Virginia Legislative Black Caucus Archives

Marijuana Possession and Cultivation Could Be Legal By July

VCU CNS | April 5, 2021

Topics: Cannabis Equity Reinvestment Board, chelsea higgs wise, General Assembly 2021, Kaye Kory, marijuana decriminalization, Marijuana Justice, marijuana legalization, Ralph Northam, Virginia Cannabis Control Authority, Virginia Legislative Black Caucus

Marijuana was originally scheduled to become fully legal in Virginia in 2024, but now Governor Northam has listened to advocates and is now working to move up the timeline, potentially making it legal this summer.

Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam amended legislation to accelerate the legalization of marijuana possession and home cultivation in the state to July as opposed to 2024.

“Virginia will become the 16th state to legalize marijuana — and these changes will ensure we do it with a focus on public safety, public health, and social justice,” Northam stated in a release.

The governor proposed changes to House Bill 2312 and Senate Bill 1406, which passed earlier this year during the Virginia General Assembly’s special session. The bills legalized marijuana possession and sales by Jan. 1, 2024, but marijuana legalization advocates and Democratic lawmakers lobbied to push up the date for possession.

“This is an historic milestone for racial justice and civil rights, following years of campaigning from advocates and community groups and a strong push by the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus,” the group Marijuana Justice stated in a press release.

Marijuana Justice seeks to legalize the use and possession of marijuana. The group advocates for communities most impacted by the criminalization of drugs with their “legalize it right” campaign.

The bills allow adults 21 years of age or older to legally possess up to one ounce of marijuana if they don’t intend to distribute the substance. Virginia decriminalized marijuana last year and reduced possession penalties to a $25 civil penalty and no jail time for amounts up to an ounce. In the past, possessing up to half an ounce could lead to a $500 fine and 30 days in jail.

Individuals can cultivate up to four cannabis plants without legal repercussion, with punishments ranging from misdemeanors to jail time if over the limit. The governor’s amendments would allow households to grow up to four plants beginning July 1. The plants would need to be labeled with identification information, out of sight from public view, and out of range of people under the age of 21.

Legislators will review the governor’s proposals during the General Assembly’s reconvened session on April 7, according to Del. Kaye Kory, D-Falls Church, one of more than two dozen legislators who sponsored the House bill.

Chelsea Higgs Wise, executive director of Marijuana Justice, said legalizing simple marijuana possession now rather than later is important for racial justice.

“Waiting until 2024 to legalize simple possession and therefore stop the desperate policing is allowing this continued bias enforcement against Black Virginians to continue for three years,” Wise said.

Accelerating the legislative timeline is key, Kory said.

“The figures show that it is much more common for a Black or Brown person to be charged with possession,” Kory said.

A state study released last year found that from 2010 to 2019 the average arrest rate of Black Virginians for marijuana possession was more than three times higher than that of white residents for the same crime — 6.3 per 1,000 Black individuals and 1.8 per 1,000 white people. This is despite the fact that Black Virginians use marijuana at similar rates as white residents. The conviction rate was also higher for Black individuals. Northam stated that people of color were still disproportionately cited for possession even after marijuana was decriminalized.

The original legislation established the Virginia Cannabis Control Authority as the regulatory structure for the manufacture and retail sale of marijuana and marijuana products.

The governor’s amendments would allow the authority to revoke a company’s business license if it interfered with union organizing efforts; failed to pay a prevailing wage as defined by the U.S. Department of Labor; or classified more than 10% of employees as independent contractors.

Lawmakers grappled with the dangers of juvenile use of marijuana, Kory said, and the impact of use on developing brains.

Marijuana Justice wants to remove the delinquency charge that designates marijuana possession a crime, not a civil penalty, if committed by someone underage. The penalty is still up to $25.

“Instead of punishment, young people should be evaluated for appropriate services that address the root causes of their usage,” Marijuana Justice stated.

