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The Daily Hit is a recap of the top financial news stories for Dec. 6, 2023.

On the Site

Parallel Stockholders Reject Proposed Restructuring in Billion-Dollar Lawsuit

A group of 40 disgruntled Parallel cannabis stockholders filed a lawsuit in the Chancery Court of Delaware rejecting the proposed restructuring of the debt-ridden cannabis company. Read more here.

SEC Wins Judgments Against Ex-Hemp Executives in Fraud Case

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission secured consent judgments against two former executives of CanaFarma Hemp Products Corp. in a case involving an alleged $15 million investment fraud scheme, the agency announced Tuesday. Read more here.

BZAM Set to Acquire Final Bell Canada in All-Stock Deal

Canada-based BZAM Ltd. (CSE: BZAM) (OTC: BZAMF) has agreed to acquire cannabis supply chain solutions company Final Bell Canada Inc., a subsidiary of Final Bell Holdings International Ltd. Read more here.

Psychedelic Deals, Partnerships Skyrocket 500% Since 2019

Business deals, partnerships, and mergers in the psychedelics industry have shot up by 500% in the last four years as the sector has gotten hotter and hotter, according to a report from the GlobalData Pharma Intelligence Center Deals Database. Read more here.

Most California Social Equity Programs Still in Development

A new report provided to state lawmakers this week confirmed what many already knew: California’s social equity programs still have a long way to go. The report delivered both a breakdown of where $35 million in funding was sent last year, and also the status of such programs as of December 2022. Read more here.

In Other News

Pineapple Express

A Los Angeles judge has appointed a receiver to take over operations of a dispensary at the center of a suit by the dispensary’s owner alleging that former executive Vincent Mehdizadeh had exploited a coveted social equity license and sought to take over the business. Read more here.

CannMenus

CannMenus, a Chicago-based cannabis retail analytics firm, and Nugget, a Canadian cannabis insights leader, have joined forces to create an unparalleled source of retail insights covering over 90% of all licensed dispensaries across the U.S. and Canada. Read more here.

Unrivaled Brands

Shareholders of California-based Unrivaled Brands overwhelmingly approved several proposals put forth in the company’s annual meeting on Dec. 5, including the agreement and plan of merger with Blum Holdings Inc., a newly formed Delaware corporation, and Blum Merger Sub Inc. Read more here.

The post The Daily Hit: December 6, 2023 appeared first on Green Market Report.

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In a stunning reversal, an Ohio GOP-controlled Senate committee has unanimously approved a revised bill that in many ways would expand the voter-approved marijuana legalization law that goes into effect on Thursday— by allowing adults to start buying marijuana from existing medical cannabis dispensaries in as soon as 90 days, maintaining home cultivation rights and providing for automatic expungements of prior marijuana convictions, among other changes.

Just days after the Senate General Government Committee advanced legislation to fundamentally undo key provisions of the cannabis initiative voters passed at the ballot last month—proposing to eliminate the home grow option and delaying legalization for at least one year until adult-use retailers started sales, for example—the panel dramatically walked back the measure and passed it in a unanimous bipartisan voice vote on Wednesday.

It’s now been referred to the Senate Rules and Reference Committee before potentially advancing to the floor as early as Wednesday evening. That said, it is not clear that the House is ready to make any changes on an expedited basis to the legalization measure that’s set to take effect on Thursday.

The overhaul of the measure comes one day after the Senate panel held a hearing and received public testimony on the initial proposal, with many advocates and stakeholders expressing frustration with the seeming undermining of voters’ decision and recommending changes such as freeing up medical cannabis dispensaries to start servicing adult consumers while regulators develop rules to license recreational retailers.

Sen. Rob McColley (R) detailed the latest changes following negotiations during an extensive recess in committee on Wednesday, stating that lawmakers’ focus “needs to be stamping out the black market” and also “protecting the access that the people of Ohioans voted for,” while ensuring that the administrative implementation “runs as efficiently as it possibly can, while protecting opportunities for for Ohioans to engage in this new industry.”

