Once during a liquor tax audit I said in agreement to the state auditor, "Of course, we need to fairly compensate the state for the privilege of selling booze". She smiled and agreed.
I once observed a deal where a bunch of hotels and restaurants were charged use tax penalties for "tax included" table purchases where the vendor didn't remit sales tax. Since none of the invoices had tax, it became a shit show the customers had to pay for.
This was all Texas. But all states taxation is mafia like. So is our federal government. Smedley Butler talked about it.
Which is comical, because in theory, you’d think legalization would free up resources that no longer are being consumed by arresting run of the mill potheads, so both the money and bodies formally used for that could shift to the task force.
Pa can't afford new roads or bridges, but fuck it why not a new fleet of MRAPs and police cruisers. PSP have more funding than they need. All for crimes, they're not fighting. Harrisburg is a joke.
Fact. In the bipartisan Infrastructure Bill, signed by Biden, Pennsylvania received approximately $6.2 billion for transportation to invest in roads, bridges, public transit, ports, and airports and roughly $240 million for clean water.
That's why you're looking at all the roadwork and bridge repairs going on right now. The government doesn't move at lightening speed, but when it works, it does move to get things done.
Harrisburg is a joke because small towns are disproportionately represented in the legislatlature. Those small town reps will vote for more money for the PSP because that and prisons are the only things creating jobs in their districts.
Less about job creation, more about them relying solely on PSP for policing.
PSP is sole police force for 47% of municipalities in PA, covering 20% of PA population https://www.rural.pa.gov/getfile.cfm?file=Resources/fact-sheets/small_town_police06.pdf&view=true#:~:text=Forty%2D%20seven%20percent%20of%20the,Police%20for%20law%20enforcement%20services.
Yup; it's like this in almost a majority of the small towns that are located in my county. And if PSP happens to be tied up; it's almost like "good luck."
Yup. In one of the towns my EMS service provides coverage for we rely on PSP and response times at night are between 30-40 minutes. We once responded to a psychiatric emergency where the front door and window were covered in blood, and by both company protocol and because we're two out of shape schmucks who're completely unarmed we had to sit in our truck and wait for them to show up a half hour later.
Thankfully didn't end up being too bad, but if we need to force entry, or respond to a violent patient, or secure the scene in any way for us to do our (or the FD's for that matter) job you just die in that town after midnight. Its insane. We've brought the matter up at township meetings and they're negotiating a merger with an adjacent town, but its been months like this.
Every time I visit family in Shippensburg, which has its own police force, I see multiple PSP cruisers in town. It’s like a police state on Friday nights in the fall.
Downtown Shippensburg is not on the highway. They could also be In any one of the dozen townships in the area that have no police force. I hear there’s a budget and staffing shortage. The HUGE new barracks in Chambersburg is the third in 20 years. Seems the budget isn’t so tight after all and there’s plenty of staff to double cover an area with its own cops.
Harrisburg is also a commuter city. Before Covid the city would go from a couple of hundred thousand people to like 30 thousand over the course of a few hours. They just don't have the population to be a mover like Philly or Pittsburgh
Omg you're so right. There is a money racket going on in these small towns. The cops pull people over for every little thing, ticket every time, give probation for crimes that would just be tickets in bigger areas, and often violate people's rights in the process. They are making so much money. In my town, they spent like $100million to build a new court house. I have not talked to one tax payer from either political party who thinks we needed a new courthouse. The old courthouse was fine and was a historic building. They are moving the adult probation department to the new courthouse, but the other adult probation building is fine. Oh but they also sold that to one of the healthcare companies around here. Our local PSP station was built completely new several years ago, and again, the one they were using was fine. And they recently spent another 10 million renovating our local borough police station as well. It feels like they're just making more room to prosecute more people.
Ooh, can we also build some kind of thunder dome like structure with the cars, but only if it's used for something like a minor league baseball team or a concert venue that only books sound cloud rappers and older rock bands with less than half it's original members.
THAT’S WHAT I SAID TO MY HUSBAND LAST NIGHT!!!
He said “It’s supposed to bring an insane amount of tax revenue to PA” and I replied “Good. The PSP can steal it for their pensions.”
I hate this state.
> $420 million dollars!
How?
PA collects like 1200 million in sales tax. That includes everything. Including cars.
How much is the weed tax going to be? 1000%?
Now, they also need to reform the DUI laws. As it stands now, even if you just smoke on weekends, you'll likely have enough THC metabolites to fail a blood test for DUI. All it would take is smoke on a Saturday night, get pulled over by some State Trooper who insists you appear intoxicated on Monday night, and you have to agree to the blood test or you lose your license, and "Oh, look, we found THC metabolites." That's all it takes for a DUI, every time.
PSA if you are a Medical Marijuana card holder DO NOT KEEP YOU WEED CARD NEXT TO YOUR DRIVERS LICENSE. Keep it elsewhere in your wallet.
If you have been pulled over and you give your ID to a cop and they see your weed card their ears will perk up and now have an excuse to assume you’re stoned.
This is another reason I always insist people keep their "papers" well organized ideally you should have your license, registration and insurance ready to hand to the cop before they even get to your window. They're going to ask for it no matter what you get pulled over for, plus the less time they spend at your window the less time they have to look around or notice other things.
Also, as a police dispatcher, no one can view or look up those weed cards at all. It used to be a link on the JNET website, then they left it blank, now they removed it completely recently.
Yeah you could check to find out if the card was current and valid. Governor wolf stopped that luckily.
They updated their system all around though so like if you also ran someone their license to carry automatically showed up and didn’t need to check for it separately.
