How to make a good woman steel. I'm an old woman, bless to
make a see I want to be I'm hit a that I'm bad of the
bowl, bad the b bad the bowl by Billy Cunningham, The Great America.
Of course, about a month ago we had State Issues one and two.
State Issue one was allowing abortion up through pregnancy ut the termination of the
pregnancy at nine months, and of course State Issue two dealt with uh marijuana
and making it similarly to alcohol. One was a constitutional amendment that the lawmakers
could not effectuate. The second one, which was recreational pot is something subject
to amendment. Joining you and I now are State Senator Steve Huffman of District
five, which is tends to be north of Dayton. He's also for thirty
two years a practicing physician, and he's been a corner so he knows where
the bodies are buried. And Senator Huffman, welcome to the Bill Cunningham Show.
And first of all, can you make the argument that I hear some
say in talk radio that we voted on this thing. How come those Republicans
want to change it? Can you tell the American people why it is proper
to change it in fact, why it was anticipated it would be changed.
Yeah, it was an initiated ballot initiative, and so it's in the revised
code. So that gave us the opportunity, and many of us in Columbus
field that that is why they chose that and not a constitutional amendment, so
that we can look at it at the taxation and the homegrown and other things
like that to what's best for the people in Ohio. So when I'm looking
at these articles and some of the materials you sent to me, one of
the main things would be to eliminate growing marijuana at home. That it appears
the people wanted to have home grow, yes, in a sense. But
then I had on the Great Bill Sites about a week or two ago,
and he mentioned that under the current law which was passed and to become effective
December seventh, which is Thursday, that there could be as many as seven
thousand joints grown at home. And that wasn't the intent. So can you
address yourself to what you're proposing relative to growing marijuana at home? You know,
the bill that we just introduced, or it was a sub bill in
a House bill that was introduced this morning, is to eliminate all home grown
and we're going to have a great discussion on that and committee tomorrow and hopefully
pass the bill out on Wednesday. But that's something still up for discussion.
But right now, it looks like the substitute bill has no homegrown because just
as Bill sites, that Bill sites a very very smart man. You know,
seven thousand joints a year and one household just seems to be a lot.
I'm not sure that's for personal use. I have my doubts. Plus,
we don't all I don't think we allow bathroom gin anymore. I don't
think I don't think you can have your own intoxicans at home because purity,
how much, what's the THC content? Those issues come into play, and
so growing. Does your crystal ball tell you that the bill coming out of
the Senate in the next day or two will have no homegrown in it at
all? I can say that we're going to look at that issue very hard
in the next few days. I'm not sure exactly how it's going to come
out, and maybe we reduce it to one plant in a certain area in
a certain way. But you know, some of the things that I you
know in this bill that I'm sure I'll stay in there. Is that you're
not allowed to if you have a daycare at your home, you would not
be able to have a home growth there because we don't want to want it
around children. Right, Well, what if what if a mom and a
dad has four kids under the age of eighteen, say they're of tender years.
Under the law passed by the electorate, couldn't they have up to seven
thousand marijuana joints in their home with children present? That is correct, And
you know a lot of things that we're trying to do in this substitute bill
is protect the children to you know, no smoking and automobiles, no public
smoking because you know you don't want you know, one parent driving, one
parent smoking, you've got two kids in the back seat. You know that's
not a proper It's not safe for the children. And a lot of these
things are going to protect the children. You may be aware, of course
you're up north of Dayton, but when you walk around downtown Cincinnati on a
summer's eve, you're often will smell marijuana everywhere. And right now, that's
it's been that case the last couple of years because the mayor and the city
Council have told the Police Division and said Cincinnati to not enforce that law.
Now, that is ridiculous because you can have cops picking and choosing which laws
to uh to enforce and which ones not to enforce. But practically the employer
says, don't do it. And so on one hand, you're going to
have parts of Ohio in which people may be cited for improper marijuana use.
In other urban areas there won't be any violation at all. And you know,
is that fair? It doesn't seem fair to me. But one thing
that uh, you know, I'm sure that we'll stay in here is about
the employer. The employers in the state of Ohio have to have the ability
to have a drug free workplace and to be able to decide if they want
to drug test for marijuana or not drug tests for marijuana to protect themselves and
protect their fellow employees. What about the tax rate, because we all know
that if the if the if the dark market, the the underground has a
lot lower prices than legal marijuana, that the market's not going to shift.
Do you understand, is the Senate understand you have to keep the legal rate
of marijuana somewhat close to the illegal rate, so that users will use illegal
and not the illegal. You know, I've dealt with the medical marijuana in
that sense, and it's true for they're about you know, forty fifty thousand
people that have a medical marijuana in the state of Ohio have never bought the
product. In most likely it's because they're getting a cheaper on the street.
So we've addressed the taxation. You know, the ten percent that was an
in initiated ballot was low compared to other states, and on our proposal today
is it's up to fifteen percent on gross sales, with also fifteen percent on
the cultivators. Senator Huffman, what happens to the to the medical marijuana those
that have the car and those dispensaries dedicated to medical marijuana. Why would somebody
want a medical marijuana card if you can easily access recreational marijuana. Well,
you know, and I've said for a long time when this started, was
many people will drop that because they want don't want to go to a physician
to get the recommendations. They don't want to go through the hassle to get
to get the card. Because a lot of what we're doing in the sub
bill is streamlining the process. We don't need to two government uh marijuana commissions
out there, one for medical, one for recreational. We don't need culture
two different set of cultivators or dispensaries. We're going to you know, streamline
the system so that each one participates in any other one. And you're right,
many people will will go away from the medical program because they can get
it also in the recreational or adult use. I would note that Fairfield and
other communities want to pass a long quickly by Thursday declaring that no one can
sell marijuana. There'll be no dispensaries in their city. What survives was so
called home rule in cities and townships and villages or maybe counties decide for itself
to have no dispensaries at all. Yes, So I mean part of the
medical marijuana program we had that was home rule that they can pass in the
ordinance that say we do not want dispensaries or cultivators in their jurisdiction. And
you know, I go back to the casinos, because you know, twenty
years ago, all we heard was if you have a casino, all the
drugs and prostitutes will be right outside your door. Doesn't seem to have happened.