Committee Chairman Michael Rulli (R) said that over “the last three or four days, a lot of the public has reached out to probably every single one of our senators with thousands of emails and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of calls.”

“I think the people have spoken,” he said.

Rather than do away with home cultivation, the committee-approved legislation would maintain adults’ right to grow up to six plants per person, though it would cap the household limit at six plants rather than 12 as set by the initiated statute.

As initially attached to an unrelated-House passed bill on alcohol regulations earlier this week, the measure would have effectively re-criminalized possession of marijuana unless it was obtained from a state-licensed retailer, which couldn’t start sales for at least one year from the effective date. That change was removed and replaced with language to “immediately” permit adults to buy cannabis from existing dispensaries as the adult-use market is established, McColley said. That could happen within 90 day’s of the bill’s passage, he explained.

Strikingly, the committee also revised the bill to provide for automatic expungements of certain prior cannabis-related convictions—a reform strongly favored by advocates that was not included in the Issue 2 initiative that voters approved, in large part due to a single-subject restriction for ballot measures.

The amended bill, as compared to the prior draft, restores the cap on marijuana retailers to 350, slightly increases the THC limit on cannabis extracts (though not to the level approved by voters) while restoring the original THC cap on flower, maintains a ban on sharing home cultivated marijuana among adults and makes revisions to the tax rate and revenue allocation, in part to support the facilitation of automatic expungements of convictions involving possession of up to 2.5 ounces of marijuana.

The marijuana excise tax would be set at 15 percent (up from 10 percent under the initiated statute), and local governments could levy an additional tax of up to three percent. The proposed 15 percent cultivator tax that was originally in the amendment package was removed.

The legislation calls for $15 million in marijuana tax revenue to go toward expungements. The remaining revenue would go to a Department of Public Safety law enforcement training (16 percent), an attorney general’s office law enforcement training fund (14 percent), drug law enforcement fund (five percent), poison control fund (two percent), substance misuse treatment (nine percent), suicide hotline services (nine percent), jail construction and renovation (28 percent), safe driver training (five percent) and more.

The bill advanced through committee with an emergency clause that would put it into effect immediately upon enactment. But in order to achieve that, it must pass with at least two-thirds of the vote instead of a simple majority.

Because the cannabis language was attached to a non-controversial House-passed measure on alcohol regulations, it only needs a concurrence vote in the House. That’s not expected to happen according to the expedited timeline that Senate President Matt Huffman (R) has said he wants, however, meaning adults 21 and older will simply be able to legally possess up to 2.5 ounces of marijuana and grow up to six plants beginning on Thursday.

Huffman and other top Republicans, including Gov. Mike DeWine (R), have insisted that voters were only supportive of the fundamental principle of legalizing marijuana without necessarily backing specific policies around issues such as tax revenue. That argument has increasingly faced pushback from advocates and stakeholders, however.

Meanwhile, the House is looking at a different marijuana legalization amendment proposal filed by Rep. Jamie Callender (R). The House Finance Committee took up that legislation—which would preserve home grow and other key components of the voter-passed initiative, while making other changes opposed by advocates—in its own hearing on Wednesday.

“I want to address to the governor and the president of the Senate directly,” Callender said at Wednesday’s hearing. “They have a concern that we need to get something done before midnight tonight passed by both chambers and signed by the governor. The only thing that goes into effect tonight at midnight—that is the effective date of this initiative statute—will be the home grow and the possession amounts, two and a half ounces and six plants per household or 12 per family.”

“In the negotiations, our position has been that those two items were fundamental to what the people voted on. So even if, and hopefully when, we reach an agreement with the governor in the Senate, as long as those two things remained the same as the people voted for it, there is no drop-dead date of today.”

