Four members of the Senate Judiciary Committee voted in favor of S.241, a bill that would allow the sale of marijuana to adults in Vermont beginning in 2018.
Sen. Alice Nitka, D-Windsor, voted against the bill.
An opponent of the legislation called the committee vote “a sad day for Vermonters.”
The five-member panel whittled down the legislation over the last three weeks, meeting a deadline imposed by Senate President Pro Tem John Campbell. The bill is the first glimpse of what a legal market could look like in Vermont.
The bill goes next to the Senate Finance Committee before being voted on by the full Senate.
The most recent draft of the bill eliminates a section of the original bill that would have allowed Vermonters to grow some marijuana at home. The change elicited criticism from many pot proponents, who argue homegrown marijuana and small-scale cultivation would be akin to home-brew beer.
With that change, committee chair Sen. Dick Sears, D-Bennington, whose support for the legislation was uncertain, gave the bill his blessing.
Moments before the vote Friday morning, the 24-year Senate veteran said that he believes the bill is a positive step for Vermont’s criminal justice system.
“I think this bill is a sane piece of criminal justice policy,” Sears said. “Lifting the civil penalties for those who possess an ounce or under and are adults is sane criminal justice policy.”
The legislation as passed removes civil penalties for possessing an ounce or less of marijuana by Vermont residents. Out-of-state visitors could buy a quarter ounce at a time from dispensaries.
The bill authorizes the state to issue up to 30 licenses for private operations, which would vary in size and scale of production. Under the proposal, any growers or financiers of growers would need to meet a minimum two-year residency requirement in order to get a license.
Under the proposal, many aspects of the system would be left to the discretion of a board.
Sen. Jeanette White, D-Windham, and Sen. Joe Benning, R-Caledonia, jointly sponsored the bill, and both voted in favor of the bill Friday. Both are also members of the Senate Government Operations Committee, which took more than 100 hours of testimony on pot last year.
Finance Committee chair Tim Ashe, D/P-Chittenden said he was “quite impressed” by the Judiciary Committee’s work. He said he believes the bill addresses most of the preconditions Gov. Peter Shumlin outlined for legalization in his State of the State address.
Nitka, the sole opposition vote, praised the committee’s work but feared legalizing pot because she believes the increased accessibility will be detrimental to young Vermonters.
“I don’t mind old farts smoking, but I don’t want to make more marijuana available to children in homes,” Nitka said.
Nitka, a former social worker, said that keeping marijuana away from children is her prime concern. She also raised questions about traffic safety.
Debbie Haskins, executive director of Smart Approaches to Marijuana Vermont, said that the bill’s passage out of Senate Judiciary marks “a very sad day for Vermonters, in particular for youth.”
Groups that oppose the legalization proposal intensified their campaigns in the days ahead of the vote. Earlier this week, a Harvard neuroscientist argued against loosening the ban on marijuana as a matter of public health.
“I’m puzzled that we’re going to continue this conversation and move this bill forward when the science is real clear,” Haskins said.
Haskins said that the group would be reviewing the latest draft of the bill Friday, and will continue the campaign in the coming weeks.
“We hope before it gets through the entire process that the science the research and the people of Vermont will step forward and say, no not now,” Haskins said.
Proponents of regulating marijuana, meanwhile, say that the bill still has a long way to go.
Sen. David Zuckerman, P/D-Chittenden, who has been working on the issue for more than a decade, lauded the committee’s work, but sees room for improvement.
“I appreciate that this bill changes the discussion from a prohibition model to a regulated model,” Zuckerman said. “That’s a big step forward.”
He said that he would have preferred to see a bill that issues more permits to small, “Vermont-scale” growers, instead of skewing production toward larger-scale farms.
Matt Simon, of the Marijuana Policy Project, raised similar concerns about limitations on small operations.
Meanwhile, Campbell still does not plan to support the legislations, saying he believes it’s “not the right time” for a bill to pass. But the Senate leader said he plans to stay true to his word to the governor and others that he will not get in the way of the bill and belives the discussion worthwhile.
Campbell expects that the bill will make it to the Senate floor, but before it gets there several other committees, including Transportation and Agriculture, will take testimony.
The Transportation Committee will begin taking testimony on aspects of S.241 beginning Wednesday, according to committee chair Sen. Dick Mazza, D-Grand Isle.
Mazza said he thinks legalization is “inevitable” and will likely happen eventually, but he doesn’t believe the time is right — in part because of road safety considerations.
Meanwhile, lawmakers in the House have not yet begun work on the legislation. House Speaker Shap Smith, D-Morrisville, said he’s not sure how much support there is in the 150-member body for the legislation. In the past, he has expressed doubts that all the questions around legalization can be answered before the session is over.
As for predictions for the outcome in the Senate, Campbell said he expects it will be a close vote among the upper chamber’s 29 voting members. Campbell believes the outcome will largely depend on how well Sen. Sears makes the case for the bill on the floor.
“If I was a betting man, I wouldn’t be betting against him,” Campbell said. “That’s for sure.”
