Legal cannabis sales in NH clear Senate, but will it become law?
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CONCORD — For the first time in its history, the New Hampshire Senate voted Thursday to legalize cannabis sales in the Granite State. The legislation features state control over marijuana sales and appears to be in line with the wishes of Gov. Chris Sununu.
House Bill 1633 passed 14-9 after hours of debate that included several amendments being introduced on the floor. Sen. Howard Pearl, R-Loudon, Sen. Tim Lang, R-Sanbornton, Sen. Daryl Abbas, R-Salem, Sen. Dan Innis, R-Bradford and Sen. Keith Murphy, R-Manchester joined the Democratic senators, except for Sen. Lou D’Allesandro, D-Manchester, in voting for the bill.
Abbas, who introduced the bill as ought to pass, said the bill was his “best attempt to mitigate all the negatives.”
“No cannabis policy will be perfect. This amendment was drafted to balance the public safety needs of our communities with the legalization of cannabis,” Abbas said. “The state-regulated market will allow New Hampshire to have more control over cannabis commerce with a limited number of stores and strict regulations.”
NH marijuana bill battle is far from over
The version that passed the Senate Thursday is different from the one that passed the House in late April. The Senate version features a franchise model where the state of New Hampshire would have complete control over retail cannabis, including the advertising, product quality, and even the location of the stores.
It’s a version Sununu has said he wants to see rather than the House bill, which had featured a model more like legal cannabis in neighboring states that gave retailers more freedom.
The changes mean the bill must go back to the House for approval — if it makes it there. It first must go through the Senate Finance Committee, where it could see more changes. Senate President Jeb Bradley, R-Wolfeboro, has been a staunch opponent of cannabis legalization and sits on the committee.
Even if it makes it to the House, the differences in versions will likely cause issues. The House has passed bills to legalize marijuana many times in the past, but usually favors a more free market, libertarian approach that is at odds with Sununu’s vision.
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“There's a whole bunch of people in the House who feel completely different about where this cannabis bill has gone. The odds of any kind of concurrence or conference committee success with that bill are not great,” said Rep. David Meuse, D-Portsmouth. “And then if it gets changed to basically address concerns of folks in the House to a point where enough will vote on it to actually approve the bill, what that does is it lowers the odds of Sununu signing it.”
How will Biden’s marijuana policy affect New Hampshire?
On Thursday, the U.S. Department of Justice formally proposed a rule to move marijuana from a Schedule I drug, which includes drugs like heroin and methamphetamine, to a Schedule III, which are drugs considered to have a low to moderate risk of abuse like Tylenol with codeine or anabolic steroids.
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President Joe Biden called the reclassification “an important move toward reversing longstanding inequities” in a social media post.
However, because it isn’t legalizing the drug for recreational use, the New Hampshire Bulletin reported that the change will have limited effects on New Hampshire. Its main impact will be helping therapeutic cannabis facilities to access tax breaks and allow for more federal grants for research on the drug.
This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Legal cannabis sales in NH clear Senate, but will it become law?