It seems that they're legitimate businesses and they're all regulated. In all the
drug addict dealers are not going to be outside your medical marijuana. But as
the state, I think we should respect that and let the local jurisdictions make
their own dec so we could have a circumstance whether the entire county in a
sense, could be a dry county, because that's the way it is.
Would you be comfortable if county wide, some county commissioners said no dispensaries,
no cultivation in our county. Are you comfortable with that? I'm comfortable with
that, but I'm not sure you can do it county wide because the local
control goes to the local city or the local township. But if the whole
county wanted to do that, that's what and if they don't, people don't
like it, you shouldvote out those county commissioners. And that's why we are
system the way it is. When I had on Senator, I'm sorry,
when I had on Governor Mike Dwine, I don't know about four or five
weeks ago, just I think it was the day after it passed. He
said, look, there's no need to run to hurry or rush this thing.
Others are saying December seventh is like a drop down date. That's Thursday.
It's in the law. Can you speak of the what's going to change
on December the seventh, Assuming you and the Senate and the House and the
Governor can't get together in the next forty eight hours to pass something, what's
the status of this marijuana law come Friday morning. Well, that's up for
the legal people like yourself to finally look at that. But what I'm told
is that in there are some provisions that go into effect thirty days after the
election, which is on the seventh, and that would be that cultivators would
get so many dispensaries, and if you have a dispensary, you get so
many more of these, and also you're allowed to start home going on the
seventh. So that's why we have some urgency on some things, and we
also have some time on others because the Department will can take up to a
year to make the rules. So we're really looking at the things that we
really need to get done by the seventh, but also going to get those
other things done that we have a little more time on and you have a
provision here about how to use the money, and you talk about hundreds of
millions of dollars. It seems like a bullload of cash, and it is,
but on a state budget of fifty billion dollars, it's not really I
mean, it's significant, of course, but it's not do or die.
What is the new proposal you have for dividing up the money coming in That
might be in the range of three to five hundred million dollars, who knows
what that number is, But what's your idea about chopping up the profits enforcement
fifteen the marijuana, substance abuse in drug abuse, and ten percent to the
safe driver program, and then the rest goes back to the general fund that
we can distribute at any time for more law enforcement or more substance abuse,
whatever's needed at the time. Rather than put it in code, we're going
to let the General Assembly and the governor make that decision every two years on
what's best to use that money for. So the idea is to walk before
you run, to see let's put this where. I think we're about the
twenty third or twenty fourth state to approve recreational marijuana. Some have had great
success, some have not. In California, the legal headshops as they're called,
have little or no business because the market is still a dark market,
and so that would be a problem. But maybe the home grow operations in
California might be different than Ohio. But for those who want to grow marijuana
beginning December seventh, would that be legal? It would if we don't do
anything. And the one thing about home grown, it's my understanding, is
a very difficult plant to grow one that you know bugs and a few use
pesticides on the plant. You don't want to be smoking these toxic pesticides.
And the other thing is is mold from when you're drying it out. These
mold spores get on there that can also be talked. That can be very
dangerous to the individual that's using it. And so really you want to you
want to have a product if it's sold under the auspices of the state of
Ohio, that that is wholesome, as used as intended, and it doesn't
have unintended fentanel or something else or mold in it. And that's the idea
of prohibiting home growth, correct. I think that's a bit big part of
it. Is is that, you know, we want people to have safe
product. It's now that the initiative valid, initiative passed, but we want
it to be safe for everybody. So the law we passed will not be
the law that takes effect. Well, that is what the Senate is trying
to do. Well, we'll see in a couple of days how successful we
are and if we can get to our fellows, members of the General Assembly
and the House to agree. That doesn't sound likely to me. I'm used
to having nothing happening in anywhere. I can't conceive of all that happened hapening
in the next two days. But you're saying, Senator Huffman, you're saying
that's possible. I think. I think it's possible. I think the hard
work of Senator McCaulay to get all these things together. Well, we'll listen
to what people have to say on Tuesday and most likely come back with the
sub bill on on Wednesday, and you know the plan of the President is
to pass it out and see what We'll see what the thoughts of the House
members say, and then if you've got to tweak it down the road,
you'll do that too. But that's that's to be determined. But unless something
changes, there could be thousands of Ohioans having homegrown marijuana in their uh in
their basements come Thursday and Friday, and at this point it would not be
illegal. Well I'll tell you Willie, there are already thousands of people in
the state of Ohio already doing that, but it would just be a little
a little more legal. All right, Senator Huffman, thank you, and
we'll see what happens. But you're cautiously optimistic something can be done before Friday.
Yes, I am. I think on the leadership of the President and
Senator McCauley and others, well, I think we can get it done.
All right, Senator, thank you very much, Thank you, take care,
have a good done. Thank you all. Let's continue with more.
And so what you passed, what you voted for, is not what's going
to happen. And then hopefully the Senate, the House, when he talks
about the President, it means the president of the Senate in Columbus and all
of them need to get on the same page very quickly. Let's continue.
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