ALABAMA – It could be a few weeks before the Alabama House of Representatives takes up two of the most ambitious and controversial pieces of legislation in the 2021 regular session.
House Speaker Mac McCutcheon, R-Monrovia, said recently bills authorizing medical marijuana and establishing a lottery and gambling won’t come up for a vote in the chamber for a few weeks. The medical marijuana bill may not go to the floor until the last week of the session, expected in mid-May.
“I think members are still educating themselves and they are still reading the bill,” McCutcheon said of the medical marijuana legislation. “I couldn’t stand up and say it would be an absolute pass, because there are still some no votes.”
As of Monday morning, neither bill had appeared on House committee agendas for the week.
The gambling bill got transmitted to the House late last week after passing the Senate on Tuesday evening, along with companion amendments on the regulation of casinos and distribution of proceeds. The legislation would establish a state lottery and six gambling establishments in the state.
McCutcheon said he wanted a floor vote before the session ends in mid-May. Rep. Chris Blacksher, R-Phenix City, who will handle the bill in the House, said Monday he expected to discuss the bill with representatives this week to gauge the mood of the House.
“I think this week’s going to be big,” he said.
The moves are not unexpected for two issues the chamber has viewed with skepticism. The House in the past has been uneasy about casino gambling, and lottery bills have faced difficulties. Representatives amended a lottery bill in a 2016 special session to make it paper-only, which killed the legislation in the Senate. In 2019, a lottery bill failed a procedural motion due to Republicans opposed to gambling and Democrats who wanted guarantees for the state’s dog tracks.
The medical marijuana bill, which passed the Senate in 2019 and 2020, blazed through the upper chamber in February with little debate or pushback. But the road in the lower chamber has been harsh. The House converted the 2019 bill into a study commission. The COVID outbreak prevented a vote on the legislation last year, but leaders have directed the medical marijuana bill, sponsored by Sen. Tim Melson, R-Florence, through two committees instead of the usual one.
The bill would authorize the use of medical marijuana for more than a dozen conditions, including cancer, HIV/AIDS, chronic pain, sickle-cell anemia, and depression. Special dispensaries would distribute cannabis as tablets, capsules, gelatins and vaporized oils. The law bans smoking or vaping cannabis, or putting it in baked goods. Patients would need a recommendation from a physician to obtain medical marijuana and would have to register as cannabis patients, purchasing a card costing no more than $65. The bill would also set up processes to license growers and distributors.
The legislation got through the House Judiciary and Health committees with several amendments that left the core of the bill in place.
Rep. Mike Ball, R-Madison, who will handle the bill in the House, said Monday he thought there was “a lot of support” in the chamber for the bill. But he was uneasy about delaying the vote, saying “the longer it waits, the easier it is for folks to kill it.
“If we wait until toward the end, maybe that will give more time for the truth to come out about what it is and what it isn’t,” Ball said. “This is medical, not recreational.”
McCutcheon said Thursday delaying the marijuana bill would give the chamber time to take up House bills as a deadline to send legislation to the other chamber approaches. The speaker also expects to take up the state’s two budgets by the end of the month.
“We’re looking at getting the budgets on the floor somewhere around the 27th of April,” he said. “And so we want to get those out of the way, and then we’ll address the marijuana after that.”
