Prohibition, Safety Discussed At Marijuana Legalization Forum

SOMERDALE, NJ - With a final vote on the proposed legalization of marijuana for adult use in New Jersey set for Monday, the Camden County Mayors’ Association did what it could to clear up questions from community members at Sterling High School Wednesday night.

Legislative committees in both the New Jersey Senate and the Assembly approved a bill that would legalize recreational marijuana for adults over 21 in the state this week. The bill now heads to the full Senate and Assembly, which would each need to approve it before the bill could land on Gov. Phil Murphy's desk for his signature.

Read more here: NJ Recreational Pot Bill Approved By Committees; Final Vote Soon

Senate Bill 2703 includes some changes from the legislation the state was considering in December. Of particular note, the legislation voids any existing ordinances that ban marijuana sales. So any municipality that previously enacted a ban on marijuana-related activities will have to enact a new ban.

If the current legislation is passed and signed into law, marijuana use for adults 21 and older becomes legal throughout the state, and municipalities who wish to ban it will have to “opt out.”
However, a commission will be established by the state to establish regulations concerning growth, sale, taxation and other aspects of the law. Once those regulations are passed and made public, towns will then have 180 days to decide what actions they want to take.

If the municipality doesn’t act, the state law takes effect and the municipality will not be able to institute a ban for another five years. Anyone who institutes a ban and later decides to overturn it will not have to wait five years to do so.

Once a ban is in place, a municipality would not have to act every five years after that. Conditional bans, meaning municipalities can adopt certain aspects of the law while prohibiting others.
Previously, municipalities had 180 days from the day the legislation was signed to act.

The panel assembled on Wednesday night consisted of two lawyers, an activist with the state NAACP, a police chief and a doctor who clarified this and other issues related to legalization. Somerdale Mayor Gary Passante moderated.

William J. Caruso, Esq., of Archer Law, provided an overview of the legislation and answered questions. According to Caruso, there is no reason to think that the federal government will withhold money from states and municipalities that have legalized marijuana for recreational or medicinal use. However, anyone with a federal job may still be fired for smoking marijuana, either recreationally or for medicinal reasons.

The legislation includes a 3 percent local revenue tax on retail sales; 2 percent tax on cultivation; 2 percent tax on processing; and a 1 percent wholesale tax. There are also various fees associated with possible legalization, and towns can choose to lower their tax rates if they impose requirements that dispensaries coming into town hire locally.

Taxation is dependent on towns being a host community for dispensaries, Caruso said. However, other aspects, including reimbursements to towns that must repurpose K-9s trained to detect marijuana, are not. Any town with K-9s that were trained to detect marijuana will be reimbursed for the officers’ training time.

He pointed out that mostly African Americans are arrested for marijuana, and decriminalization alone wouldn’t stop racial profiling. Expungement for sales and possession of marijuana is also a big piece of the legislation.

“People arrested for marijuana have that blemish on their record forever,” Caruso said. “It can stop you from getting student loans, stop you from getting a job.”

Richard Todd Edwards, of the NJ-NAACP, said his organization worked with officials to increase expungement to arrests up to five pounds. It was originally limited to under 50 grams. Reviewing sentences and expungement will help anyone arrested for marijuana to become productive citizens again, he said.

While police may be freed up to pursue other crimes, Berlin Police Chief Leonard Check said police officers will have to be trained in what to look for when it comes to impaired driving related to marijuana use.

“There is no equivalent for the 0.08 blood alcohol content in other drugs,” Check said.

He said when marijuana was legalized in Washington, traffic deaths related to marijuana doubled. In Colorado, one out of every three traffic deaths is related to marijuana use. He is also concerned that marijuana will no longer be seen as dangerous, and increased use will lead to harder drug use.

David L. Nathan, a psychiatrist and member of the Doctors for Cannabis Regulation, said there is no proven connection between marijuana use and harder drug use outside of a correlation between previous marijuana use among people who now use hard drugs.

“There are plenty of people who used marijuana who never went on to use hard drugs,” Nathan said, adding that prescription drugs are more likely to lead to opioid addiction.

Nathan also noted that addiction to any drug, including marijuana, is more likely in people under the age of 21 than those 21 years old and older.

“This legislation gets it right with that,” Nathan said.

Smoking marijuana will be prohibited anywhere in which smoking and vaping is already prohibited, including public places. Condo associations will also have the option to ban it, but not in private units.

Medicinal clinics are not permitted within a certain distance from daycares, schools, playgrounds, parks and the like, and the panel expects the commission that will be appointed to establish similar rules for recreational facilities.

The panel cautioned that the legislation is always changing, and what is considered Monday may have different aspects than what is currently being proposed.

One resident pointed out that municipalities that prohibit marijuana in town will still be impacted if their neighbors allow it.

“Even if neighboring towns don’t allow it, there’s still a home delivery aspect,” Caruso said, pointing out that towns already deal with marijuana use as it is.

See related: 16 Things To Know About NJ Legal Marijuana Bill Before It’s Law