By: Jared Evan
NY is about to become the 15th state in the republic to legalize marijuana, after years of attempting to pass a bill.
WSJ reported State Sen. Liz Krueger said lawmakers were finalizing a bill that would create a new state regulator for cannabis products and decriminalize the possession of up to three ounces of marijuana. New Yorkers will be allowed to cultivate marijuana for personal use and the state will study a new system for determining whether drivers are inebriated because of marijuana use, she said.
“I think that will give us a head start on a good program, because we were able to watch what other states went through and hopefully come up with something that addresses the problems,” she said in an interview on Wednesday.
Fourteen states and three territories have legalized recreational marijuana, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Nearby, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Vermont have legalized the plant for recreational use, and Connecticut is close to legalizing marijuana soon.
The new bill proposes a heavy tax, which may indeed keep “stoners” away from the legal marijuana and still getting the weed from the black market.
The state estimates could be around $300 million a year when the program matures. Under the legislation, the state would levy a 9% tax on retail sales and localities would levy an additional 4%. Towns, villages, and cities may opt out of retail and delivery marijuana sales, according to the proposal, according to WSJ.
It would also impose an additional tax based on the level of THC, the active ingredient in marijuana, ranging from 0.5 cents per milligram for flower to 3 cents per milligram for edibles.
New York would eliminate penalties for possession of less than three ounces of cannabis, and automatically expunge records of people with past convictions for marijuana-related offenses that would no longer be criminalized. That’s a step beyond a 2019 law that expunged many past convictions for marijuana possession and reduced the penalty for possessing small amounts, AP reported
The new bill’s goal is to use the taxes to fund Office of Cannabis Management and law-enforcement officers who are trained to detect impaired driving, according to the WSJ. The rest of the tax revenue is broken down as followed: 20% of the remaining revenue will be dedicated to treatment and public education, 40% will be dedicated to school aid and 40% will be dedicated to a fund that will make grants for social “equity”.
“Social equity” is very vague but sounds like a race-based hand out to certain races within the city, in other words, most likely, a discriminatory program which skin color determines who benefits.
Oakland, California recently enacted a program offering $500/monthly to families below the family line, excluding poor white people.
Assembly Majority Leader Crystal Peoples-Stokes, a Buffalo Democrat who sponsors the legislation, said “It’s important to use resources to go back and do a deep dive to look at who these people are, what’s the status of their life now and see what they need.”
