More than three months later, Gov. Phil Murphy still hasn’t signed a bill to make it happen.
And, in the interim, thousands of people have been arrested on cannabis possession charges.
The purported holdup has been Murphy’s concern that the proposed law hasn’t specified uniform penalties for underage users.
Last week, state Sen. Nilsa Cruz-Perez, D-Camden, and state Sen. Nick Scutari, D-Union, introduced a “cleanup” bill to address Murphy’s concerns.
It provides for light penalties for underage use. It discourages police from making arrests by making the process onerously time-consuming.
It also creates a 26-person task force to review underage marijuana consumption in the Garden State and police encounters with users.
The cleanup bill is slated to be heard in committee in Trenton on Monday. It must pass both the Assembly and the Senate — and there is no guarantee it will — before Thursday for it to proceed to the governor’s desk, as per the agreement between Murphy and the Legislature.