Tag: marijuana

House votes to legalize weed

The House on Friday passed a landmark bill that would remove federal penalties on marijuana and erase cannabis-related criminal records.

The bill passed by a vote of 228-164, with several Republicans on board. While the MORE Act is not expected to come up in the Senate this year, and likely won’t in the next session of Congress either, its passage nevertheless marks a monumental step in marijuana policy.

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San Francisco bans smoking tobacco inside your apartment, marijuana is totally fine though.

Officials in San Francisco have banned all tobacco smoking inside apartments, citing concerns about secondhand smoke. Don’t worry though the ban only includes tobacco products, smoking pot in your home is still allowed.

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, the Board of Supervisors voted 10-1 Tuesday to approve the ordinance making San Francisco the largest city in the country to ban tobacco smoking inside apartments.

Apparently, the reason marijuana smoking isn’t banned is that such a ban would not provide any space for people to actually legally smoke pot, as it’s still illegal under state law to smoke pot in public places.

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New Jersey weighs ‘social equity’ tax on marijuana

New Jersey lawmakers may include a so-called social equity tax in the legislation establishing a legal market for recreational marijuana, according to reports.

Bills in the state Senate and Assembly would give cannabis regulators the authority to impose the “social equity excise fee,” which would help fund programs aimed at reducing racial disparities caused by drug laws.

The influential Legislative Black Caucus has lobbied for programs aimed at helping Black communities, which have been hard-hit by marijuana prohibition. Black residents are likelier to be arrested on marijuana charges than white residents, for example.

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New York City Wants People to Call 911 on Someone Smoking Cannabis

Somebody peacefully getting high without bothering or harming anybody else is listed together with “a disorderly person or small or large group, including protestors, causing a hazardous or dangerous condition right now” and “an emergency situation or condition that might cause danger to life or personal property” as reasons to call 911 instead of the 311 Citizen Service Management System.

According to the Observer, this is “yet another example of how police resources are used—and perhaps misused—in New York City for lack of any better alternatives, as there’s simply no one else to call.”

New York City has long held the unglamorous title as the most inhospitable city in the United States for cannabis users, with possession being most frequent reason why a New Yorker would be arrested.

And while cannabis possession was decriminalized in New York State last August the act of smoking weed is still a crime. 

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