Governor Phil Murphy signed bills establishing a limited medical magic mushroom or psilocybin study and the anti-underground, NJ Cannabis Regulatory Commission (CRC) bills into law before leaving office.
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The bills, along with others, were rammed through the legislature during the lame duck session. It was done before the new session of the legislature began under the 57th Governor of New Jersey, Mikie Sherrill.
Limited Hospital Medical Mushroom Study
Murphy signed a bill making limited progress towards legal medical magic mushrooms or psilocybin that Heady NJ has been following.
His office announced that “SCS for S-2283/ACS for A-3852 (Scutari, Vitale/Calabrese, Verrelli) – Establishes Psilocybin Behavioral Health Access and Therapy Pilot Program; appropriates $6 million,” was signed into law hours very shortly before Sherrill took office.
The law does not legalize underground shrooms, which are great for treating trauma. It also does not set up a market or create job opportunities that the bill initially seemed to promise.
The bill wants the federal Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to approve a large corporation’s fake or synthetic version of psilocybin so that a limited study of patients can be done by ambitious hospitals.
The shroom patient and business advocates who testified were all very critical of the drastic transformation of the bill during the shady process.
But technically, it still counts as progress to celebrate. Plus, it sets a Psilocybin board under the Department of Health to recommend future progress.
Noted advocate Mike Brennan of the Coalition for Medical Marijuana of NJ (CMMNJ) wrote an op-ed Heady NJ published critical of the bill.
NJ Senate President Nick Scutari (D-22-Union) led the efforts to make underground shroom possession a mere misdemeanor and not a felony during the cannabis legalization implementation debate of 2020-2021.
This led many underground operators to begin providing quality natural psilocybin to their customers.
Anti-Legacy, CRC Reform Bill Signed into Law
According to a release, “S-4847/A-6267 (Scutari/Atkins) – Makes various changes to membership on Cannabis Regulatory Commission (CRC) and to legalized medical and personal use cannabis marketplace” was also signed into law shortly before into law before Mikie Sherrill became Governor.
Thus, the anti-underground legacy bill and CRC reform bill, which Heady NJ previously detailed was also rammed through during the lame duck session.
While it does want the State Police to go after underground legacy operators, it leaves the details vague.
NJ Cannabis Progress Under Murphy
The NJ cannabis market would not be what it is had Murphy not won in 2017 and 2021.
The NJ medical cannabis legalization law CUMMA was signed into law on the last day of former Governor Jon Corzine’s one term in 2010. He was succeeded by the shady Chris Christie (R). He said many times he hated weed. So, Christie established a terrible medical cannabis market.
Now there are more than 260 legal NJ cannabis dispensaries open. In addition many cultivators are making the price of legal cannabis increasingly competitive.
The NJ Cannabis Regulatory Commission (CRC) was established in spring 2021 shortly after the legalization law was signed into law. To Heady NJ, it seemed they were not given many staff or much of a budget initially. There were also about 1800 applications for conditional licenses.
But Murphy empowered NJ-CRC Chair Dianna Houenou to guide the market to the blossoming state it has reached over time.
Issues and Solutions
Unfortunately, the social justice experiment of conditional licenses failed. It became apparent that money and town approval were issues the CRC could not address.
Sadly, Heady NJ saw annual license applicants open quicker, which was not supposed to happen.
Cynical cannabis professionals and policy experts were right. Only about 20 to 30 percent of conditional license winners would open.
A lot of them had problems with town approval. But a law to legalize weed was not going to change the immense power towns have in Jersey.
The Economic Development Authority (EDA) under Murphy should get an A for effort for trying to blaze a trail and help entrepreneurs.
Although there are many smaller and very large MSOs in the NJ cannabis market, local serial entrepreneurs, including women and minorities, have opened as well.
While some goals have not been met, other goals have been wildly successful. For example, older state legal cannabis markets don’t have any legal consumption lounges. Jersey has 2 in AC and one near Philly so far.
But Murphy has prioritized other economic policies like hustling Hollywood far more than legal cannabis. He has not mentioned it once during his last few months in office.
Nonetheless, great progress has been made under Murphy. Thus, Heady NJ is grateful and wishes him well.
