State & Local Legislatures

Ellen Story, D-Amherst, responding to the 69 percent of the voters in her district who instructed her to vote "in favor of legislation that would allow the state to regulate and tax marijuana like alcohol" on Nov. 2, 2010, is sponsoring "An Act to Regulate and Tax the Cannabis Industry." Assigned House Docket Number 01091, it will receive a bill number in the near future. If enacted, the state’s current prohibition upon adults having or growing a personal supply will be repealed, analogous to alcohol-control laws for home winemaking.

Jennifer Lande, Stephen Cuspilich and Charles Kwiatkowski are fighting for legal access to medical marijuana. They traveled to Trenton on a bitterly cold day to participate in a rare process of the state Constitution. They all live with serious medical conditions and offered honest and, at times, painful testimony. Their pleas for a working medical marijuana program in New Jersey created an important record for how to proceed next.

Mayor Vince Gray is reviewing the policies that will govern the District's medical marijuana program and is being pushed to make changes that could help improve the program's reception on Capitol Hill. At-large Councilman David Catania informed Gray that if the mayor doesn't act, the city's Alcoholic Beverage Control Board will be able to send out solicitations for marijuana dispensary applications on February 14. Gray said, "Hopefully by [Feb. 14] we'll be operative, but we'll see how it works out."

Steph Sherer, a medical marijuana patient and Executive Director of Americans for Safe Access, opines on medical marijuana patient privacy.

A medical marijuana supporter says he'll file an ethics complaint against an Iowa lawmaker who says he obtained a medical marijuana prescription in California under false pretenses to show the flaws in such a program. The Des Moines Register says Mike Pesce told a House subcommittee that Rep. Clel Baudler, of Greenfield, should be investigated.

A House committee has approved a sweeping revision of Delaware's drug laws that supporters say will bring more consistency and fairness to the criminal justice system.