Illinois Marijuana Bill Could Dramatically Decrease Arrests Of Young Black Men
Adults in Illinois would be means to use tiny amounts recreational pot but fear of jail time underneath dual bills introduced by a General Assembly. The bills are a first-ever legislation in a state directed during rolling behind marijuana-related penalties.
On Tuesday, lawmakers in both state houses introduced bills that would decriminalize and legalize tiny amounts of recreational pot for people over 21. Illinois now has a despotic commander module for authorised medical marijuana.
“It’s decriminalization on steroids,” Ali Nagib, partner executive of the Illinois section of The National Organization for a Reform of Marijuana Laws,
Even yet tiny amounts would be authorised if a law were passed, Illinois would not be reaping a taxation income excavation like Colorado
In a reduce chamber, state Rep. Kelly Cassidy (D-Chicago) filed a check that would reduce a rapist penalties of recreational pot possession of 30 grams or fewer to a $100 sheet and a sparse offense.
Though conjunction bills residence quantities of recreational pot that would impact a blurb industry, some contend a parliament check in sold has a intensity to assistance a long-running problem of black and Latino residents being criminalized for pot offenses during a disproportional rate to whites.
“It would solve a inconsistency and detain issue,” Kathleen Kane-Willis, executive of the Chicago-based Illinois Consortium on Drug Policy during Roosevelt University,
Chicago Marijuana Arrests Per 1000 Residents, 2011-14
(The darker a color, a aloft a concentration. Click for breakdown.)
African-American Share Of Chicago Population, 2013
(The darker a color, a aloft a concentration. Click for breakdown.)
Maps pleasantness of University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy Graduate Candidate Scarlett Swerdlow.
In Illinois, blacks were about 7.6 times some-more expected to be arrested for possession than whites, according to a 2014 news by a ICDP. That rate ranks Illinois third in a republic for a black-to-white secular inconsistency of pot possession offenders, “despite a fact that pot use is a same between these dual groups,” a news said.
In 2010, Illinois ranked fifth nationally in a series of arrests for pot possession, behind New York, Texas, Florida and California.
“To have such a radical inconsistency formed on neighbored and secular combination of area is intensely unfortunate to us during a consortium,” pronounced Kane-Willis, who also co-authored a report. “It doesn’t allege a goals of open reserve … [Criminalizing recreational pot use] is also expensive: how do we wish to spend a military time and resources? It’s a 0 sum diversion during slightest in tenure of time.”
Both Nagib and Kane-Willis contend they feel assured a dual new bills on recreational pot legalization and decriminalization won’t be a final to come from a legislature this session.
“I consider there’s expected going to be one other bill, maybe more, introduced this event about taxation and regulate,” Nagib said. “It’s a state of a rather enlarged review on what a right approach brazen is on this policy…but it’s a good interest in a belligerent to contend ‘here’s how we can re-introduce this plant.'”
Article source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/02/06/recreational-marijuana-illinois_n_6626368.html?utm_hp_ref=chicago&ir=Chicago