The amendments would fund a public awareness campaign on the health and safety risks of marijuana. The changes also would train law enforcement officers to recognize and prevent drugged driving. Northam stated that his amendments include “explicit language directing ongoing support for public health education.”

The bill established a Cannabis Equity Reinvestment Board tasked with providing youth mentoring programs to marginalized youth and those in foster care, as well as providing scholarships to children who have been negatively impacted by marijuana in their family or community.

The current expungement of marijuana-related crimes is set for July 1, 2025. Northam’s new amendments call for marijuana-related criminal records to be expunged and sealed “as soon as state agencies are able” and to “simplify the criteria” for when records can be sealed. This will allow individuals convicted with marijuana offenses to be resentenced, according to the new amendment.

The bills originally passed along party lines. No Republicans voted for either bill, and several Democrats in the House did not vote on either measure. Sens. Richard Stuart, R-Montross, and Jill Vogel, R-Warrenton, stated that the governor’s amendments helped assuage their original concerns.

The conservative, faith-based organization The Family Foundation told supporters Thursday to contact their representatives and urge them to vote against the accelerated timeline.

The organization stated that violent and nonviolent crime rates have increased in states that have legalized marijuana, citing an opinion piece from a police defense group.

“It’s always been about generating more tax revenue to finance the ever-expanding state bureaucracy, creating massive fortunes for those who would use marijuana (like gambling) to prey on our most vulnerable citizens, and catering to a generation increasingly void of moral standards,” stated Victoria Cobb, the foundation’s president.

Written by Sam Fowler, Capital News Service. Top Photo: Members of the group Marijuana Justice at a press conference in January 2020 to support the legalization of marijuana in the commonwealth. Photo by Emma Gauthier/CNS.

100 Years After Women Earned the Right to Vote, Will VA Legislators Pass Equal Rights Amendment?

VCU CNS | December 27, 2019

Topics: Anne Schlafly Cori, constitutional amendments, danica roem, Eagle Forum, Equal Rights Amendment, General Assembly, Generation Ratify, Glen Sturtevant, hala ayala, Jennifer Carroll Foy, Jennifer McClellan, Mark Cole, Scott Surovell, US Constitution, va ratify era, Virginia Legislative Black Caucus

With a new Democratic majority in the General Assembly, Virginia could become the 38th state to ratify the ERA. Generation Z, people of color, and the LGBTQ community are leading a new generation in the decades-long fight to add the amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

University of Virginia student Emilia Couture had no idea what the Equal Rights Amendment was before her sister told her about the amendment a few years back.

Now as the outreach director of Generation Ratify, a youth-led movement created to ratify the ERA, Couture and many others are leading a new generation in the decades-long fight to add the amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

“It’s time to change the face of the movement by including the next generation — the youth,” Generation Ratify said on its website.

The ERA seeks to guarantee equal rights in the U.S. Constitution regardless of sex. The amendment was introduced in Congress in 1923, roughly three years after the 19th Amendment gave women the right to vote. It took Congress nearly five decades to pass the amendment, which still needed to be approved by 38 states. Two deadlines passed without the required approval. By the 1980s, 35 states had ratified the amendment, but it wasn’t until recent years that the movement gained more momentum. Nevada and Illinois ratified the ERA in 2017 and 2018, respectively. With a new Democratic majority in the General Assembly, Virginia could become the 38th state to ratify the ERA.

Despite being born nearly two decades after the ERA’s last ratification deadline in 1982, Couture believes young people are aware of intersectionality, and want to implement inclusivity in the ERA.

*Members of Generation Ratify at a VA Ratify ERA rally (via Generation Ratify/Instagram)*

According to Generation Ratify, gender equality is an intersectionality issue, which means that when social categorizations like race and gender combine, members of more than one minority group experience other disadvantages than just gender inequality.

“I think for a long time, the ERA movement has largely been a white women’s movement, and it’s really problematic that it has been,” Couture said.

