans developed and collapsed during that time. Lawmakers extended the deadline for Murphy to sign the bills by more than two weeks, and lengthy, at times tense, negotiations continued.
They finally turned out to be fertile on Monday morning.
Murphy acknowledged Monday that the legalization effort took longer than expected.
“This process may have had its ups and downs, but it ends in the right place. And I firmly believe that this process has ended in laws that will serve as a national model, ”he said.
Legalization advocates are celebrating the long-awaited news, but those looking to buy marijuana in New Jersey will have to keep waiting. The state will have to license new dispensaries to meet the public need.
New Jersey has 13 medical marijuana dispensaries across the state, and current companies expect to open more this spring. But they have so far struggled to supply enough marijuana for the state’s 100,000 registered patients, and they must declare that they can meet that need before opening their doors to the public.
Experts had estimated that the sale could begin in late 2021, but those guesses came before the debate over fines for minors ran out of the legislative process for an additional two months.
Murphy said the legal marijuana market would start to form in the coming months. He will still have to take a full seat on the Cannabis Regulatory Commission to oversee the marijuana industry, which has six months to draft its rules and regulations before seeking new business licensees.
While marijuana users do not yet have legal options to buy it, arrests for thousands of possession cases should begin to stop.
And, with immediate effect, those arrested for small-scale marijuana possession – an arrest that may have kept them from employment or the opportunity to continue their education – will be able to get relief and move on, said Murphy.
The decriminalization bill signed Monday allows people to possess up to six ounces of marijuana without legal ramifications. But the bill on fines for minors for using marijuana also prevents police from stopping young people if they smell marijuana, and only allows them to issue warnings to young people.
If they knowingly violate that law and improperly detain someone, they could be charged with depriving them of civil rights.
“This language is at worst anti-police rhetoric and the consequences will be real,” the state police Benevolent Association said in a statement. “Underage users of marijuana will be free to smoke it anywhere, including in places that are illegal under the bill, because simply stopping a person from enforcing the law is now illegal for the police.”
Monday’s signing closes a long, tumultuous chapter in the efforts to bring legal marijuana to New Jersey, but opens the next that will require the work of many to make it a reality.
“We can get started on establishing responsible, sustainable, profitable and diverse adult use and an expanded medical cannabis market in New Jersey,” Edmund DeVeaux, head of the New Jersey CannaBusiness Association, said in a statement.
“Now the real work can begin.”
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Amanda Hoover can be reached at [email protected]Follow her on Twitter @amandahoovernj