Virginia’s effort to revisit outdated cannabis convictions is moving forward again, though in a revised form that shifts how people access relief. Governor Abigail Spanberger’s amendments to SB 62 / HB 26 replace the bill’s original automatic resentencing framework...
After signing a bill into law that decriminalized marijuana earlier this year, Governor Ralph Northam formally voiced his support for fully legalizing marijuana in Virginia next year. This is welcome news both for civil rights advocates and cannabis enthusiasts in the Commonwealth. Recreational marijuana use may be legal in Virginia by 2021 --...
In the wake of the General Assembly's decriminalization of marijuana, which took effect July 1, this law would, according to activists, help decrease the over-policing of Black and brown Virginians. The state Senate approved a bill Friday that would prohibit search and seizures based solely on the odor of marijuana. Activists say this is a small...
Advocates may not agree about whether decriminalization or outright legalization is the correct path for Virginia marijuana legislation. But they're united in the belief that the state's current laws must change. Advocates dressed in black stood Wednesday at the base of the Virginia Civil Rights Memorial to voice their support of marijuana...
In 2018, almost 20,000 people, most of them African American, were found guilty of marijuana possession in Virginia courts. The racial disparities where the state's marijuana convictions are concerned has led some state officials to consider decriminalizing and perhaps legalizing marijuana. Now that Democrats have won control of the General...
Last week, Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring took to social media to voice his support for "legal, regulated adult use" of marijuana -- a sentiment that, according to a just-released study, more than half of Virginians support. Attorney General Mark Herring tweeted his support for the legalization of recreational marijuana in Virginia last...
“You wouldn’t know it, but there’s a park back there. It’s beautiful. Linco used to swim in there as a kid,” says Cyrax of Divine Council, pointing to a nondescript patch of trees. On the surface, it doesn’t look like much—just a string of woods a lot like the spots you made the best of near your childhood home. I ask if that was the spot where...