While it would also keep home grow, the bill from Callender, who introduced another bipartisan bill to legalize marijuana this session, would add residency requirements for where plants can be cultivated to avoid “multiple individuals aggregating their home grow plants into a single location, in essence creating an unofficial cultivation facility,” the sponsor said in written testimony.

The legislation would further strictly prohibit sharing of marijuana between adults, including giving away home-grown cannabis. And it would add advertising and marketing restrictions that Callender said would align marijuana rules with those in place for alcohol and tobacco.

In addition to the 10 percent excise tax on marijuana sales, the House bill would impose a 10 percent tax on cultivators’ gross receipts. Revenue from the cultivator tax would go toward creating and renovating jails (36 percent), county sheriffs in areas with at least one cultivator (36 percent), law enforcement training (23 percent) and a crime victims assistance fund (five percent).

For the sales tax revenue, the 36 percent that Issue 2 allocated to social equity programs would instead go to counties for the purposes of funding equity grants and a job placement program, as well as “any other purpose that involves community engagement, economic development, or social programming.”

Another 36 percent would go to local governments with cannabis shops, 12.5 percent would support the 988 suicide and crisis lifeline, 10 percent would fund mental health treatment in county jails, three percent would cover administrative costs of regulating the cannabis market and 2.5 percent would go to a substance misuse treatment fund.

The sponsor said on Wednesday that he expects “we will probably have some discussions and amend” the tax provisions and “possibly other things as they come up that I’m not even aware of” before the legislation advances through the House committee next week.

“Back in November, the voters of Ohio approved Issue 2 by a margin of 56.97 percent to allow adult use cannabis in Ohio,” Callender said in his testimony. “HB 354 does not aim to change the intent of Issue 2 or override the will of the voters. Instead, it aims to add clarification for the departments who will be tasked with administering and regulating adult use cannabis in Ohio.”

“Another reason for not trying to cram something through today but rather thoughtfully approach what we’re doing [is to] make sure we have buy-in from everybody—that everyone is comfortable with what we’re doing and that we can move forward unified,” he said. “We want to respect the integrity of what the people voted on—but we have a lot of flexibility within that framework.”

Callender also took a question about cannabis expungements and said he’s “very supportive” of the reform, referencing separate bipartisan legislation on the issue, and he’s not opposed to adding it to his amendment measure. However, “my goal is to have a very broad-based support” so it may need to be handled separately.

At Wednesday’s hearing, Finance Committee Chairman Jay Edwards (R) said that while he was “ardent against Issue 2 that we just voted on, I do think that I will put my foot down and respect the will of the voters.”

“Does that mean that we need to make changes? Yeah, there probably are some changes that need made,” he said. “But I think as a chair of this committee and bills that run through this committee, I will do my best to make sure that we respect the will of the voters. November’s over with—that election is over with.”

House Speaker Jason Stephens (R)—who has maintained that legislators should more thoughtfully address amendments to the initiated statute, even if that takes more time—hasn’t weighed in on the merits of Callender’s bill but said “we will have discussions on that.”

“There are a lot of different ideas that are going on about it and we’ll continue the discussion,” he said.

While some Democratic lawmakers have indicated that they may be amenable to certain revisions, such as putting certain cannabis tax revenue toward K-12 education, other supporters of the voter-passed legalization initiative are firmly against letting legislators undermine the will of the majority that approved it.

Ohio Rep. Juanita Brent (D) recently emphasized that people who’ve been criminalized over marijuana, as well as those with industry experience, should be involved in any efforts to amend the state’s voter-approved legalization law, arguing that it shouldn’t be left up to “anti-cannabis” legislators alone to revise the statute.

Meanwhile, Rep. Gary Click (R) filed legislation last week that would allow individual municipalities to locally ban the use and home cultivation of cannabis in their jurisdictions and also revise how state marijuana tax revenue would be distributed by, for example, reducing funds allocated to social equity and jobs programs and instead steering them toward law enforcement training.

