NYS Legislative Agenda: Create a System for the Production, Distribution and Adult Non-medical Use of Marijuana in New York
Create a System for the Production, Distribution and Adult Non-medical Use of Marijuana in New York
The City Bar supports efforts to create a system for the production, distribution, and adult non-medical use of marijuana. Marijuana prohibition is a costly and ineffective policy that has not succeeded in eliminating marijuana use. The failed policy has devastated families and communities, eroded respect for the law, and strained police-citizen relations. Accordingly, the City Bar supports state and federal legislative and policy changes that reduce or eliminate criminalization of marijuana and that permit, tax, and regulate the production, distribution, and adult use of marijuana. The City Bar offers the following key provisions as essential for inclusion in any comprehensive and effective marijuana regulation policy: (1) provide for the expungement of marijuana convictions; (2) reinvest tax revenue into research, education and those communities most impacted by prohibition; and (3) create a market system that allows for fair access. Any marijuana regulation system should reverse, not exacerbate, inequities, and seek to ensure that individuals and communities that have been harmed historically by enforcement be given fair access to the market and its economic benefits and relief from criminal convictions.
Reissued from 2019 NYS Legislative Agenda
