Connecticut took a step in the right direction when it decriminalized adult possession of small amounts of marijuana and legalized medical marijuana. This bill requiring a plan to fully legalize marijuana presents a chance for our state to further honor individual privacy rights, prevent discrimination, and remedy the disparate burdens that marijuana prohibition has placed on youth, communities of color, and poor communities throughout our state.
Connecticut’s history of disproportionately arresting people for marijuana possession overall, and its disturbing track record of racial disparities in this enforcement, mean that communities continue to suffer from decades of prior marijuana criminalization. We therefore encourage the legislature to require the plan to fully legalize marijuana to include proposals that prohibit discrimination against people with marijuana-related convictions and create a pathway toward expungement of those records.
