Trend: Marijuana Laws in Georgia
In the United States, marijuana possession is entirely legal in 11 states and medically legal in 33 states. The state of Georgia is not either of these cases, but is starting to make changes with the Hemp Farming Act.
In April, 2019 the Georgia General Assembly passed the Georgia Hemp Farming Act (House Bill 213) which was then signed into law on May 10th by Gov. Brian Kemp. The Act allows licensed Georgia farmers to grow hemp, a strain of the Cannabis plant, which can provide medical oil.
Counties across the state of Georgia are seeing the effects of the Georgia Hemp Farming Act on their police departments. The counties, in turn, are halting the prosecution of marijuana cases.
The reason for the cease in prosecutions is the inability to test for tetrahydrocannabinol, or “THC” levels. Police can test for the presence of THC but cannot determine how much of it is in a person’s system, or whether the THC is from marijuana or the legalized hemp plant.
Athens-Clarke County, Georgia is one of the counties who has changed the way they react to marijuana cases.
Capt. Adam Fouche of the University of Georgia Police Department said, “We have paused our arrest of misdemeanor marijuana cases while we await further guidance from the state on the availability of testing procedures to sufficiently distinguish marijuana from hemp.”
Along with Athens-Clarke County, Cobb County, Gwinnett County and Dekalb County have all adopted similar policies. Since 2016, 12 counties or cities in Georgia have passed laws reducing the penalty for possession of an ounce or less of marijuana.
In consequence, there has been fewer marijuana arrests in recent years. Over 28,000 people were arrested for marijuana possession in Georgia in 2010; however, despite a population increase of 600,000 people, in 2016 just 23,700 people were arrested for possessing marijuana.
Some Georgians believe that because of the new hemp law and counties’ recent policy changes, that the state is on the path to decriminalization and legalization.
Jared Shelton, a UGA junior from Rome, Georgia said, “This recent change in policy leads me to speculate that the legalization of marijuana in the state of Georgia is the direction we are heading in, slowly but surely.” Jared continued, ”Incarcerating an individual for possessing small amounts of a natural substance that is being legalized in many other states across the country to me is a waste of government resources and tax payer dollars.”
Lydia Aletraris received both her master’s degree in sociology and her doctorate in sociology from The University of Georgia.
A few years later while living in California, she accepted a research position in 2012 to study drugs and prescription medications.
Now, as a member of the UGA Sociology Department studying substance abuse, she has been granted approval for a nationwide research project into states reactions to cannabis legalization.
Although Georgia may be seemingly headed to legalization, Lydia Aletraris feels that there is still a long road ahead.
“No state has gone to legalization without a comprehensive medical law first, but in Georgia we have a weird medical law; it’s pretty useless,” said Aletraris. “People can possess cards that allow them to have medical marijuana but there is no legal way to obtain it, so I do not think we are going to see full blown legalization in Georgia until we have an extensive medical program that allows citizens to obtain medical cannabis legally.”