Rep. Cindy Abrams (R) also introduced a bill last month that would revise the marijuana law by putting $40 million in cannabis tax dollars toward law enforcement training annually.

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The Ohio Department of Commerce was quick to publish an FAQ guide for residents to learn about the new law and timeline for implementation, though regulators repeatedly noted that the policies may be subject to change depending on how the legislature acts.

Prohibitionist organizations that campaigned against Issue 2, meanwhile, are set on a fundamental undermining of the newly approved law, with some describing plans to pressure the legislature to entirely repeal legalization before it’s even implemented.

For what it’s worth, a number of Ohio lawmakers said in September that they doubted the legislature would seek to repeal a voter-passed legalization law. The Senate president affirmed repeal wasn’t part of the agenda, at least not in the next year.

Voters were only able to decide on the issue after lawmakers declined to take the opportunity to pass their own reform as part of the ballot qualification process. They were given months to enact legalization that they could have molded to address their outstanding concerns, but the legislature ultimately deferred to voters by default.

As early voting kicked off in late October, the GOP-controlled Senate passed a resolution urging residents to reject measure.

Unlike the top state Republican lawmakers, one of the state’s GOP representatives in Congress—Rep. Dave Joyce, co-chair of the Congressional Cannabis Caucus, said in September that he would be voting in favor of the initiative in November. He encouraged “all Ohio voters to participate and make their voices heard on this important issue.”

Senate Banking Committee Chairman Sherrod Brown (D-OH) said in late October he voted in favor of the legalization ballot initiative, calling it a “hard decision” but one that was based on his belief that the reform would promote “safety” for consumers.

Meanwhile, Vivek Ramaswamy, a 2024 Republican presidential candidate, said he voted against a ballot initiative to legalize marijuana in Ohio because he’s concerned the federal government could “weaponize” criminalization against people who are engaged in state-legal cannabis activities under the “fake” pretense that they’re protected from federal prosecution.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), for his part, said recently that Ohio’s vote to legalize marijuana at the ballot is one of the latest examples of how Americans are rejecting “MAGA extremism,” and he added that he’s committed to continuing to work on a bipartisan basis “to keep moving on bipartisan cannabis legislation as soon as we can.”

Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-OR), co-chair of the Congressional Cannabis Caucus, told Marijuana Moment that “the vote in Ohio was a great big exclamation point on the things we’ve been talking about.”

“We’ve been saying for years how this issue has crested, how it’s got broad momentum, how it is inclusive. It’s sort of like the success with the [Ohio abortion rights] issue—except this was more pronounced,” he said. “We got more votes than the abortion issue. We get more votes than anybody on the ballot.”

The White House has separately said that “nothing has changed” with President Joe Biden’s stance on marijuana, declining to say if he supports Ohio’s vote to legalize or whether he backs further reform of federal cannabis laws.

Meanwhile, as Ohio voters approved statewide legalization, activists also chalked up a series of little-noticed wins to decriminalize larger amounts of cannabis in three Ohio cities, according to preliminary county election results.

Massachusetts Psychedelics Activists Say Local Election Clerks Certified More Than Enough Signatures For 2024 Legalization Initiative

Photo courtesy of Mike Latimer.

The post Ohio Senate Committee Approves Bill To Allow Marijuana Sales From Dispensaries ‘Immediately’, Keep Home Grow And Expunge Records appeared first on Marijuana Moment.

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Georgia recently became the first U.S. state to allow pharmacies to sell medical marijuana, with nearly 120 facilities applying to sell cannabis oil as of October. But now the federal Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) is warning pharmacies that dispensing THC is unlawful because it remains a Schedule I drug.

“All DEA registrants, including DEA-registered pharmacies, are required to abide by all relevant federal laws and regulations,” says a copy of a letter sent to a Georgia pharmacy by Matthew J. Strait, a DEA deputy assistant administrator in the agency’s Diversion Control Division. “A DEA-registered pharmacy may only dispense controlled substances in Schedules II-V of the Controlled Substances Act. Neither marijuana nor THC can lawfully be possessed, handled, or dispensed by any DEA-registered pharmacy.”

