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December Newsletter
House Judiciary Committee Approves Comprehensive Marijuana Legislation
The House Judiciary Committee has voted to approve the Marijuana Opportunity Reinvestment and Expungement Act (MORE Act), the first piece of comprehensive marijuana legislation to ever make it out of a congressional committee.
If approved by Congress, the MORE Act will repair many of the harms caused by marijuana prohibition. It would provide grants to communities negatively impacted by the drug war, enhance access to drug use treatment, encourage socially and economically disadvantaged people to enter the marijuana industry, and prevent the government from denying benefits, financial aid, or citizenship because of a simple marijuana infraction. DPA has been shaping the bill since its inception.
Speaking at a press conference ahead of the vote, DPA's executive director, Maria McFarland Sánchez-Moreno, said:
“At the Drug Policy Alliance, we have kept our eye on the ball of both ending the devastating harms of prohibition and, to the extent possible, beginning to repair them.”
“We have worked closely with groundbreaking leaders in the House, like Representative Barbara Lee, Chairman Jerry Nadler, Chairwoman Maxine Waters, Chairman Jim McGovern, and I am delighted today to stand with them in support of the MORE Act, which is the most robust marijuana reform legislation introduced at the federal level to date.”
This legislation won’t make up for the full scale of harm that prohibition has caused to its victims. But it is the closest we’ve come yet to not only ending those harms at the federal level, but also beginning to repair them. Now it’s up to Congress to do the right thing and swiftly pass the bill to ensure justice is not delayed a moment longer.
Learn more
DPA Honors Leading Drug Policy Advocates at International Drug Policy Reform Conference
In November 2019, DPA hosted the International Drug Policy Reform Conference, the premier gathering of the reform movement, in St. Louis, Missouri. The event attracted nearly 1,300 people representing 50 countries, all eager to listen, learn, and strategize about local, state, national, and international drug policy issues.
There were more than 50 panels and special events at the Reform Conference, including sessions on criminal justice reform, harm reduction, marijuana regulation, and more.
We were delighted to honor several stalwarts of drug policy reform for their exceptional accomplishments in our movement. Recipients included Deon Haywood, human rights defender and executive director of Women With a Vision; Bill Spearn, Vancouver police inspector and proponent of supervised consumption sites; Marsha Rosenbaum, DPA's director emerita and founder of the Safety First drug education program; and Nightcrawlers, a group of nightshift journalists covering the Philippines war on drugs. To further highlight support for those working to expose the devastation caused by the drug war in the Philippines, a conference gathering took place under cultural collective RESBAK’s iconic “Stop the Killings” banner in a united show of support.
“These distinguished recipients have gone above and beyond, in some cases even risking their careers, lives, and freedom, to end the cruel and inhumane war on drugs,” said Maria McFarland Sánchez-Moreno, executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance. “Their work – and that of the brave visionaries who came before them – gives us genuine and necessary hope for change, and is paving the way for a real shift in how the world views drugs and those who use them. It is a joy to be able to honor them.”
Learn more
DPA-Led Coalition Demands Congress Allow D.C. to Regulate Marijuana Distribution
In 2014, voters in Washington, D.C., approved a ballot measure to legalize marijuana for adult use. However, a Congressional budget rider has prohibited the creation of a regulatory framework for its sale and taxation. In a bid to change this, DPA led a group of criminal justice reform, liberty, and drug policy organizations in sending a letter to the House and Senate Appropriations Committees along with the Financial Services and General Government Subcommittees asking that they remove this caveat.
Washington, D.C. is the only jurisdiction – among the twelve that have voted to legalize – that Congress has blocked from regulating marijuana distribution. This prevents the city from enjoying the improvements in public safety, criminal justice, and economic opportunities that legalization has created elsewhere.
Queen Adesuyi, policy manager at DPA’s Office of National Affairs, said:
“Under these conditions – where marijuana is essentially decriminalized, but there is no legal access for adult use – D.C. has been left with a complicated grey market that is both unsafe and a far cry from the racial and economic justice promises of the Initiative 71 campaign.”
“It’s time that Congress get its hands off of D.C. and allows D.C. Council, Mayor Muriel Bowser, and other D.C. stakeholders to deliver on the promises of equity and justice for those disproportionately impacted by racially-biased enforcement of marijuana laws.”
Read the full letter here.
L.A. County Board ATI Voting Members Endorse Supervised Consumption Sites
DPA has been working with committees of the Los Angeles Board of Supervisors (BOS) to advance harm reduction services in the county. Early this year, the BOS created a Working Group, Alternatives to Incarceration (ATI), to develop and create a roadmap to reduce reliance on incarceration and expand diversion and treatment options. After the BOS voted to cancel a $1.7 billion contract to replace Men’s Central Jail in August, the need and opportunity for the ATI to create a comprehensive plan to build a more effective justice system became evident.
DPA staff were initially successful in getting the Women's, LGBQ+/TGI subcommittee to recommend that supervised consumption sites (SCS) become “service hubs and be part of the decentralized system of care”.
Norma Palacios, administrative assistant for DPA’s Los Angeles office, then presented this policy recommendation before the ATI voting members, who also voted to endorse the SCS recommendation.
DPA will be contributing to the development of a three-year implementation plan for this recommendation that will be included in a final report and presentation to the BOS in February.
This is a huge win for DPA at the local level and helps to set the stage to amend L.A., and potentially other jurisdictions, into our state-level bill in California (AB 362, Eggman) to permit SCS.
Drug Policy in the News
Vice: California Liberals Talked a Big Game About Weed Justice. Then Big Cannabis Took Over
New York Times: Where the Nurses Prescribe Heroin
Filter: The Drug Policy Reform Movement Debates Its Next Moves
High Times: House Judiciary Committee Approves Historic MORE Act
Marijuana Moment: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Voices Support for Decriminalizing Psychedelics
McClatchy Washington Bureau: This effort to decriminalize marijuana nationally is even getting Republican support
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