Voter-passed Issue 2 allows Ohioans to possess up to six marijuana plants per person (and no more than 12 per household). The Senate’s buzz-killers instead opted for a maximum of six plants per household.
Because the House failed to act on the Senate scheme Wednesday, what voters legalized – up to six plants per individual, 12 per household – remains the law.
The intermediate challenge – for now – is that Ohioans likely won’t be able to legally buy marijuana from licensed vendors until mid-2024 because Issue 2 gave state officials up to nine months to enact a framework for legal (recreational) marijuana. That’s why home-grow matters.
Now and unless something changes, an Ohioan who doesn’t have a medical cannabis card can’t buy marijuana from an Ohio medical marijuana dispensary. The Senate plan, perhaps a trade-off for crimping home-grow, would allow the sale of recreational adult use marijuana by Ohio’s existing medical dispensaries within, one legislator estimated, 90 days of the Senate amendment’s passage. (The House, as noted, hasn’t acted on the Senate’s idea.)
Of course, none of this would be at issue if the legislature had readied Ohio for legalization, given that voters’ OK of Issue 2 was easily foreseen. But that implies Statehouse work, rather than Statehouse showboating.
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Gov. Mike DeWine, state Budget Director Kimberly Murnieks and key legislators deserve an ovation for good news about Ohio’s finances.
DeWine announced Dec. 8 that Standard & Poor’s Global Ratings has upgraded Ohio’s general obligation bond ratings to “AAA,” highest rating possible, citing the strength of Ohio’s financial management.
The S&P upgrade means Ohio, for “the first time, has been rated ‘AAA/Aaa’ by all three [bond] rating agencies,” the governor’s office said.
The higher a state’s bond rating, the lower the interest rate a state must pay on bonds. That is: Higher bond ratings = lower costs to taxpayers.
The other rating agencies are Moody’s Investor Services and Fitch Ratings, which also top-rated Ohio’s general obligation bonds. The Bond Buyer, the leading publication covering the bond-market, headlined its report on Ohio’s bond ratings boost this way: “Ohio wins ‘triple-A Triple Crown.’”
For all the General Assembly’s bluster on gender, guns, etc., the legislature’s budget-writers have arguably bolstered Ohio’s finances. (How they’ve done so is open to robust debate, but the credit ratings speak for themselves.) The current budget chairs in the Senate and House are state Rep. Jay Edwards, a Nelsonville Republican, and state Sen. Matt Dolan, a Chagrin Falls Republican. Dolan is running for GOP nomination for a U.S. Senate seat now held by Sen. Sherrod Brown, a Cleveland Democrat.
Budget strength can’t mask the fact some policy choices are wrong-headed: good example, privatizing public schooling via vouchers. Still, as to the bond-rating boost, an Ohio maxim comes to mind: When Ohioans elect a governor, they’re hiring a manager. In DeWine, financially speaking, they got one.
Thomas Suddes is a former legislative reporter with The Plain Dealer in Cleveland and writes from Ohio University. You can reach him at tsuddes@gmail.com.
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