The letter, dated November 27, was first posted online by Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM), an anti-cannabis advocacy group. DEA did not immediately respond to emails from Marijuana Moment attempting to confirm its authenticity.

One potential complicating factor around DEA’s advisory is a congressional budget rider that prevents the the Department of Justice from spending resources to interfere with the implementation of state medical marijuana laws. The provision was first enacted into law in 2014 and was extended last month to at least February 2024.

It’s not immediately clear how DEA squares its threat against state-authorized pharmacies that provide medical cannabis oil to patients with the agency’s obligation to follow the congressionally enacted federal law.

States that have legalized medical marijuana have typically avoided distribution through traditional pharmacies specifically to avoid conflicts with federal pharmaceutical law and regulations. Similarly, rather than prescribe cannabis—an act that’s illegal under federal law—doctors typically issue recommendations, which are protected on First Amendment grounds in order to preserve open communication between doctors and patients.

In October, however, Georgia’s Board of Pharmacy began accepting applications from independent pharmacies to dispense low-THC cannabis oil, which under state law can contain no more than 5 percent THC. The goal was to improve access to medical marijuana among patients, who are otherwise restricted to just seven dispensaries that have opened in the state since April.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported in early October that nearly 120 pharmacies had applied to the Board of Pharmacy to dispense marijuana products made by Botanical Sciences, one of the state’s two licensed producers. Pharmacies could also distribute medical cannabis from Trulieve, the state’s other licensed producer.

As of late October, at least three pharmacies had begun dispensing Botanical Sciences products, the company said in a press release. According to a map on the company’s website, more than 100 more are slated to open soon.

If sales of medical cannabis products went online in all locations, about 90 percent of Georgians would be within a 30-minute drive of a pharmacy selling marijuana, according to anAssociated Press report. Hour. The state allowance applies only to independent pharmacies, not larger chains such as CVS and others.

“Pharmacists are a trusted provider, and it’s a way for us to destigmatize this new medicine,” Mindy Leech, a pharmacist and the owner of Lee-King Pharmacy, in Newnan, told AP the Board of Pharmacy announcement in October. “It will make people more comfortable if they want to come in and ask questions about it.”

For now, it’s unclear how the program will proceed in light of DEA’s recent scrutiny. Georgia’s Board of Pharmacy did not immediately respond to Marijuana Moment’s request for comment about the agency letter. And the state Department of Public Health did not respond to an email Wednesday.

A public relations contact for Botanical Sciences also did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In comments on social media, SAM President Kevin Sabet, who opposes medical marijuana, touted the DEA guidance as support of “the federal government’s position that marijuana is not medicine.”

@michaelmumper, Executive Director of @GaMJpolicy, concurred, saying, “Patients who get medication from their trusted pharmacists assume that those drugs are fully tested, FDA approved, legal at the federal level,…

— SAM (@learnaboutsam) December 6, 2023

That, however, is a misstatement of the federal government’s position. In August, news leaked that the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) had recommended DEA reschedule marijuana as a Schedule III controlled substance—a clear indication that the agency determined that cannabis does offer medical benefits.

Rather, DEA’s actions instead appear designed to keep federally regulated pharmacies in check as the agency completes its part of the rescheduling review.

It’s been just over three months since HHS sent its rescheduling recommendation to DEA, but since then the agency has been mostly silent on the matter.

While the Congressional Research Service (CRS) recently concluded that it was “likely” that DEA would follow the HHS recommendation based on past precedent, DEA reserves the right to disregard the health agency’s advice because it has final jurisdiction over the Controlled Substances Act (CSA).