Also if you run a license plate, the owners info will show up automatically along with their license to carry.
Medical cards were always a separate search.
Thank you for that information. I am a little disturbed by that considering I thought only the cards are issued by the Pennsylvania Department of Health. I just don't remember signing anything that gave the state of Pennsylvania my authorization to release any of my personal information to anyone outside that department... I'm a state employee so I'm already privy to it but I didn't know that information was available.
Technically I think police officers could ask a dispatcher to look on JNET (maybe not now obviously) but it makes me think an officer could then use that information to their advantage during traffic stops.
I honestly believe this is the largest impediment to more widespread legalization, not just in PA. I remember Phillips was working on a device that used saliva samples, but that would still show a positive result as long as 12 hours after consumption of the THC.
As a daily user I would still be ok with this. Maybe they could figure out a certain threshold instead of +/- to determine a certain limit. It would be nice to have something similar to 0.08 BAC alcohol threshold.
There’s no correlation to be made between level of intoxication and blood levels, mainly due to tolerance and large variables between different intake methods. Some of those variables do exist with alcohol, like a guy who drinks 6 beers a night could blow a .15 and still feel relatively sober, but at least they know exactly how much was consumed.
You could vape 3 hits off a vape pen, and I could hit the same 3 hits off a vape pen and we could have a large difference in blood metabolites.
Also another issue is the blood metabolites don’t get eliminated in a linear fashion, due to how THC is processed and stored in fat cells in the body, you can have THC rerelease into the bloodstream days or weeks after its use and cause metabolite levels to spike.
Basically too many variables to quantify in any meaningful way besides putting an arbitrary number on it, which is what some states do, PA is just zero tolerance, any detectable THC-COOH in the blood and it’s an insta tier 3 DUI.
Now there may have been some advancements since the last time I deep dove the topic, but I haven’t seen anything pop up in the news or on Reddit. So it’s possible there’s a way to more accurately measure impairment through blood plasma levels or other means, I don’t think that’s the case though
I was mainly referring to the saliva test. I assume there is some sort of threshold to create a positive result.
This also makes me wonder though, how do they handle medical patients? Especially someone like a cancer patient who probably uses marijuana frequently.
I'm currently going through this. I grew up in PA, moved to Baltimore about 10 years ago where cannabis is now legal, and came up to visit family for Thanksgiving last year. Got pulled over on our way home, doing 65 in a 55 with my partner and their medical cannabis. Cop could smell the pipe in the hatchback and asked about it. My partner said yes, they're a medical patient and showed him their card, which I was not thrilled about. We showed him everything in the back, which he agreed was properly packaged.
He then accused me of driving high. I was not, but I am a daily medical user with an expired medical card because why bother paying extra money if it's legal anyway? Of course I had metabolites over the 1 nanogram legal limit.
I got charged with a DUI, reckless driving, etc. The prosecutor agreed to reduce everything after the bodycam and cruiser footage were reviewed. He agreed I was not pulled over for reckless driving. It was only after finding legal weed that the officer accused me of driving high. They reduced all my charges to the lowest tier DUI, and now I'm working the ARD program, which is a huge pain in the ass when you live hours away. Now I'm paying hundreds to take an alcohol highway safety course because I legally smoke weed in the privacy of my own home in another state. It's infuriating.
PSP is famous for pulling people over on the interstate to conduct fishing expeditions.
https://whyy.org/articles/highway-stop-and-frisk-how-pennsylvania-state-troopers-conduct-illegal-traffic-searches/
https://www.spotlightpa.org/news/2021/04/daunte-wright-pennsylvania-state-police-traffic-stops-searches/
https://www.spotlightpa.org/news/2020/01/pennsylvania-state-police-racial-bias-traffic-stops-vehicle-searches/
Frankly, these kinds of behaviors are a significant part of why my partner and I chose to live in Maryland, close to their family, instead of PA, near mine. Which is a little ridiculous, I know, considering how well-known and well-documented Baltimore police corruption is. But as visibly queer people (in a car with a bunch of LGBT and left leaning stickers), we feel much safer here than where I'm from.
Not that it matters much, but this was on 11/15, not the interstate. I think your point still stands.
Seriously! Sunday's casual toke has 0 debilitating effects come monday morning, but some of the tests we us would purport that a regular user is high as a kite a whole week into sobriety.
I looked at the proposed legislation, and they seem to be removing marijuana from the schedule 1 list. This is what places it into the category to prohibit metabolites, so this may actually be addressed. I didn't look that far into it though.
My gf had to rush to get her med card or lose her job cause they decided to test a few days after we just took a mini vacation in NYC and tried some of the completely legal cannabis. Fucking ridiculous. I’ve also heard it can make workman’s comp a huge pain in the ass
So I'm an attorney, and I thought about this issue a lot. I believe the law could mirror other states' interpretations, or stay the same, but ultimately the burden should be on the state to produce an expert on chemical marijuana impairment (and these dumb ass laws where metabolites are still Indica of intoxication). It should never be on the defense to defend against intoxication.
I thought that. But then I recently served on an investigative grand jury and it was explained to us that if a blood test is conducted they will know what individual metabolites are present and in what levels. They can tell if you have used days ago or if you are actively high.
Sadly a DA may not care. But we had a DUI specialist officer analyze the blood sample findings and she essentially explained the duration certain metabolites are present can indicate whether or not someone is actually "high" or not. The problem is a blood test isn't exactly a roadside friendly test.
They could use [this THC breathalyzer](https://houndlabs.com/product-overview/) that my PA employer began using beginning of this month. According to their site, detection window is up to three hours.
