A top Pennsylvania House Democratic committee chairman says it’s “high time” to legalize marijuana and lay the groundwork for businesses in the state to export cannabis to other markets if federal law changes—and he sees a “real opportunity” to do so, even as his Republican counterpart is downplaying that possibility this session.
In interviews on PoliticsPA’s Voices of Reason podcast that were posted on Monday, House Appropriations Committee Chairman Jordan Harris (D) and Minority Chairman Seth Grove (R) gave competing perspectives on the prospects of legalizing cannabis, as the governor has again called for as part of his budget request.
Harris said he does see a pathway for legalization. But short of that, he said “there’s a real opportunity to at least decriminalize it in the commonwealth.”
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“I also believe that soon we’ll see the federal government doing some things around rescheduling of cannabis,” the chairman said, and he hopes that kind of reform could eventually allow farmers to export marijuana to other states.
“Pennsylvania, if we want to get in front of things, it’s high time that we legalize adult-use cannabis, tax it and create the industry here,” Harris said.
While he didn’t want to get into specifics on possible revenue from legalizing marijuana, he said it would generate a “significant amount of money” for state coffers.
“Think about all of the places in rural Pennsylvania where we just have tons of farmland. All of that could fuel a large cannabis industry here in Pennsylvania that, one, could provide cannabis here for folks in our commonwealth,” Harris said. “But, two, once it’s rescheduled at the federal level, the exporting could be tremendous because of all of the space we have. I mean, it’s a true opportunity and it’s one that I don’t think we want to miss.”
But Grove, the minority chairman of the Appropriations Committee, is doubtful that the Democratic-controlled House will be able to craft and deliver legalization legislation that could advance through the GOP majority Senate.
Since Gov. Josh Shapiro (D) included legalization in his budget proposal last month, the committee has held “three weeks of budget hearings” without having a marijuana bill to consider, Grove said.
He also challenged the idea that the Department of Agriculture is well-positioned to regulate the cannabis industry, as the governor’s plan envisions. Agriculture Secretary Russell Redding testified at an Appropriations Committee hearing last month that he was “excited” about the prospect and supports it, Grove said there’s no way to know if it could effectively oversee regulations given the current lack of legislation.
“It’s frustrating because there’s big pieces of this budget we couldn’t ask. Recreational marijuana was one of them, right?” he said. “There’s no legislation out there. It is a major funding source of the governor’s budget this year and into the future.”
He also questioned whether it was “deliberate” that the governor included legalization in the budget without having a bill for lawmakers to review.
H/T: https://www.marijuanamoment.net
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