On Tuesday, six Democratic governors wrote a letter to the Biden administration urging that rescheduling be completed by the end of the year. As DEA noted in its letter to the Georgia pharmacy, pharmacies would be permitted to dispense marijuana if it’s moved to Schedule III

“Rescheduling cannabis aligns with a safe, regulated product that Americans can trust,” says the governors’ letter, which points to a poll that found 88 percent of Americans support legalization for medical or recreational use. “As governors, we might disagree about whether recreational cannabis legalization or even cannabis use is a net positive, but we agree that the cannabis industry is here to stay, the states have created strong regulations, and supporting the state-regulated marketplace is essential for the safety of the American people.”

The government has since released HHS’s rescheduling letter to DEA—in response to a public records request—in highly redacted form. The redacted portions include virtually the entire substance of the message, such as the scheduling recommendation itself, as well as the scientific review portion that was attached to the letter.

The document, sent to DEA Administrator Anne Milgram, says that the HHS recommendation was based on “the eight factors determinative of control of a substance under 21 U.S.C. 81 1 (c).”

The government has since released HHS’s rescheduling letter to DEA—in response to a public records request—in highly redacted form. The redacted portions include virtually the entire substance of the message, such as the scheduling recommendation itself, as well as the scientific review portion that was attached to the letter.

The document, sent to DEA Administrator Anne Milgram, says that the HHS recommendation was based on “the eight factors determinative of control of a substance under 21 U.S.C. 81 1 (c).”

Psilocybin’s ‘Efficacy And Safety’ For Bipolar II Depression Demonstrated By American Medical Association Study

Photo courtesy of Mike Latimer.

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“I look forward to joining the incredible team at the Cannabis Compliance Board and executing the governor’s agenda to ethically regulate this burgeoning industry.”

By Dana Gentry, Nevada Current

Gov. Joe Lombardo (R) announced Tuesday that James Humm will be the new executive director of the Cannabis Compliance Board.

The position is currently held by Tyler Klimas, who is leaving to start a cannabis and hemp consulting company. Klimas is bound by a one-year cooling off period during which he cannot represent certain establishments in the state.

“I approached the governor’s office in September and let them know I’d be transitioning out,” Klimas said via phone. “So we’ve worked over the last couple of months to put a transition plan in place and he appointed Jimmy Humm, who I’m with right now and who’s going to take over the role.”

“Jimmy has done exemplary work at the Governor’s Office of Economic Development, and I look forward to Jimmy bringing his nuanced understanding of state government and industry issues to his new role,” Lombardo said in a news release.

Jimmy's contributions here at GOED have been invaluable and will be greatly missed. We appreciate his dedication to serving Nevada and wish him continued success in this exciting new venture: https://t.co/uRcCD4hz34!

— Nevada GOED (@DiversifyNevada) December 5, 2023

Humm has worked at GOED since 2019, first as Director of Compliance and Regulatory Affairs, and most recently as Director of Public Policy and Government Affairs.

“During his tenure at GOED, Humm served as the agency’s point person in the Nevada Legislature, where he successfully passed several economic development related bills and contributed to the approval and signage of several others,” the news release said.

He previously served as the deputy chief of staff and legislative liaison for the Office of Attorney General. He also worked as director of operations for a Las Vegas law firm.

“I am humbled and honored to be appointed by Governor Lombardo to serve in this role,” Humm said. “I look forward to joining the incredible team at the Cannabis Compliance Board and executing the governor’s agenda to ethically regulate this burgeoning industry.”

This story was first published by Nevada Current.

Six Governors Push Biden To Ensure Marijuana Is Rescheduled By The End Of This Year

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Lawmakers in Lubbock, Texas have officially approved a resolution to put a local marijuana decriminalization initiative on the ballot next spring after declining to enact on the reform legislatively.

The Lubbock City Council voted on Tuesday to schedule a special election on the issue for May 4, 2024. This comes one month after legislators unanimously rejected the decriminalization proposal that was put on the agenda after activists submitted enough signatures to force its consideration.