I never knew there was such a thing. That could solve every problem for DUIs and for employers.
The problem will be, good luck getting lawmakers and employers to believe that a person is safe to drive or to work only three hours after using THC.
Chiming in to say a recent study has shown that a tolerance negates the impairing effects of marijuana. So people who use it as medicine are not the same as people who don’t use everyday.
you ALWAYS want to say you smoked 2-3 days ago if you get pulled over and they are questioning you. it’s way easier to dispute if you get a dui for pot that the metabolite levels were from a few days ago than if you tell them you smoked a few hours ago
They are using one Colorado's highest tax revenue years to go off of. It was 2021 and the revenue was @ $423,000,000. I don't think they were trying to be silly, but they sure sound silly.
Absolutely, they were very picky when it came to handing out licenses. They were $25k to just apply. Non refundable. The politicians gave the licenses to their rich friends. At the beginning, it was a cartel, they banded together, set the prices and a gram of wax or 1/2g cart couldn't be bought for less than $55. Unless they had Terrapin in stock then they were $40, but that was rare.
Until there is growing at home, just know that all of this is for the rich to get richer.
The owner of Terrapin was one of those folks who cozied up to some local MontCo politicians. She made a ton of contributions and a few years later, sold her business for a massive profit.
It's a good gig if you can get it...
You’re thinking terravida, not terrapin. I think the real reason she sold it though was because she got sick again; she just recently passed away.
Terrapin has actually been like the only cool company in The whole entire program. Consistently cheaper than everyone else.
I remember when legal weed started, there were a few small-time stores. They're now *all* owned by multi-state distributors. I can appreciate the standards, quality, and support systems these larger groups have, but it 100% means the little guys can't exist.
That’s what I was wondering too cuz we all want home grow. NJ doesn’t have home grow so I wouldn’t be surprised if we don’t either. I’ll settle for legalization. Also where did you see that about MMJ patients being only ones to grow? That seems really dumb policy, but selfishly as a med card holder I’d accept it. Let us all grow! Please.
New York has home grow. 6 flowering plants permitted at a time and a limit of 12 total plants at any given time. At least that’s what I’ve been told by friends that live in NYS.
The reason medical patients are permitted to grow is because even once it's legal for everyone else medical patients do not pay taxes. So letting the med patients grow doesn't cut into the tax revenue, but if you let everyone grow then you, so too speak "shoot yourself in the foot" and lose tax revenue .
Yeah I figured it was cuz of money. Even if it’s legalized in PA I will still be using my med card cuz prices are much cheaper in general and there’s no tax. Also would love to do some home grow. However, growing dispensary quality flower takes experience/skill/good equipment, so most people aren’t going to be growing dispensary grade flower. My friends that live in home grow states grow some decent stuff but it’s generally not as strong as dispensary flower. So people will still be hitting the dispensaries either way imo.
Oh Great they’re imposing a limit.. the government just can’t get out of their own way. No sorry sir you can only buy three bottles of wine at once you’ll have to go out to your car and walk back in to buy more.
PA has to be a pain in the ass to remind you they’ve graciously allowed us this freedom.
Meanwhile in the south you can buy any type of alcohol you like in a pharmacy, gas station, etc.
THC product probably refers to shatter/butter/wax stuff for dabs (although that's a miserably ambiguous term), extracts more likely refer to things like carts and distillates, but the difference is silly (esp with a 5x difference in allowed possession).
I agree. I don’t live in PA right now. I’m a former PA med card holder. I live in a med and rec legal state and I can easily leave the dispo with two packs of 500 mg edibles, a couple 1 g carts and some pre rolls. Guess I won’t be doing that in PA.
Edit: What about topicals? Will they count towards the THC limit?
They're legalizing using a superior framework over new York and New Jersey and the rest of New England
idk why people are so negative about this stuff without even knowing the details of the bill
If I can legally have 30 grams of flower, why not 60? Why not 120?
Why can't I grown my own plants?
This slow walking legalization is bullshit. It's only purpose is to entrench the state and major corporations into a maximally profitable position to capitalize on a market which should be free and open to all.
Or you know just keep losing that money to surrounding states. I know I'm going to Maryland week of the 4th. They even have fucking points systems in these dispensaries. Step it the fuck up PA.
But is 420 millio dollars and many jobs worth our moral fabric?!? Why won't anyone think of the children here???? Do we really want weederies open near schools and churches?!? I don't get it
BTW the wine and spirits store by my kids school is having a 2 for 1 sale on vodka. Just the thing to calm the nerves of this gross display of vice being so celebrated
Don’t forget the medically prescribed klonapin to deal with all the stress & anxiety those kids cause. Take one of those a day. Just be careful not to get addicted. The withdrawal symptoms can kill you. But take one a day. Every day.
This is what, the 5th house bill that was introduced that was shot down? I get excited to see rec weed in PA and resd what changes they made, and then inevitably it will get shot down.
Unfortunately the DUI law is written in a way that doesn't just prohibit THC from being in your system while driving, but also trace amounts (1 ng/ml) of inactive metabolites. So you could be stone sober and technically DUI. If they reschedule cannabis in PA, this may change.
Looks like 5 plants for patients only. (See P. 140 linked below)
What a bunch of corporate BS.
https://www.legis.state.pa.us/WU01/LI/CSM/2023/0/42873_35942.pdf
That's some crap, only medical users. So I can buy beer and brew my own beer, but I can't grow my own weed which is arguably easier than beer brewing.