The amendment has diverse support in the state legislature, including men. According to a 2016 poll conducted by the ERA Coalition, the ERA is supported by a majority of men and women. Sen. Glen Sturtevant, R-Richmond, sponsored ERA legislation in 2019, and Sen. Scott Surovell, D-Fairfax, introduced bills in the past two years to ratify the amendment.

Sen. Jennifer McClellan, D-Richmond, said African American women and women of color were overlooked in the building of the ERA and women’s rights, but now these women are leading the push for the ERA.

Sen. Pat Spearman, D-North Las Vegas, an openly lesbian, African American woman, led the fight in Nevada to ratify the ERA. Spearman served as the chief sponsor of the 2017 resolution to ratify the ERA in the Nevada Legislature, approved that year.

“It is a symbol of the fact that we are becoming a more perfected union and we understand that equality matters,” Spearman said.

*Long-time ERA advocates and new advocates for the amendment join together to discuss the history of the fight for equality. (Photo by Christopher Brown)*

Virginia legislators have made multiple attempts to ratify the ERA. This year, Senate Joint Resolution 284 to ratify the ERA passed the Senate, but never made it out of a House subcommittee. Four Republicans voted against the resolution in a subcommittee, while two Democrats voted for it. During the vote, Del. Margaret Ransone, R-Westmoreland, said she voted against the resolution because she doesn’t need words on a piece of paper representing women’s equality because “God made us all equal.”

Del. Hala Ayala, D-Prince William, one of two Latinas elected to the General Assembly in 2017, said in a recent interview with Capital News Service that she doesn’t understand why some members of the Republican party would “argue the moral obligation that we have to not only look towards our constituents, who overwhelmingly supported this, but also women, who wanted their voices to be heard.”

Democrats then filed motions for rule changes that would have the amendment heard on the House floor and give delegates a chance to vote on it, but the motions failed.

Several members of the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus are leading the push to ratify the ERA in the upcoming General Assembly session. Ayala is chief co-patron on House Joint Resolution 1, sponsored by Del. Jennifer Carroll Foy, D- Prince William. McClellan and Sen. Mamie Locke, D-Hampton, are chief patrons of Senate Joint Resolution 1, which seeks to ratify the amendment in the Senate.

Carroll Foy said that she believes that the ERA has a far-reaching impact on women of color than other marginalized groups due to inequality in pay.

“As an African American woman, I am paid approximately 60 cents to a man’s dollar,” Carroll Foy said.

While the ERA does not explicitly talk about equal pay for women, Carroll Foy said she believes that adding the amendment to the Constitution would be the anchor when it comes to passing equal pay legislation.

*R to L: Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring, former Illinois Republican House Rep. Steven Andersson and Nevada Democratic Sen. Pat Spearman. (Photo by Christopher Brown)*

However, not all women advocate for the amendment’s passage. Anne Schlafly Cori, chairman of the Eagle Forum, an advocacy organization for conservative values, said the ERA would harm women.

“ERA does not put women in the Constitution, ERA puts sex in the Constitution,” Schlafly Cori said. “Sex has a lot of other meanings besides men and women.”

Schlafly Cori’s mother, Phyllis Schlafly, founded the Eagle Forum. During the 1970s, Schlafly was a strong opponent of the ERA. For the new generation, Schlafly Cori said she believes that the ERA, if ratified, would give constitutional rights to what she called “a group of people who didn’t exist in the 1970s,” transgender people.

The amendment bans sex-based discrimination; however, it does not specify what sex is. According to the National Institutes of Health, sex refers to the biological differences between females and males, while gender identity refers to a person’s internal sense of gender. Del. Danica Roem, D-Prince William, a co-patron of HJ1, said people think LGBTQ people are “subverting social norms” when it comes to gender and sex.

“Discrimination in regards to sexual orientation, gender identity, and gender expression are all inherently discrimination on accounts of sex,” said Roem.

Roem said that discrimination against LGBTQ people justifies ratifying the ERA.

