Foolish consistency: 2011 legislature sticks with old, failed marijuana penalties 

The 2011 legislature adjourned on June 23, and Louisiana still does not have a law that effectively protects medical marijuana patients from arrest. In the last several sessions, Louisiana legislators have been too busy trying to increase marijuana penalties and discriminate against marijuana users to introduce compassionate medical marijuana legislation. Please email your state legislators to ask them to provide medical marijuana patients with the protection they need. 

In 2011, the legislature almost passed a welfare discrimination bill, but backed off at the last second after MPP members took action on a June 16 alert. H.B. 7 would have required at least 20% of Family Independence Temporary Assistance Program benefit recipients to undergo a drug test. Recipients who failed one test would be ineligible until completing a rehabilitation program and testing clean. H.B. 7 passed the House, 67-26, and a Senate committee, but did not receive a Senate vote. Also, the legislature passed HCR 16, which directs the Drug Policy Board to coordinate a study of the overall impact and estimated aggregate costs of illegal drug use in Louisiana.

In 2010, the legislature focused on bad bills, although the worst of them died without passage. The House considered two welfare discrimination bills, H.B. 611 and H.B. 617, which would have required drug testing of cash assistance recipients and would have suspended cash assistance after two positive tests. H.B. 611 died in a House committee, while H.B. 617 passed the House, 61-27, but died in Senate committee. The House also considered and failed to pass H.B. 139, which would have branded repeat drug offenders with a "scarlet letter," mandating that they carry special "DRUG OFFENDER" driver’s licenses.

Learn about Louisiana's marijuana laws

Louisiana has some of the harshest marijuana laws in the country, and it has the fifth-highest marijuana arrest rate in the United States. First-offense possession of even a single joint is punishable by up to six months in jail. In 2010, S.B. 576 passed into law, and actually increased the penalty for second-offense marijuana possession by including a mandatory minimum fine of at least $250 and 48 hours in jail. In 2010 as well, the legislature passed H.B. 117, a parole revocation bill that treats with slightly more lenience certain offenders who are convicted of simple possession of marijuana while on parole. It also passed S.B. 502, which removed possession of less than 60 lbs. of marijuana from the legal definition of racketeering, so that only those individuals who possessed 60 lbs. or more may be charged.

You can learn more about Louisiana’s marijuana penalties and enforcement by reading this report by Jon Gettman, Ph.D. You can send a letter to your legislators asking them to reduce the penalty for possession of marijuana to a civil fine or asking them to end marijuana prohibition entirely.

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