Should marijuana be legalized in New Jersey, growers and sellers would not be able to do business in Barnegat Township. An ordinance adopted at the July 2 township committee meeting will forbid the “sale, manufacture and farming and marijuana paraphernalia” in the municipality.
Deputy Mayor Alfonso Cirulli acknowledged the ordinance could eventually be declared moot.
“Eventually, the state may not allow us to do this,” he said. “Whatever we do will be superseded by anything that the state does.”
Gov. Phil Murphy’s first hundred days in office came and went without legalized marijuana, as he’d promised to get done as a candidate. Now his first budget is approved, still without taxes from legalization.
Top Democrats are now saying it could be approved before Labor Day.
Murphy’s original budget plan in March counted on $60 million from adult-use, recreational marijuana sales starting Jan. 1. But the budget he signed Sunday includes none of that, though there’s still $20 million from sales of medical marijuana.
As June burned to a close, lawmakers in Trenton were still scrambling to pass a budget by the end of the month and avoid a government shutdown. Surprisingly absent from negotiations was one of the main platforms on which Gov. Phil Murphy ran for office: marijuana legalization.
Despite support from top lawmakers, marijuana reform couldn't get done before the June 30 budget deadline. It's now been delayed until at least later this summer.
Three speakers told Cape May County Chamber of Commerce members June 21 of the widespread negative effects legalized, recreational marijuana could have.
Legislation is pending in Trenton that could make the drug legal for recreational use. It is legal for medical applications with a physician's prescription.
NJ R.A.M.P.
Grace Hanlon, represented New Jersey Responsible Approaches to Marijuana Policies, and showed slides and video clips of the impact legalized marijuana has had in Colorado.
SYNOPSIS
Establishes requirements for home delivery of medical marijuana.
Don't hold your breath for movement on legislation to legalize marijuana before Saturday's state budget deadline.
Legislators and industry insiders say it's going to be kicked down the road until after New Jersey gets a budget.
Sen. Nicholas Scutari, D-Union, who proposed his recreational/medicinal marijuana mashup just three weeks ago, told NJ Advance Media there'll be no push to get legislation done this week but he believes it could be hashed out over the next month.
Fresh out of prison, the marijuana activist who calls himself "NJWeedman" says he'll oppose the state's push toward legal weed unless the rules are changed to guarantee African-American and Latino entrepreneurs a bigger share of the market.
Ed Forchion joins a growing cadre of pro-marijuana activists in New Jersey who are advocating for minorities to have a significant share of what could be a $1 billion market in growing, distributing and selling legal weed.
The probability of an adult-use marijuana bill passing in New Jersey before a June 30 budget deadline reportedly is declining, but lawmakers still look poised to approve recreational MJ within the next year, according to a policy analyst and advocate.
The current effort is hitting a snag because of state budget squabbles as well as lack of consensus over the details of a marijuana industry, according to NorthJersey.com.
For the past several years, the question of whether to legalize the recreational use of marijuana for adults has been a hotly debated topic across the country. The 2017 gubernatorial race brought this debate to New Jersey, when then-candidate Phil Murphy proclaimed that one of his goals for his first 100 days as Governor would be the passage of legislation to legalize the recreational use of marijuana for adults. While those 100 days have come and gone without the passage of such legislation, Governor Murphy remains committed to the legalization of recreational marijuana.
Rev. William Henry opposes marijuana legalization. He says government rarely does with the proceeds what it says it will do.
“And you may say, ‘why would children be smoking marijuana?’ Well, if their parents have it, it’s in their household,” said Henry, a pastor at Everlasting Life Ministries.