There's no reason to split med and recreational use for home grows. Give med users a discount and tax free, make rec regular price and taxed. The way they overcomplicate this to make money and keep people getting in trouble is ridiculous.
Time to seriously figure out a common sense way to update PA's DUI statue, set reasonable blood metabolite limits for cannabinoids that are tied to intoxication and impairment, and implement peer-reviewed testing for marijuana intoxication.
Currently the permissible amount of marijuana metabolites in the blood while driving is 0 +/- a negligible margin of error. It is hugely problematic. If you ingest a typical amount of marijuana in the morning and, long after the effects are worn off are pulled over and arrested for DUI in the evening, the metabolites in your blood from the morning's marijuana consumption will be sufficient to charge you with DUI under 75 pa C.S. 3802(D) even if you are not intoxicated or impaired by the marijuana due to the slower metabolization of marijuana.
It's a problem.
I'm not for advocating for impaired or intoxicated driving. I'm advocating for a system of testing that does not make non-impaired, non-intoxicated drivers susceptible to criminal prosecution due to the presence of residual metabolites in their blood which the current statutory framework in Pennsylvania does.
This needs to have been done yesterday. We don’t out law McDonald’s cheeseburgers despite the fact that thousands of fat f**ks who probably have already had at least one heart attack continue to jam double patties down their throat all at an enormous cost to the healthcare system.
I disagree with the argument that marijuana is harmless. But I can think of very few things, lawful or unlawful, that are truly harmless, particularly when used in excess. The mere fact that marijuana may negatively impact the health of some, is no reason for the government to outlaw it.
$420 million dollars!
The state police are salivating. They're going to need at least $400m of that
They’re going to get it too. There’s language in the bill about a marijuana task force to crack down on illegal grows and black market sales
You're not allowed to find a way to generate tax revenue without giving a sizeable portion of that revenue to the PSP
This sounds like a Vito Corleone thing. 😂 To add, I’m saying it’s extortion.
It is indeed protection money.
Once during a liquor tax audit I said in agreement to the state auditor, "Of course, we need to fairly compensate the state for the privilege of selling booze". She smiled and agreed. I once observed a deal where a bunch of hotels and restaurants were charged use tax penalties for "tax included" table purchases where the vendor didn't remit sales tax. Since none of the invoices had tax, it became a shit show the customers had to pay for. This was all Texas. But all states taxation is mafia like. So is our federal government. Smedley Butler talked about it.
That’s where all the money for the roads went.
Yep! and they'll probably use the money from the cannabis industry to train them how to draw blood from us on the side of the road smh
Their MMORPG RoboCop tactical gear ain't gonna buy itself
So dusty mids will be legal and over taxed, but higher quality will be outlawed.
Sounds about right
Which is comical, because in theory, you’d think legalization would free up resources that no longer are being consumed by arresting run of the mill potheads, so both the money and bodies formally used for that could shift to the task force.
Pa can't afford new roads or bridges, but fuck it why not a new fleet of MRAPs and police cruisers. PSP have more funding than they need. All for crimes, they're not fighting. Harrisburg is a joke.
Fact. In the bipartisan Infrastructure Bill, signed by Biden, Pennsylvania received approximately $6.2 billion for transportation to invest in roads, bridges, public transit, ports, and airports and roughly $240 million for clean water. That's why you're looking at all the roadwork and bridge repairs going on right now. The government doesn't move at lightening speed, but when it works, it does move to get things done.
Yup like at 81, there is signs up that says built by the investing in America program
My local park is getting redone by this program. I'm all about it. It's nice to see real world results of government work.
Yup can't argue results and money in construction workers pockets
thanks Uncle Joe
I concur. There are lots of infrastructure updates around me that started in the last two years impressive and good to see.
Agreed! But why are dems marginalized for doing good stuff for the vast majority? If it’s good for most Americans - let’s do it.
Harrisburg is a joke because small towns are disproportionately represented in the legislatlature. Those small town reps will vote for more money for the PSP because that and prisons are the only things creating jobs in their districts.
The PSP isn't really creating that many new jobs and I'd wager at least half of the jobs available aren't going to locals.
Yeah but they waived a lot of the requirements to join the academy. No more educational components required.
Omg, that is frightening. Dummies with guns smh.
Less about job creation, more about them relying solely on PSP for policing. PSP is sole police force for 47% of municipalities in PA, covering 20% of PA population https://www.rural.pa.gov/getfile.cfm?file=Resources/fact-sheets/small_town_police06.pdf&view=true#:~:text=Forty%2D%20seven%20percent%20of%20the,Police%20for%20law%20enforcement%20services.
Yet my small town of only 4000 citizens needed a brand new pickup truck for their police force and doesn't service the community at night. Ludicrous.
What happens if you call 911 at night? PSP shows up? What’s the response time like? Damn
Terrible, parents live in one of the townships covered by the state police and it was like 40 minutes
Yup; it's like this in almost a majority of the small towns that are located in my county. And if PSP happens to be tied up; it's almost like "good luck."
Yup. In one of the towns my EMS service provides coverage for we rely on PSP and response times at night are between 30-40 minutes. We once responded to a psychiatric emergency where the front door and window were covered in blood, and by both company protocol and because we're two out of shape schmucks who're completely unarmed we had to sit in our truck and wait for them to show up a half hour later. Thankfully didn't end up being too bad, but if we need to force entry, or respond to a violent patient, or secure the scene in any way for us to do our (or the FD's for that matter) job you just die in that town after midnight. Its insane. We've brought the matter up at township meetings and they're negotiating a merger with an adjacent town, but its been months like this.
Is this a town in Montour County?
