New York legalizes recreational marijuana

After years of stalled attempts, New York state has legalized the use of recreational marijuana, enacting a robust program that will reinvest millions of dollars of tax revenues from cannabis in minority communities ravaged by the decadeslong war on drugs.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed the cannabis legislation Wednesday, a day after the state Legislature passed the bill following hours of debate among lawmakers in Albany.

New York became the 15th state to legalize the recreational use of cannabis.

Democratic lawmakers, especially those who are nonwhite, insisted that a large portion of the money be earmarked for communities where Black and Latino people have been arrested on marijuana charges in disproportionate numbers.

Forty percent of the tax revenue from pot sales will be steered to those communities, and people convicted of marijuana-related offenses that are no longer criminalized will have their records automatically expunged.

The law also seeks to allow people with past convictions and those involved in the illicit cannabis market to participate in the new legal market.

“Unlike any other state in America, this legislation is intentional about equity,” Crystal PeoplesStokes, the Democratic majority leader in the Assembly who sponsored the bill, said on the floor of the lower chamber.

Certain parts of the law went into effect immediately.

Individuals are now allowed to possess up to 3 ounces of cannabis for recreational purposes or 24 grams of concentrated forms of the drug, such as oils.

New Yorkers are permitted to smoke cannabis in public wherever smoking tobacco is allowed, although localities and a new state agency could create regulations to more strictly control smoking cannabis in public.