[A]fter a tense morning and three committee votes, a marijuana bill eked out of the House Judiciary Committee Friday.
The stripped-down House version of S.241, which scraps the Senate’s plan to legalize recreational pot in 2018, passed narrowly on a vote of 6 to 5.
The latest draft of the bill looks very different from the version that passed the Senate in February on a 17 to 12 vote. But the committee’s vote keeps the bill alive.
Committee Chair Maxine Grad, D-Moretown, proposed a new version of the bill earlier this week, which expanded decriminalization to make possession of two marijuana plants a civil penalty and eliminated the Senate’s framework for legalizing and regulating pot.
On Friday, the committee first defeated a motion from Rep. Gary Viens, R-Newport, to table the bill by a vote of 6 to 5. That gave the committee the opportunity to vote on Grad’s amendment. However, after some discussion, the panel voted it down by a vote of 6 to 5.
After Grad’s proposal failed, Committee Vice Chair Willem Jewett, D-Ripton, proposed a second amendment. His version retained most of Grad’s proposal, but stripped out a section that expanded the decriminalization law.
Jewett’s 25-page amendment includes a new criminal offense for the chemical extraction of marijuana for hash oil. It would create a penalty for driving under the influence if a person’s blood alcohol level is 0.05 percent or higher and if there are any traces of psychoactive chemicals in the person’s system.
The updated version of the bill includes the formation of a commission that would make recommendations about marijuana-related issues in Vermont.
The bill gives $350,000 to the Department of Health for education and prevention programs. It also would fund to the Department of Public Safety for a forensic lab that could process blood samples for evidence of drug consumption, and for funding drug recognition expert training for law enforcement.
Jewett’s amendment passed the committee on a vote of 6 to 5. Rep. Bill Frank, D-Underhill, was the only committee member to change his vote.
The legislation will move next to the Ways and Means Committee and then to the Appropriations Committee before it reaches the House floor. If passed, a conference committee would be set up with the Senate.
Rep. Vicky Strong, R-Irasburg, said the process was rushed, and she would have liked more time to look at the amendment that Jewett presented before the vote.
Strong supports the push for more educational programs geared at preventing young people from using marijuana.
“So in the end I support a lot of what’s in the bill,” Strong said. “I’m just still very worried about the games that go on here.”
Strong said she’s worried about what will happen to the bill in the Senate or in conference committee. She’s concerned that “behind closed doors things are going to happen that we hadn’t really planned on.”
Viens, who had moved to table the bill, said in committee that he would have preferred to pass the amendment as a new House bill, rather than amending the Senate bill, because of what could happen in conference committee.
“My biggest concern is that this is still S.241,” Viens said a few moments before voting against Jewett’s amendment.
Grad, however, said that she believes it was important for the committee to take a position.
Even if the committee had killed S.241, it’s likely that marijuana legalization would have gone to conference. The Senate could attach the language of the bill to another piece of legislation.
If the House approves the bill that came out of House Judiciary today, Grad said, she will be tethered to the House position and can argue for it if the bill goes to a conference committee. “Then I don’t have very far to go,” Grad said.
Grad said she believes the commission preserves the work that the Senate put into crafting the legislation, but also makes clear where the House stands on the issues. On a conference committee, Grad said her job would be to advocate for the House position.
“We did not pass a legalization bill,” Grad said.
Jewett said it was important for the committee to take a position on the Senate bill.
“Hiding behind pinning it to the wall or tabling it or whatever you want to call it is not the way to do the people’s business,” Jewett said.
Jewett feels like a “mechanic” on the bill, he said. He does not list the marijuana legalization debate as one of his priorities, but he sees the legislation as a step toward creating a middle ground in the discussion. Currently, the issue is polarized, he said.
House Speaker Shap Smith said that the bill now goes to the Ways and Means and Appropriations Committees, and that he’s unsure how the bill will be received there.
Smith said he will likely “push pretty hard” to pass the bill through the House.
“I really believe that the policy that we have now is broken, and if we’re not going to move forward on a legalize and regulate model, that we ought to answer the questions that are preventing us from doing that,” Smith said.
Sen. Dick Sears, D-Bennington, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee and a supporter of the bill in the Senate, said Friday that he was disappointed with the bill that came out of the House Judiciary Committee.
Sears referenced the referendum on marijuana legalization scheduled for November in Massachusetts, and raised questions about how that will impact Vermonters, particularly those in the southern part of the state.
“I’m really concerned that we’re putting ourselves once again behind the eight ball,” Sears said.
He said when he began working on the issue he was skeptical, but that he came around after hearing testimony on the widespread use of marijuana in Vermont and the ability of young people to access it.
But Sears said that he plans to continue to push for the version of the bill that the Senate adopted.
“I’m not giving up the ship. We’ve got a long way to go and a short time to get there,” Sears said.
There are multiple ways to move forward, Sears said.
“We have bills in the Senate that have the word marijuana in them that came over from the House, and that gives us an opening if we need one,” Sears said.
Editor’s note: This story was updated at 6:10 p.m. Mark Johnson contributed reporting to this story.
