| Greg Dewald/Clay Middle School |
| The new law will fix an imbalance under which possession of marijuana paraphernalia received a stiffer penalty than possession of marijuana itself |
Ohio will start treating people who get caught with a marijuana pipe the same way it treats those who get traffic tickets starting this fall, reversing an imbalance that punished possession of marijuana paraphernalia more harshly than possession of marijuana itself.
While the removal of barriers that keep reformed felons from getting jobs was the portion of Senate Bill 337 that got lots of attention when Republican Gov. John R. Kasich signed it — it’s a considered a national model of how to write such a bill — the part that decriminalizes possession of most marijuana paraphernalia isn’t as well known, report M.L. Schultze and Simon Husted of WKSU.