420DC Weekly Round Up

Headlines from 2/9-2/16

Brought to you by The Outlaw Report

MD

Legalization Must Accommodate the Illicit Market

Though rare, the cash-only and underground nature of the illicit market can make its participants potential targets. According to a Department Of Justice press release from earlier this year, in February 2019, a Baltimore man was shot and killed after attempting to rob a low-level cannabis dealer—who is now serving a 20-year minimum sentence for murder—at a gas station on the corner of Wylie Avenue and Park Heights Avenue. Eric Sterling, a retired criminal defense lawyer warns that legalizing cannabis for adult-use and assuming customers will opt to purchase legally from dispensaries is not enough to combat illicit sales. 

 

VA

Bill Would Allow Individual Communities to Determine

As Virginia’s 2021 cannabis legislation evolves and advances, one delegate sponsors a bill that would allow localities to opt out of legalization, potentially establishing a regulatory patchwork across the Commonwealth. HB 2315’s sole sponsor is Del. Daniel Marshall, a Republican from Virginia’s 14th District. Some advocates say allowing individual localities to opt out of legalization would give rise to an unnecessarily complex and unfair landscape.

 

DC

Plant Medicine Coalition Pushes For Federal Decrim of Psychedelics

Plant Medicine Coalition’s early ambitions include advocating for $100 million in federal funding for research into these drugs, improving the quality of psychedelic-related dialogue among lawmakers, and establishing Community Healing Hubs centered on plant medicine. It also seeks to build on and support a growing wave of pro-psychedelic activism across the country, which has led to multiple local victories for reformists, including in the state of Oregon, and cities such as Denver, Ann Arbor, Oakland and Santa Cruz. Lavasani said PMC’s ultimate goal “is to deschedule these medicines and have some kind of sweeping legislation that allows for integration of psychedelics into our society.”

 

QUICK HIT

The Outlaw Report Turns One Year Old!

Allow us all to boast a little bit: The Outlaw Report has been at it for a full year now. Across more than 50 newsletters, plenty of podcasts, and quite of these pithy quick hits (and probably to some readers, a little too many Andy Harris jokes), myself and our small, scrappy team have tried to keep everybody up to date on the cannabis comings and goings in Maryland, Washington D.C., and Virginia.