Del. Mark Cole, R-Fredericksburg, believes the ERA will be ratified in 2020. However, Cole said that ratifying the amendment will lead to a series of “costly and divisive lawsuits.” Since the ERA’s last ratification deadline passed in 1982, the amendment is considered expired, according to Cole. He also notes that five states rescinded their ratifications.

“Regardless of who wins these lawsuits, a large portion of the country will consider the Constitution to be tainted,” Cole said in a statement on his website posted in January. “Either with an amendment that is not valid or because an amendment that should be included was not.”

During the 2019 General Assembly session, Cole proposed HJ 692, which would have Congress re-submit the amendment with “language that addresses the concerns that caused the old ERA to fail,” but it died in committee. ERA Advocates, however, said they believe that the original amendment can still be ratified. Supporters have cited U.S. Supreme Court cases like Coleman v. Miller, where the Supreme Court decided that it’s up to Congress to decide an amendment’s ratification period.

Generation Ratify wants to remove the ERA’s ratification deadline. In November, the organization wrote to members of Congress to support resolutions which would remove the amendment’s deadline from the ratification process.

“People of all genders deserve constitutional equality,” said Rosie Couture, Generation Ratify’s executive director. “It is that simple. Period.”

It’s unclear what Congress will do if the ERA is ratified by 38 states or what impact the amendment will have if it makes it into the Constitution, but many state Democrats are determined to approve the amendment. McClellan and other Virginia Democrats said they feel confident that the ERA will pass in the upcoming General Assembly session.

“To do it in the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment, I think it is very appropriate,” McClellan said. “While it’s long overdue, I think getting it done in 2020 is a little bit of poetic justice.”

Written by Christopher Brown, Capital News Service.

Opinion: We Have A Blue Virginia. What Will We Do With It?

Marilyn Drew Necci | November 7, 2019

Topics: danica roem, Election 2019, Equality Virginia, General Assembly, Ghazala Hashmi, James Parrish, Karl Frisch, LGBTQ rights, Michael Berlucchi, Ralph Northam, Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates, Virginia Legislative Black Caucus

GayRVA Editor-In-Chief Marilyn Drew Necci has an extensive wish list for our new Democratic General Assembly, one that starts with LGBTQ civil rights and goes a lot farther from there.

Well, it’s finally happened — no matter how your mom or your Trump-loving former high school classmates feel about it, Virginia has become a blue state. Our governor is a Democrat, our Congressional representatives are mostly Democrats, and on Tuesday, we voted to give Democrats control of both houses of the Virginia General Assembly. This might change at some point in the future, but at least for the next two years, Democrats are in the driver’s seat when it comes to making the laws in Virginia.

Tuesday brought us all sorts of progressive election results. All five of Virginia’s LGBTQ representatives in the General Assembly were re-elected, which makes Danica Roem, as of two years ago the first transgender person elected to statewide office, now the first transgender person to be RE-elected to statewide office. Her fellow Delegate Dawn Adams also became the first lesbian to be re-elected in the General Assembly.

Farther down the ballot, openly LGBTQ candidate Karl Frisch won a seat on the Fairfax County School Board, defeating an opponent who used anti-LGBTQ rhetoric throughout the campaigning process. In Virginia Beach, former Hampton Roads Pride President Michael Berlucchi was elected to the vacant City Council seat he’d previously been appointed to last May.

Meanwhile, in the West End, Ghazala Hashmi defeated Glen Sturtevant and his “Save Our Neighborhood Schools” campaign to become the first Muslim woman to serve on Virginia’s state Senate. Hashmi is one of two new female state Senators, who along with four new female Delegates pushes the total of female General Assembly members to 41 out of 140 — the highest it’s ever been.

In the House Of Delegates, four new African American delegates, only one of whom is succeeding a previous African American representative, swelled the membership of the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus to 23. Of the four Democrats who have already announced their candidacy for the next session’s Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates, only one is a white man, while two are black and two are women. Since the position has only ever been held by white men, there will likely be more history made when the coming session’s Speaker of the House is sworn in.

