Lieutenant governor asks lawmakers to tweak Ohio marijuana law
COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) – On Dec. 7, recreational marijuana became legal in Ohio, after voters overwhelmingly passed a ballot initiative to do so.
Despite it being legal, and decriminalized, there is still no place to legally buy it and some lawmakers said the law is missing guardrails. But, despite the Ohio Senate passing a bill to address some of those things, the House did not take it up for a vote.
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“They have a responsibility to take action on this and they have just walked away without fulfilling that responsibility,” Lt. Gov. Jon Husted said.
“I don’t agree with that at all, I think we have a duty to take in information and make good decisions instead of rash decisions,” Speaker of the Ohio House Jason Stephens (R-Kitts Hill) said. “We have 99 members, that’s a lot of voices; we are starting to get to that consolidation of what makes the most sense.”
Ohio House Minority Leader Allison Russo (D-Upper Arlington), agreed with Stephens, and said “rushing to undermine” the law would be a “huge mistake.”
“There certainly are statewide elected [officials], as well as the senate president, who don’t agree with what the voters passed, that’s fine, that’s their prerogative,” she said. “But that’s not a failure that we haven’t totally upended the will of the voters.”
The day before the law went into effect, the Ohio Senate passed a Sub-House Bill 86 to, among other things, change the tax distribution, scale back home-grow, and set guardrails to prevent public consumption and advertising to kids. But Stephens said parts of the bill were not agreeable, like the home-grow provision,
“That’s a non-starter for me,” he said. “I think people voted for that, and it doesn’t mean there doesn’t need to be rules around that.”
The Senate’s bill also permits medical dispensaries to sell recreational marijuana, so Ohioans have a place to legally buy it before the first dispensary opens, likely in the fall. Russo said there is room for discussion on changes like that.
“I think that there’s room for continued discussion, clarifications, strengthening some of the safety components of it,” Russo said. “We still do have a little bit of time before many of the parts of Issue 2 go into effect.”
Gov. Mike DeWine said with marijuana being legal, with no place to buy it, “doesn’t make a lot of sense.” DeWine said, “there are huge, huge, huge problems connected with this, so we want the legislature to deal with it.”
While the House did not consider what the Senate passed, they did introduce their own legislation, that focuses on setting up guardrails and the tax distribution, called House Bill 354.
“I think it is important to respect the will of the votes and we’re doing that,” Stephens said. “But we’re also dealing with a brand-new industry, bringing it into the area where the taxation is going to be important, and the consumer side is going to be important.”
Stephens said he thinks it is important to have a business structure that allows the market to be viable “and doesn’t create an unintentional black market because the tax rates are too high on the hoops are too big to jump through to actually obey the law.”
Stephens said there are ongoing discussions about the excise tax rate, but he does not think that will be set in stone, even if House Bill 354 passes. He compared it to other state taxes, like income tax rates, that tend to change.
“We’re probably going to see that change, regardless of what is put into this, there will probably be other bills or actions to deal with that,” Stephens said.
Russo said some of the ongoing discussions also include THC levels and “making sure there’s some consistency” between adult use and medical programs. But she said the “big disagreement” has to do with the tax revenue distribution.
“The senate proposal is sort of a one size fits all, it goes through the state, not really coming back directly to local communities,” Russo said. “Whereas I think what you’re seeing in some of the House proposals and the language as passed by the voters really puts those local communities front and center and being able to benefit from the revenues.”
Russo said though she does not think the money going to the state’s General Revenue Fund is a good idea, there is a balance that can be found there, if the underlying goal stays the same between chambers.
“It is very important that there is that tax revenue that is going to local communities so that they can make decisions about how best to use some of that money,” she said.
But the law will have been in effect for at least one month before the next scheduled house and senate sessions and Husted said that’s not good for Ohio. He said he wants to be sure children are not targeted by advertisements, that it does not become a “public nuisance,” that the product is regulated, and potency is limited.
“All of those kinds of things are important guardrails to put around these products,” Husted said.
Husted said the House failed to “act on something that will affect public health, particularly children.”
“We have poor health outcomes, in many cases in Ohio, surrounding smoking and these issues and the legislature’s inaction is only going to make it worse,” he said. “I thank the Senate for taking action on this, the House went home, didn’t act and it is going to be harmful to kids.”
Husted said one of their “fundamental responsibilities” is to make sure they are protecting kids.
“There is a price to be paid for society every day the legislature waits to take action,” DeWine said. “I’m not angry, but I’m just concerned about the situation we have in Ohio.
Husted said while some people think the new market will bolster Ohio’s economy, he thinks the new law will have the opposite effect.
“It actually is going to be harmful to the economy because it is going to take more and more people out of the workforce,” Husted said. “More and more people are going to be taken out of the workforce because they can’t pass a drug test.”
Despite the House not acting on the law before breaking for winter, Representative Ron Ferguson (R-Wintersville) sent the letter below to DeWine (R-Ohio).
Ferguson letter to DeWineDownload
Stephens said he wants to get something done “early next year.” Right now, the House and Senate’s next sessions are scheduled for the end of January, but Stephens said that’s flexible.
“We can also schedule a session once we’re able to figure all this out and get this done if we need to do that,” Stephens said.
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