It has raised more money than almost anyone else.
Here’s your daily round-up of pot-news, excerpted from the newsletter WeedWeek. Download WeedWeek’s free 2016 election guide here.
Privateer Holdings, parent company of Leafly and other cannabis brands, raised $40M bringing its total to more than $100M.
Virginia isn’t very friendly when it comes to cannabis. Less than a half-ounce can get you up to a year in jail and $2,500 in fines and anything over a half-ounce nets you anywhere from a mandatory year in jail to 10 years. Even paraphernalia can get you a year in the pokey.
But a proposal from Virginia state Sen. Adam Ebbin would ease some of that by decriminalizing an ounce or less of pot and dropping the fine to $100. The bill would also lessen the penalties for people caught growing six plants or less – though that would still remain illegal.
Virginia is for medical marijuana lovers, with 84 percent of registered voters polled in a recent Quinnipiac University Polling Institute study saying they want legal access for sick Virginians.
But support for medical marijuana doesn’t equal support for the recreational use of cannabis, with 46 percent of people in the same poll agreeing that adult use be tolerated. That could shift in the next few years, however. Seventy-one percent of voters aged 18 to 29 said they want to legalize cannabis.
There’s growing talk about a medical marijuana bill being submitted in West Virginia in the coming months, with Del. Mike Manypenny announcing last week that he will make a fourth attempt at winning over his fellow lawmakers.
While the bill does face considerable challenges in the conservative state, Manypenny’s last bill in 2013 managed to get nine co-sponsors as well as a hearing before the House Health and Human Resources Committee before failing to move forward to the House floor.
| Marijuana Policy Project’s Matt Simon. |
West Virginia lawmakers have begun considering the possibility of allowing for legal medical marijuana use and cultivation in their state. As we reported earlier this week, an interim joint health committee (no pun intended) has been called to evaluate whether legalizing medical cannabis is the right move for the state. Yesterday was the first of the hearings, with Marijuana Policy Project analyst and spokesman Matt Simon taking the stand and urging politicians in his home state to come to their senses.
“Those are some of the really tragic cases in my opinion, patients who have to move to another state just to try a plant that would work for them,” Simon told lawmakers.
| The Weed Blog |
Delegate Mike Manypenny, who said he’s convinced the Lord put marijuana in His grand scheme of creation to provide mankind with relief from chronic pain, has introduced a bill in the West Virginia House of Delegates which would allow the medicinal use of cannabis in the state.
| CBS 6 |
| Delegate David Englin hopes to revitalize a 30-year-old Virginia law which allows marijuana to be used for medicinal purposes |
A medical marijuana bill is scheduled to go before a Virginia House committee on Tuesday.
| Photo: Let’s Talk Style |
An inmate who allegedly received a box of marijuana-filled ballpoint pens from a female Cook County, Illinois sheriff’s deputy is facing a felony contraband charge for the transaction.