On Tuesday, Illinois became the 11th American state to legalize certain amounts of cannabis for recreational use, when first-term Democratic Governor J.B. Pritzker fulfilled a key campaign promise by signing a new law to allow allow licensed growth, sales, possession and personal use of cannabis, commonly known as marijuana, by adults who are least 21 years old, according to a report by The Chicago Tribune.
“Illinoisans have had enough. The time for change has long since passed,” Pritzker said at the signing ceremony for the bill on Tuesday morning. “This legalization of adult use cannabis brings an important and overdue change to our state, and it’s the right thing to do.”
But though Illinois follows 10 other states—Alaska, California, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, Oregon, Vermont and Washington—plus the District of Columbia in legalizing recreational pot, the Illinois law may be a landmark for the other measures it includes, according to a report by WBNS TV.
The Illinois law also wipes away convictions for possession or purchase of up to 30 grams of pot, expunging them from the criminal records of nearly 800,000 people in the country’s sixth most heavily populated state, allowing many of them a fresh start with clean criminal records. Illinois is the second most populous state to legalize recreational cannabis, ranking behind only California.
But the new law goes further still, requiring that portions of the hefty taxes levied on legal pot sales must be reinvested in the state’s most economically impoverished communities, according to the WBNS report. At the same time, preference in awarding cannabis vendor license will be given, under the new law, to applicants from low-income communities, and areas with previously high rates of pot convictions.
The measures are designed to address what statistics show has been the disproportionate impact of the marijuana-law enforcement on low-income and minority communities.
Though white and black Americans use marijuana at approximately the same rate, black users are almost four times more likely than whites to be arrested for pot-related offenses, according to ACLU statistics. Between 2001 and 2010, 88 percent of all cannabis arrests were on simple possession charges—not for selling, producing or distributing pot. Of all drug arrests in 2010, more than half, 52 percent, were marijuana arrests.
But the new law is not all good news for pot enthusiasts. Though Illinois residents may now legally purchase up to 30 grams—about one ounce—of cannabis from licensed vendors, and non-residents may purchase 15 grams, legal pot in Illinois will be taxed at rates up to 34.75 percent, depending on the potency of the cannabis product purchased, according to USA Today.
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