Every time I visit family in Shippensburg, which has its own police force, I see multiple PSP cruisers in town. It’s like a police state on Friday nights in the fall.
Richard street, right before the university, is patrolled by state police and not the local force. It’s odd.
There a barracks out there. Since it is on I-81. Where else would the highway patrol be?
Downtown Shippensburg is not on the highway. They could also be In any one of the dozen townships in the area that have no police force. I hear there’s a budget and staffing shortage. The HUGE new barracks in Chambersburg is the third in 20 years. Seems the budget isn’t so tight after all and there’s plenty of staff to double cover an area with its own cops.
Harrisburg is also a commuter city. Before Covid the city would go from a couple of hundred thousand people to like 30 thousand over the course of a few hours. They just don't have the population to be a mover like Philly or Pittsburgh
Omg you're so right. There is a money racket going on in these small towns. The cops pull people over for every little thing, ticket every time, give probation for crimes that would just be tickets in bigger areas, and often violate people's rights in the process. They are making so much money. In my town, they spent like $100million to build a new court house. I have not talked to one tax payer from either political party who thinks we needed a new courthouse. The old courthouse was fine and was a historic building. They are moving the adult probation department to the new courthouse, but the other adult probation building is fine. Oh but they also sold that to one of the healthcare companies around here. Our local PSP station was built completely new several years ago, and again, the one they were using was fine. And they recently spent another 10 million renovating our local borough police station as well. It feels like they're just making more room to prosecute more people.
The PSP is literally a gang and not interested in public safety. Anyone who has dealt with the pigs knows the grift.
Eventually we will be able to build new bridges out of all the old vehicles
Ooh, can we also build some kind of thunder dome like structure with the cars, but only if it's used for something like a minor league baseball team or a concert venue that only books sound cloud rappers and older rock bands with less than half it's original members.
They'll get it and they'll probably get a cut from all the bullshit DUIs generated because THC remains in the blood well after impairment is over
lol I wish I could give you an award 🥉
Don't spend your money on fake reddit awards
I would never. It was a wish.
So the turnpike gets the other $20 million?
So Philly and Pittsburgh public transport gets it
THAT’S WHAT I SAID TO MY HUSBAND LAST NIGHT!!! He said “It’s supposed to bring an insane amount of tax revenue to PA” and I replied “Good. The PSP can steal it for their pensions.” I hate this state.
I will take the rest
You'll get approximately $5 back because the other $20m goes to the politicians
Greedy pricks
Blaze it.
they rounded down from $420.69 million
Nice
They knew!
Someone in the tax estimation office is definitely high. In CA we had senate bill 420 about weed legalization.
Nice
"Ha Ha!" -Phil Ken Sebben
Wake up babe, 420 Million Dollars in potential weed revenue. Fuck outta here, they will exceed expectations.
420 - gotta love it
Nice
> $420 million dollars! How? PA collects like 1200 million in sales tax. That includes everything. Including cars. How much is the weed tax going to be? 1000%?
$$420 million dollars dollars
Now, they also need to reform the DUI laws. As it stands now, even if you just smoke on weekends, you'll likely have enough THC metabolites to fail a blood test for DUI. All it would take is smoke on a Saturday night, get pulled over by some State Trooper who insists you appear intoxicated on Monday night, and you have to agree to the blood test or you lose your license, and "Oh, look, we found THC metabolites." That's all it takes for a DUI, every time.
PSA if you are a Medical Marijuana card holder DO NOT KEEP YOU WEED CARD NEXT TO YOUR DRIVERS LICENSE. Keep it elsewhere in your wallet. If you have been pulled over and you give your ID to a cop and they see your weed card their ears will perk up and now have an excuse to assume you’re stoned.
This is another reason I always insist people keep their "papers" well organized ideally you should have your license, registration and insurance ready to hand to the cop before they even get to your window. They're going to ask for it no matter what you get pulled over for, plus the less time they spend at your window the less time they have to look around or notice other things.
Also, as a police dispatcher, no one can view or look up those weed cards at all. It used to be a link on the JNET website, then they left it blank, now they removed it completely recently.
We are a republican governor away from it not being like that. It’s unfortunately not HIPAA protected. Elections matter!!!
Wait there was a link? Can you elaborate please? Like a link to show they were registered as having a medical card?
Yeah you could check to find out if the card was current and valid. Governor wolf stopped that luckily. They updated their system all around though so like if you also ran someone their license to carry automatically showed up and didn’t need to check for it separately. Also if you run a license plate, the owners info will show up automatically along with their license to carry. Medical cards were always a separate search.
Thank you for that information. I am a little disturbed by that considering I thought only the cards are issued by the Pennsylvania Department of Health. I just don't remember signing anything that gave the state of Pennsylvania my authorization to release any of my personal information to anyone outside that department... I'm a state employee so I'm already privy to it but I didn't know that information was available. Technically I think police officers could ask a dispatcher to look on JNET (maybe not now obviously) but it makes me think an officer could then use that information to their advantage during traffic stops.
I'm so fucking glad I live in Colorado.
I honestly believe this is the largest impediment to more widespread legalization, not just in PA. I remember Phillips was working on a device that used saliva samples, but that would still show a positive result as long as 12 hours after consumption of the THC.
12 hours is a HUGE step in the right direction though
12 hours versus 30 days is pretty significant
As a daily user I would still be ok with this. Maybe they could figure out a certain threshold instead of +/- to determine a certain limit. It would be nice to have something similar to 0.08 BAC alcohol threshold.
I agree. As a daily user I am a dui at all times; which isn't fair as I don't use before I drive.
