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Little opposition seen to decriminalization of marijuana
March 24, 2009 - projo.com
PROVIDENCE — No one seems to be getting worked up about a bill before the General Assembly that would decriminalize possession of less than an ounce of marijuana, making it a civil violation punishable by fine rather than jail time.
At a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee last week, only three people — a former New Jersey police detective, a spokesman for a convict assistance agency and a representative of the American Civil Liberties Union — testified about the bill. All were in favor of it.
No one from the attorney general’s office, the governor’s office or any other state agency appeared to oppose it. Nor was there anyone from the state’s law enforcement agencies to speak a negative word.
Amy Kempe, spokeswoman for Governor Carcieri, said it would be premature for the governor to comment on a bill that has not been voted on by either the House or the Senate, since it could change in any number of ways during that process. If it’s approved, she said, the governor would take a position on the bill as passed. The state Health Department, which had opposed last year’s medical marijuana bill, had no position and the state’s drug court officials declined to comment as well.
Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch’s spokesman, Michael Healey, said with literally hundreds and hundreds of bills introduced each session, Lynch had to pick the ones that most closely affected his office’s operations or legislative priorities. He said the marijuana decriminalization bill was not one of them. Healey added Lynch had supported the medical marijuana law.
Pawtucket Police Chief George L. Kelley III, president of the Rhode Island Police Chiefs’ Association, also declined to comment, either personally or on his organization’s behalf, saying the bill “is not on our radar.”
The Assembly last year overrode a Carcieri veto to legalize marijuana for medical uses. A new bill sponsored by Sen. Leo R. Blais, R-Coventry, would not make possession of an ounce or less of marijuana legal, but it would reduce penalty for such possession from up to a year of jail time to a civil violation with a maximum $100 fine and forfeiture of the marijuana. The laws concerning possession with intent to sell would not be changed.
Sen. Charles J. Levesque, D-Portsmouth, vice chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said he thought that with the state facing such a difficult time with its budget, fiscal issues might shunt the Blais bill aside, at least this year.
Blais said he thought his bill had a 60-percent chance of passing this session. He attributed the lack of vocal opposition to last year’s passage of the medical marijuana law, saying it showed support for easing the penalties concerning a small amount of the drug.
“We approved medical marijuana,” Blais said. “That was the fight. That horse is already out of the barn and in the next field.”
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