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Ohioans for Cannabis Choice is mounting a referendum effort against a new law cracking down on intoxicating hemp and making several changes to Ohio’s voter-passed recreational marijuana law. If its signature gathering effort proves successful, Ohio voters will be asked whether to reject provisions of Ohio Senate Bill 56 next November. They’ll need to collect almost 250,000 signatures to put that question on the ballot.
Ohio voters approved adult-use marijuana at the ballot box in November 2023. State lawmakers have been wrestling with changes to that law ever since.
Wesley Bryant, the owner of 420 Craft Beverages in Cleveland and one of the petitioners leading the referendum campaign, called lawmakers’ recent changes “a slap in the face to voters who overwhelmingly voted to legalize cannabis in 2023.”
What’s in the bill
Among S.B. 56’s changes, lawmakers capped marijuana potency, prohibited smoking in most public places, and imposed penalties on smoking in vehicles — as a driver or a passenger. Bringing legally purchased marijuana into Ohio from another stat would become illegal and Ohioans would face criminal penalties if they exceeded limits on homegrown cannabis. The new law also eliminates anti-discrimination provisions related to housing, employment, and organ donation.
But perhaps the biggest change for Ohio’s marijuana industry is language banning intoxicating hemp outside of a licensed cannabis dispensary. Those products start from cannabis plants with very little naturally occurring THC and then alter other compounds in a laboratory setting to create more of the chemical that makes users feel high. The prohibition brings Ohio in line with recent changes to federal law.
Gov. Mike DeWine has been complaining for almost two years about the proliferation of intoxicating hemp products like gummies made to look like popular candy brands or other snacks. By signing S.B. 56 those products become illegal in March.
Notably, state lawmakers had thrown a lifeline to the state’s booming THC beverage industry. The bill that arrived on DeWine’s desk would’ve allowed beverages with up to 5 milligrams of THC to be produced and sold in Ohio until the end of 2026, when federal law kicks in and they become illegal. Instead, DeWine issued a line-item veto effectively prohibiting them in March along with other intoxicating hemp products.
The referendum
Ohioans for Cannabis Choice quickly announced plans for the referendum and filed its initial batch of signatures a little more than a week after DeWine signed the legislation.
“In filing our petitions today,” Bryant said in a statement, “We are taking a stand for Ohioans against politicians in Columbus and saying no to the government overreach of S.B. 56.”
With petitions delivered, state officials are on the clock. The Secretary of State has 10 business days to verify the signatures, and the Attorney General has the same amount of time to certify the petition summary is fair and truthful.
If the petition clears those bars, organizers can begin canvassing to collect signatures. They’ll need 6% of the total number of votes cast in the most recent gubernatorial election (248,092). The group will also need 3% of an individual county’s gubernatorial turnout in 44 of Ohio’s 88 counties.
Organizers will have 90 days from the date the governor filed the law with the secretary to collect the require signatures.
Another petitioner, Tuscarawas County hemp farmer Joseph Ellwood, said ordinary Ohioans weren’t asking for changes lawmakers made.
“Ohioans oppose re-criminalizing cannabis,” he said. “For example, making it a crime to grow more than six plants, a crime to have unauthorized paraphernalia, and a crime to buy marijuana in Michigan and bring it home.”
“And this is just the start,” Ellwood added. “Politicians in Columbus won’t stop until marijuana and hemp are completely illegal in Ohio again.”
Andrew Greene, the group’s third petitioner and an employee at a Dayton distribution center, said numerous jobs are at stake if S.B. 56 takes effect.
“There are thousands of workers like me who are going to lose their jobs because S.B. 56 will close more than 6,000 small businesses across Ohio,” Greene said.
“It’s sad because the cannabis industry, both hemp and marijuana, support legislation that will protect consumers and strengthen Ohio farmers and small businesses,” he went on, “But these out-of-touch politicians are hell bent on re-criminalizing marijuana and hemp products.”
Reactions
The measure’s sponsor, state Sen. Steve Huffman, R-Tipp City, expressed some sympathy for those frustrated with the bill, but portrayed several provisions as clarifications rather than wholesale changes. He pointed to the number of plants allowed for home growers as an example.
“We clarified the number of plants — six for one person, six for the other — that didn’t change,” he said of the 12-plant household limit. “But the way the ballot initiative was, you weren’t allowed to be prosecuted till 23 (plants) which really didn’t make sense, and 12 seemed to be what was intended, and we went with that.”
Lawmakers improved the expungement process, he added, and did work behind the scenes to hopefully streamline licensing and regulation for business owners.
And Huffman questioned the motives of those behind the referendum. Although Ohio voters approved adult-use marijuana, he said, much of the pushback against his bill seems to be coming from the hemp industry.
“The (2023) ballot initiative had absolutely zero effect on anything in the hemp industry,” Huffman said. “But it sounds like that’s the vast majority of what people want to overturn.”
“There’s some contradiction there,” he added.
DeWine spokesman Dan Tierney made a similar point. While he stressed it’s the right of any Ohio citizen to pursue a referendum, the organizers’ claim that S.B. 56 goes against the will of the voters is “inconsistent.”
The 2023 ballot measure could’ve allowed marijuana sales anywhere, Tierney said, but it didn’t. And so seeking a referendum to protect the sale of THC infused beverages in bars or convenience stores doesn’t protect the will of the voters.
Originally published by the Ohio Capital Journal. Republished here with permission.
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Nick Evans, Ohio Capital Journal
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