Two months after voters gave their signoff, governor cites ‘drafting error’ in long-delayed bills as reason for withholding his signature
Voters okayed recreational marijuana in November, but Trenton has yet to finalize the legislation needed to make it legal.
IAN T. SHEARN, CONTRIBUTING WRITER, NJ Spotlight
Creating law can be a messy affair. And this is why legislators invented the “clean-up” bill.
And that is exactly what Gov. Phil Murphy is insisting on, to fix what his office said is a “drafting error” in the two landmark pieces of legislation to legalize recreational marijuana that have been languishing on his desk since Dec. 17.
Though the bills have been years in the making, it was only when they were passed and were sent to his desk that he realized they didn’t address something he believed was important — specifying penalties for minors who possess cannabis. Not until a third, clean-up bill is drafted and passed addressing that issue, he insisted, would he sign the other two.
So instead of tweaking the current bill, both houses of the Legislature are working on a third piece of legislation.
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The bill is scheduled for committee hearing in both houses Thursday, and then a floor vote on Monday.
Fix ‘unintended consequences’ later
“We understand the need to discourage minors from using marijuana, and a structure with fines is better than one with criminal consequences,” said ACLU-NJ Executive Director Amol Sinha. “That said, we are concerned that these fines are too high, especially for those in lower-income communities, and we want to make sure this isn’t another back-door pathway into the criminal justice system. … Meaning what happens if someone can’t pay the fine? Will they be arrested? We should avoid any such entanglement with the criminal system, and commit to fixing unintended consequences along the way.”
Asked Tuesday when the Senate version of the new legislation will be finalized, Sen. Nicholas Scutari, sponsor of the legalization bill, said, “sometime between now and Thursday morning.” Scutari said lawmakers in the upper house want to make one final tweak, adding language that would create a mechanism to insure that there would be no arrest record for a minor caught with cannabis.
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