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Ohio on Tuesday could become the next of Pennsylvania’s neighbors to legalize recreational marijuana.
At the same time, there’s a renewed bipartisan push in the U.S. House of Representatives to give federal approval to legal pot.
With those developments as a backdrop and given the support of Gov. Josh Shapiro, Pennsylvania’s House Health Committee Chairman Dan Frankel, D-Allegheny County, says it’s inevitable the Keystone State is heading toward legalization and it’s time to figure out how it can be done in a responsible way.
A House subcommittee on Wednesday held the chamber’s first-ever hearing on recreational adult-use marijuana legalization featuring experts from the medical and substance abuse fields, as well as academics who study the legal marijuana market.
Frankel said the hearing was the first of several to be held over the coming months.
“We’re taking a little more deliberative process to get it right here and looking at a couple different models,” Frankel said. “This was the first opportunity for us to have a hearing to get kind of an overview of the issues that we need to deal with as we put together a legislative proposal.”
Recreational marijuana legalization has drawn bipartisan support in the Senate but there also are vocal opponents who either see it as dangerous or best left to Congress to implement.
At the hearing, critics said the consequences outweigh potential revenue.
Shapiro’s first budget included an estimate that a 20% tax on the wholesale price of adult-use cannabis could generate more than $188 million in new revenue by 2028.
“This is very much about money and large industry,” said Rep. Paul Schemel, R-Franklin County, who opposes legalization.
He pointed to a Forbes article that projects the cannabis industry stands to make $57 billion off legal recreational use by the end of this decade. That figure jumps to $72 billion if a few additional states, including Pennsylvania, legalizes it.
But given the reports that indicate it leads to higher use among young adults, Schemel said, “In my nine years in the legislature, I can think of no policy initiative that we have ever taken up which we know for a fact does harm to our constituents.”
Rep. Kathy Rapp, R-Crawford County, said the potential revenue will not offset the cost to law enforcement, schools and mental health professionals in combating addiction and the danger that higher potency marijuana would cause.
Jeff Hanley, executive director of the Commonwealth Prevention Alliance, a statewide nonprofit supporting substance abuse prevention professionals. Hanley pointed out despite efforts to implement a legalization policy that tries to rein in the harm, people’s behavior can’t fully be controlled through laws and regulations.
But Rep. Rick Krajewski, D-Philadelphia, said as state representatives, they can play “an active role in addressing the issues that we know are impacting users and communities, particularly communities of color every single day with the status quo.”
Penn State College of Medicine professor Kent Vrana said while he opposes recreational cannabis, he offered some suggested guardrails the state might consider if it goes down the legalization path.
He urged the state to regulate production and sale so consumers know what they are buying, requiring it to be grown in state and not allowing the sale of synthetic products. Vrana also advocated regulating the concentration of THC, the psychoactive component that produces the high, to 25% in cannabis products and 30% in vape products, instead of the more potent products sold in other states.
Amanda Reiman of New Frontier Data, a data analysis company that studies the legal cannabis industry, said being able to control who produces the product, how it’s tested, and where it can be sold are advantages that come with legalization.
What’s more, she said it also is the only way to reduce illicit market sales of cannabis. Data she shared projects that by legalizing recreational weed, Pennsylvania could eclipse the illicit market by 2028 whereas staying with only legalized medical marijuana, legal sales won’t overtake the black market sales even by 2030.
“So if one of the goals of this is to make things safer, tested products, labeled properly kept in stores where people under 21 can’t access them, that is the piece that is going to reduce the illicit market,” Reiman said.
After hearing testimony from the health care professionals about how the brain development continues into the mid-20s, Schemel asked for her opinion of what age should be considered safe for consumers to use marijuana products.
Reiman responded, “If we allow people to drink at 21, we should allow people to access regulated cannabis at 21.”
Concerns about younger Pennsylvanians’ access to marijuana dominated much of the attention at the hearing. Discouraging their use comes down to a matter of policies and preventions efforts and education about the risk factors that marijuana poses, Vrana said.
However, he added, “I think the subtlety that we have to remember is in legalizing recreational use for adults, we are giving it the stamp of imprimatur that it is safe, that adults can use it so why can’t kids. That’s the concern.”
Dan Bartkowiak, a spokesman for the conservative Pennsylvania Family Institute, shares that concern. At a news conference prior to the hearing, he referenced a Temple University study released last spring that concluded state legalization will lead to more children and young adults using marijuana.
“Pushing to legalize an addictive and dangerous substance like marijuana for recreational use would be harmful to Pennsylvanians and should absolutely be avoided,” he said. “No amount of projected tax revenue is worth sacrificing the health and well being of our citizens, particularly our children.”
Jan Murphy may be reached at jmurphy@pennlive.com. Follow her on X at @JanMurphy.