A top Ohio Democratic senator says GOP House leadership is doing a “disservice” to the public by failing to advance legislation to expedite marijuana sales after voters approved a legalization ballot measure last year.
The criticism is increasingly bipartisan, as Gov. Mike DeWine (R) has similarly pushed the legislature to pave a faster pathway to sales to resolve the “ridiculous” situation Ohio has found itself in—a regulatory limbo where cannabis is legal to possess and grow but access to licensed shops is months away.
“It’s really being held up in the House,” Senate Minority Leader Nickie Antonio (D) told WKRC, adding that it’s “really a disservice to the people of Ohio.”
The Senate did pass a bill in December that would address the issue by allowing existing medical cannabis dispensaries to dually serve patients and adult consumers within 90 days of enactment, in addition to other changes to the initiated statute. But the House hasn’t taken it up, and the chamber has also been considering an alternative package.
“Every day that goes by where we don’t have the ability for folks to either go to the medical dispensaries to legally purchase, we also open ourselves up for an illegal market,” Antonio said. “All that time that passes without having these pathways to legal purchase, without having expungements, and that means people who could have this on their record that aren’t able to get jobs, not able to change things in their lives because of having this record.”
House Speaker Jason Stephens (R) said earlier this month that it’s a “complex issue,” after his chamber declined to take up the Senate-passed legislation.
Meanwhile, James Canepa, who was selected to serve as the first superintendent of the Division of Cannabis Control (DCC), says that the legislature’s delayed action could complicate regulators’ work to effectively stand up the new market.
“To test it, to process it, to sell it, to grow it—you need a permit. And there are steps that need to happen. One of the big steps is this rulemaking process,” he said. “The division doesn’t have unilateral authority to decide whatever the rules are going to be.”
Hellbound and Down 