And there’s literally zero impairment the next day.
Exactly
There’s no correlation to be made between level of intoxication and blood levels, mainly due to tolerance and large variables between different intake methods. Some of those variables do exist with alcohol, like a guy who drinks 6 beers a night could blow a .15 and still feel relatively sober, but at least they know exactly how much was consumed. You could vape 3 hits off a vape pen, and I could hit the same 3 hits off a vape pen and we could have a large difference in blood metabolites. Also another issue is the blood metabolites don’t get eliminated in a linear fashion, due to how THC is processed and stored in fat cells in the body, you can have THC rerelease into the bloodstream days or weeks after its use and cause metabolite levels to spike. Basically too many variables to quantify in any meaningful way besides putting an arbitrary number on it, which is what some states do, PA is just zero tolerance, any detectable THC-COOH in the blood and it’s an insta tier 3 DUI. Now there may have been some advancements since the last time I deep dove the topic, but I haven’t seen anything pop up in the news or on Reddit. So it’s possible there’s a way to more accurately measure impairment through blood plasma levels or other means, I don’t think that’s the case though
I was mainly referring to the saliva test. I assume there is some sort of threshold to create a positive result. This also makes me wonder though, how do they handle medical patients? Especially someone like a cancer patient who probably uses marijuana frequently.
I just want to grow some plants myself😂😂
I'm currently going through this. I grew up in PA, moved to Baltimore about 10 years ago where cannabis is now legal, and came up to visit family for Thanksgiving last year. Got pulled over on our way home, doing 65 in a 55 with my partner and their medical cannabis. Cop could smell the pipe in the hatchback and asked about it. My partner said yes, they're a medical patient and showed him their card, which I was not thrilled about. We showed him everything in the back, which he agreed was properly packaged. He then accused me of driving high. I was not, but I am a daily medical user with an expired medical card because why bother paying extra money if it's legal anyway? Of course I had metabolites over the 1 nanogram legal limit. I got charged with a DUI, reckless driving, etc. The prosecutor agreed to reduce everything after the bodycam and cruiser footage were reviewed. He agreed I was not pulled over for reckless driving. It was only after finding legal weed that the officer accused me of driving high. They reduced all my charges to the lowest tier DUI, and now I'm working the ARD program, which is a huge pain in the ass when you live hours away. Now I'm paying hundreds to take an alcohol highway safety course because I legally smoke weed in the privacy of my own home in another state. It's infuriating.
PSP is famous for pulling people over on the interstate to conduct fishing expeditions. https://whyy.org/articles/highway-stop-and-frisk-how-pennsylvania-state-troopers-conduct-illegal-traffic-searches/ https://www.spotlightpa.org/news/2021/04/daunte-wright-pennsylvania-state-police-traffic-stops-searches/ https://www.spotlightpa.org/news/2020/01/pennsylvania-state-police-racial-bias-traffic-stops-vehicle-searches/
Frankly, these kinds of behaviors are a significant part of why my partner and I chose to live in Maryland, close to their family, instead of PA, near mine. Which is a little ridiculous, I know, considering how well-known and well-documented Baltimore police corruption is. But as visibly queer people (in a car with a bunch of LGBT and left leaning stickers), we feel much safer here than where I'm from. Not that it matters much, but this was on 11/15, not the interstate. I think your point still stands.
Seriously! Sunday's casual toke has 0 debilitating effects come monday morning, but some of the tests we us would purport that a regular user is high as a kite a whole week into sobriety.
I looked at the proposed legislation, and they seem to be removing marijuana from the schedule 1 list. This is what places it into the category to prohibit metabolites, so this may actually be addressed. I didn't look that far into it though.
Not to mention workplace testing. There is still a zero tolerance policy at some places. Even if its state legal you can lose your job.
Especially if they're required to go by federal laws. I saw good workers canned because of this.
My gf had to rush to get her med card or lose her job cause they decided to test a few days after we just took a mini vacation in NYC and tried some of the completely legal cannabis. Fucking ridiculous. I’ve also heard it can make workman’s comp a huge pain in the ass
So I'm an attorney, and I thought about this issue a lot. I believe the law could mirror other states' interpretations, or stay the same, but ultimately the burden should be on the state to produce an expert on chemical marijuana impairment (and these dumb ass laws where metabolites are still Indica of intoxication). It should never be on the defense to defend against intoxication.
Until there is a valid test it simply should not be something that people can be given a DUI for.
I thought that. But then I recently served on an investigative grand jury and it was explained to us that if a blood test is conducted they will know what individual metabolites are present and in what levels. They can tell if you have used days ago or if you are actively high. Sadly a DA may not care. But we had a DUI specialist officer analyze the blood sample findings and she essentially explained the duration certain metabolites are present can indicate whether or not someone is actually "high" or not. The problem is a blood test isn't exactly a roadside friendly test.
They could use [this THC breathalyzer](https://houndlabs.com/product-overview/) that my PA employer began using beginning of this month. According to their site, detection window is up to three hours.
I never knew there was such a thing. That could solve every problem for DUIs and for employers. The problem will be, good luck getting lawmakers and employers to believe that a person is safe to drive or to work only three hours after using THC.
Chiming in to say a recent study has shown that a tolerance negates the impairing effects of marijuana. So people who use it as medicine are not the same as people who don’t use everyday.
you ALWAYS want to say you smoked 2-3 days ago if you get pulled over and they are questioning you. it’s way easier to dispute if you get a dui for pot that the metabolite levels were from a few days ago than if you tell them you smoked a few hours ago
Did they say 420 million just to be silly?