It’s easy to get bogged down in the horse race when discussing elections like these, especially when they go your way. But of course, getting representation is only half the battle. What must come next is major progress on a variety of issues that affect LGBTQ Virginians and other underrepresented minorities in our state.

For years, Equality Virginia has been pushing the General Assembly to pass a variety of much-needed LGBTQ civil rights bills, and the Republican leadership in the House Of Delegates has consistently stood in the way. Here’s a list of reforms attempted in past years, some of which passed in the Senate, none of which were ever allowed to reach a floor vote in the House Of Delegates:

Adding sexual orientation and gender identity to the list of protected classes covered by hate crime laws
Prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity in employment (currently public employees enjoy this protection, but employees of private businesses do not)
Prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity in housing
Modernization of the process through which transgender people can change the gender markers on legal documents including birth certificates
Prohibiting health care companies from withholding trans-related health care from their transgender clients
Removing the Marshall-Newman amendment to the Virginia State Constitution, added in 2006, that defines marriage within Virginia as solely between one man and one woman (this may not seem important now, but with Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court, one legal decision on SCOTUS’ part could easily make it all too relevant again)

Two years ago, I wrote an admittedly fiery editorial in which I blamed the entire situation on gerrymandering that prevented the will of a majority of Virginians from being reflected in our state’s legislature. I was angry at the time, but based on what’s happened in the two years since that editorial, it seems I was also right — court decisions over the course of 2018 and 2019 paved the way for a redrawn district map that commentators widely agree was crucial in bringing Democrats back to legislative power.

Now that the changes have been made and the votes have been counted, it’s time for our legislature to bring more good news to Virginia’s LGBTQ community. As Equality Virginia’s Executive Director, James Parrish, stated in response to the Democrats’ electoral victory, “Virginia’s voters were loud and clear and elected a pro-equality majority in the House and Senate. We look forward to working with the 2020 General Assembly to pass nondiscrimination protections for LGBT Virginians in employment, housing, and public spaces like stores or restaurants.” In that sentiment, Parrish speaks for us here at GayRVA as well.

Newly re-elected Delegate Danica Roem, for one, stands ready to make sure that these protections come to Virginia at long last. “We have a mandate from the people to pass nondiscrimination (bills) that are comprehensive and inclusive of all our LGBTQ constituents,” Roem told the Washington Blade. “We will be getting that done.”

But there are a good many more progressive issues that we’d all like to see taken up by our new Democratic legislative majority. Governor Northam brought up several of them in a post-election cabinet meeting on Wednesday. He began with guns, a hot-button topic that has had particular relevance in Virginia over the past year due to the Virginia Beach municipal building shooting and the still-lingering fallout of Unite The Right in Charlottesville. The Republican-controlled General Assembly closed a special session called for by Northam this summer to focus on gun legislation after 90 minutes, infuriating many Virginians who want to see action taken on the issue of gun violence.

During the cabinet meeting yesterday, Northam listed a number of legislative items he’d like to see passed in the General Assembly this year. Among them were universal background checks for gun buyers, reinstating the one-handgun-a-month rule, requiring reporting of lost or stolen guns within 24 hours of their disappearance, and a ban on weapons with high-capacity magazines and bump stocks. “They’re pieces of legislation that will save lives, they’re also pieces of legislation that Virginians agree with,” Northam said, according to the Virginia Mercury. “We’ll at least start with those.”

Northam also said that he wanted to give local governments the chance to decide what to do with their Confederate monuments, an issue with relevance in Richmond (the statues on Monument Avenue are currently under state control) as well as Charlottesville and Norfolk. Northam also stated that he wants to increase Virginia’s minimum wage, and work to decriminalize marijuana.

Here at GayRVA (and RVA Magazine), we’d love to see all of those things happen. Indeed, to truly fulfill the promise our newly Democratic state legislature brings to us, these things need to happen. For Virginia’s LGBTQ population and for many other marginalized communities, they will make a significant difference to our quality of life here in the Commonwealth. Let’s get it done.

Top Photo via VCU-CNS