The committee behind the marijuana initiative first filed paperwork for the Freedom Act Lubbock ordinance with the city secretary in August. After activists turned in more than 10,000 signatures, officials confirmed that the campaign submitted enough petitions to move ahead in the process earlier this month.

Local lawmakers in Lubbock, which is Texas’s tenth largest city by population, had 30 days to hold a hearing and make a decision as to whether they would enact decriminalization. They did so in November, opting to defeat it and put the issue to voters instead.

One day before the vote to schedule the May 2024 cannabis election, Adam Hernandez, communications chair for the group Lubbock Compact, which helped lead the effort to collect signatures for decriminalization, announced his bid for mayor of Lubbock.

Under the committee’s proposal, local police would be prohibited from making arrests or citations to adults in possession of up to four ounces of cannabis, unless there’s a binding state or federal court order against the policy. If that does happen, the initiative says the “City’s policy shall be to make enforcement of Class A and Class B misdemeanor marijuana possession its lowest enforcement priority.”

The text of the measure says that it’s meant to “promote the health, safety, and general welfare of the people of Lubbock.” Enacting the reform is in the interest of “carefully allocating scarce city resources, reducing the risk of discriminatory enforcement practices, and focusing city resources on the highest priority public safety concerns.”

Lubbock would be the second largest city by population in the state to enact the reform. It would join cities including Austin, Delton, Elgin, Harker Heights, Killeen and San Marcos that were largely led by Ground Game Texas.

That organization recently released a report that looked at the impacts of those similar marijuana reform efforts. It found that the measures will keep hundreds of people out of jail, even as they have led to blowback from law enforcement in some cities. The initiatives have also driven voter turnout by being on the ballot, the report said.

Another decriminalization measure that went before voters in San Antonio in May was overwhelmingly defeated, but that proposal also included provisions to prevent enforcement of abortion restrictions.

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Marijuana Moment is tracking more than 1,000 cannabis, psychedelics and drug policy bills in state legislatures and Congress this year. Patreon supporters pledging at least $25/month get access to our interactive maps, charts and hearing calendar so they don’t miss any developments.

Learn more about our marijuana bill tracker and become a supporter on Patreon to get access.
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Advocates have faced issues in certain jurisdictions where voters approved decriminalization.

Shortly after voters in Harker Heights approved their measure, the city council overturned the ordinance over concerns that it conflicted with state law. But activists collected signatures for another initiative and successfully repealed the repeal in May.

The Killeen City Council temporarily paused implementation of its local voter-approved ordinance, arguing that there were legal concerns that lawmakers needed to sort through before giving it their approval, which they eventually did. But in April, Bell County filed a lawsuit challenging the policy.

At the state-level this session, the Texas House of Representatives passed a series of bills to decriminalize marijuana, facilitate expungements and allow chronic pain patients to access medical cannabis as an opioid alternative. But they ultimately stalled out in the Senate, which has been a theme for cannabis reform measures in the conservative legislature over several sessions.

The House passed similar cannabis decriminalization proposals during the past two legislative sessions, in 2021 and 2019.

Separately, a Texas Democratic senator brought the issue of marijuana legalization to the Senate floor earlier in May, seeking to attach to an unrelated resolution an amendment that would’ve allowed Texans to vote on ending prohibition at the ballot box. But the symbolic proposal was ultimately shut down. Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick (R) agreed to another member’s point of order, deeming the cannabis amendment not germane to the broader legislation.

Nearly three in four Texas voters (72 percent) support decriminalizing marijuana, according to a University of Texas/Texas Politics Project poll last year. More than half (55 percent), meanwhile, said they’re in favor of broader legalization. Seventeen percent said it shouldn’t be legal at all.

In March, the same institution similarly showed that a majority of Texas voters feel that the state’s marijuana laws should be “less strict.”

Minnesota Marijuana Regulators Seek More Public Input As They Craft Industry Rules And Process Responses To Initial Survey

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