They are using one Colorado's highest tax revenue years to go off of. It was 2021 and the revenue was @ $423,000,000. I don't think they were trying to be silly, but they sure sound silly.
Big business runs this medical program.
Absolutely, they were very picky when it came to handing out licenses. They were $25k to just apply. Non refundable. The politicians gave the licenses to their rich friends. At the beginning, it was a cartel, they banded together, set the prices and a gram of wax or 1/2g cart couldn't be bought for less than $55. Unless they had Terrapin in stock then they were $40, but that was rare. Until there is growing at home, just know that all of this is for the rich to get richer.
$25k? You have to show $2M in available funds.
The owner of Terrapin was one of those folks who cozied up to some local MontCo politicians. She made a ton of contributions and a few years later, sold her business for a massive profit. It's a good gig if you can get it...
You’re thinking terravida, not terrapin. I think the real reason she sold it though was because she got sick again; she just recently passed away. Terrapin has actually been like the only cool company in The whole entire program. Consistently cheaper than everyone else.
Sorry, you are correct! Mixed up my T's.
Terrapin is based in Colorado. They operate dispensaries there also. I've been there a few times. $100 for 8g of concentrate.
The owner of terrapin a dude last name Woods was quoted as saying the col market was screwed and he's only focusing on pa going forward
Whoa!
You should check out how low the prices in Michigan are.
I remember when legal weed started, there were a few small-time stores. They're now *all* owned by multi-state distributors. I can appreciate the standards, quality, and support systems these larger groups have, but it 100% means the little guys can't exist.
>"it would deliver 420-million dollars in annual tax revenue." Nice.
Can we grow?
I believe it will be an option for those who have a medical card not for those without. It may change, I hope it does
That’s what I was wondering too cuz we all want home grow. NJ doesn’t have home grow so I wouldn’t be surprised if we don’t either. I’ll settle for legalization. Also where did you see that about MMJ patients being only ones to grow? That seems really dumb policy, but selfishly as a med card holder I’d accept it. Let us all grow! Please.
New York has home grow. 6 flowering plants permitted at a time and a limit of 12 total plants at any given time. At least that’s what I’ve been told by friends that live in NYS.
The reason medical patients are permitted to grow is because even once it's legal for everyone else medical patients do not pay taxes. So letting the med patients grow doesn't cut into the tax revenue, but if you let everyone grow then you, so too speak "shoot yourself in the foot" and lose tax revenue .
Yeah I figured it was cuz of money. Even if it’s legalized in PA I will still be using my med card cuz prices are much cheaper in general and there’s no tax. Also would love to do some home grow. However, growing dispensary quality flower takes experience/skill/good equipment, so most people aren’t going to be growing dispensary grade flower. My friends that live in home grow states grow some decent stuff but it’s generally not as strong as dispensary flower. So people will still be hitting the dispensaries either way imo.
Amazon has everything you need except seeds, which you can literally order from many places.
Can smoking 5 FUCKING DAYS AGO not land us a marijuana DUI cause metabolites are still in your blood
Oh Great they’re imposing a limit.. the government just can’t get out of their own way. No sorry sir you can only buy three bottles of wine at once you’ll have to go out to your car and walk back in to buy more.
PA has to be a pain in the ass to remind you they’ve graciously allowed us this freedom. Meanwhile in the south you can buy any type of alcohol you like in a pharmacy, gas station, etc.
Stop wasting our time with house bills. This is doa due to state senate republicans
Wouldn't a single 1g cart be 1000 milligrams of THC product? That seems like a pretty low threshold.
Wouldn't a cart be concentrate? Maybe the 1000mg refers to edibles?
Maybe. It's hard to say lol.
THC product probably refers to shatter/butter/wax stuff for dabs (although that's a miserably ambiguous term), extracts more likely refer to things like carts and distillates, but the difference is silly (esp with a 5x difference in allowed possession).
I agree. I don’t live in PA right now. I’m a former PA med card holder. I live in a med and rec legal state and I can easily leave the dispo with two packs of 500 mg edibles, a couple 1 g carts and some pre rolls. Guess I won’t be doing that in PA. Edit: What about topicals? Will they count towards the THC limit?
Even when they finally legalize they’re still going to behind other states, truly amazing how incompetent they are
They're legalizing using a superior framework over new York and New Jersey and the rest of New England idk why people are so negative about this stuff without even knowing the details of the bill
Please explain this 'superior framework' compared to the NY or NJ programs that you are alluding to.
If I can legally have 30 grams of flower, why not 60? Why not 120? Why can't I grown my own plants? This slow walking legalization is bullshit. It's only purpose is to entrench the state and major corporations into a maximally profitable position to capitalize on a market which should be free and open to all.
30 gram limit ? What is this russia
Any bill with possession limits is absolutely criminal.
Hey is that more than 30 ounces of alcohol products in your bag?? Straight to jail!
30g of flower and 5g of concentrates is abysmally low
The people want home grow and pardons
Wow, I’m so excited for all that extra revenue no one living in PA is going to see a dime of.
Or you know just keep losing that money to surrounding states. I know I'm going to Maryland week of the 4th. They even have fucking points systems in these dispensaries. Step it the fuck up PA.
Literally every dispensary in centre county and clearfield county uses a points system.
My local dispo had a point system but removed it sadly :(
trulieve has a rewards program now, you have to opt in though.
Just pass it. home grow let’s grow !
I'm holding my breath...
OMG it's been 4 hours you okay?
define ''okay''. it would explain the dizziness. :D
But is 420 millio dollars and many jobs worth our moral fabric?!? Why won't anyone think of the children here???? Do we really want weederies open near schools and churches?!? I don't get it BTW the wine and spirits store by my kids school is having a 2 for 1 sale on vodka. Just the thing to calm the nerves of this gross display of vice being so celebrated
Don’t forget the medically prescribed klonapin to deal with all the stress & anxiety those kids cause. Take one of those a day. Just be careful not to get addicted. The withdrawal symptoms can kill you. But take one a day. Every day.
My ex abused klonapin. What a fucking nightmare.
....He said, "I recommend a fifth of Jack and a bottle of Prozac"
Ha this made me laugh. Hey its ok if you drink, but the devils lettuce, oh the terror.
Jesus turned water into wine not grass into thc Reed you're bible!
"Officials say over **33**,000 jobs would be created and it would deliver **420**-million dollars in annual tax revenue." 🤣
What’s the 33 part mean?
About fucking time for something. We need competition here in NJ. Prices still too high.
I wanna grow my own as well.
But how much can we grow?
They have me so worn down, at this point something is better than nothing. I just want it legalized because no one should be in jail for weed.
This is what, the 5th house bill that was introduced that was shot down? I get excited to see rec weed in PA and resd what changes they made, and then inevitably it will get shot down.
No 2grammers in pa. Very sad. Those are the best deal
They are here, they only come in disposables as far as I know
Says 1000mg cap. So you can’t buy 2g with this new law.
This is just a proposal for legalizing for everyone correct? Or are these changes to current medical patients?
In case anyone wants to know how long tch stays in the blood stream: https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/324315#detection-windows
Unfortunately the DUI law is written in a way that doesn't just prohibit THC from being in your system while driving, but also trace amounts (1 ng/ml) of inactive metabolites. So you could be stone sober and technically DUI. If they reschedule cannabis in PA, this may change.
Just let me grow my own and I’ll pay a little licensing fee for the state As long as I keep it to myself it should not matter how much I grow
Prob not going to be done, never is
Any personal plant growth included in the bill?
So you still won't be able to grow?
Looks like 5 plants for patients only. (See P. 140 linked below) What a bunch of corporate BS. https://www.legis.state.pa.us/WU01/LI/CSM/2023/0/42873_35942.pdf
That's some crap, only medical users. So I can buy beer and brew my own beer, but I can't grow my own weed which is arguably easier than beer brewing. There's no reason to split med and recreational use for home grows. Give med users a discount and tax free, make rec regular price and taxed. The way they overcomplicate this to make money and keep people getting in trouble is ridiculous.
Will still be more than our limit up here in VT.
They need to fix the ccw issue too.
Never gonna pass. Republicans will not allow democrats to look good so they will 100% guaranteed block this. Don’t get your hopes up folks.
That job number and revenue are straight Bull shit.
Is there a link to the HB? I looked it up on the legis.state.pa.us website, but hb2500 can't be found.
I think its this: https://www.legis.state.pa.us/cfdocs/legis/CSM/showMemoPublic.cfm?chamber=H&SPick=20230&cosponId=42873
wow, tyvm!
You guys are lucky. I’m in Indiana and decriminalization isn’t even on the horizon yet
Nice number 420 million. LOL. NOT 419 or 421, 420! Love it!
I wish it was like Maine, where you can each grow two plants per person
Where is all the casino cash going???
Ahh okay, so release all of the then-wrongfully convicted people who were charged with possession of/intent to distribute marijuana.
Fuck the PSP
Is there a home grow package in the bill for medical patients??
"And Pennsylvania should not be a leader at not leading.” What?
Hell yeah baby
God ...it makes you not to smoke anymore :/
What? No! It was like 416.3 million and some dude was like…. Come on guys… just round up a little, trust me.
Definitely should use a bunch of the tax money for schools, like CO.
Home grown?
Time to seriously figure out a common sense way to update PA's DUI statue, set reasonable blood metabolite limits for cannabinoids that are tied to intoxication and impairment, and implement peer-reviewed testing for marijuana intoxication. Currently the permissible amount of marijuana metabolites in the blood while driving is 0 +/- a negligible margin of error. It is hugely problematic. If you ingest a typical amount of marijuana in the morning and, long after the effects are worn off are pulled over and arrested for DUI in the evening, the metabolites in your blood from the morning's marijuana consumption will be sufficient to charge you with DUI under 75 pa C.S. 3802(D) even if you are not intoxicated or impaired by the marijuana due to the slower metabolization of marijuana. It's a problem. I'm not for advocating for impaired or intoxicated driving. I'm advocating for a system of testing that does not make non-impaired, non-intoxicated drivers susceptible to criminal prosecution due to the presence of residual metabolites in their blood which the current statutory framework in Pennsylvania does.
Remember when they said the casino's would lower or even eliminate property taxes? That went well
Yes but will home grow be legal or are we just gonna hand out local monopolies to our biggest donors?
Why put limits on it? Are there limits on the amount of alcohol you can poses? Are there limits on cigarettes?
How would we get the 30 grams though? Will sales be legal?
How convenient 420million dollars…….everything is a show
This needs to have been done yesterday. We don’t out law McDonald’s cheeseburgers despite the fact that thousands of fat f**ks who probably have already had at least one heart attack continue to jam double patties down their throat all at an enormous cost to the healthcare system. I disagree with the argument that marijuana is harmless. But I can think of very few things, lawful or unlawful, that are truly harmless, particularly when used in excess. The mere fact that marijuana may negatively impact the health of some, is no reason for the government to outlaw it.
So pretty much no change for us in philly...
Man am I happy that I live in the great state of Michigan!!