MINNEAPOLIS — He won't be there in person to cast a vote, but departing House Majority Leader Ryan Winkler predicts 2023 will be the year Minnesota joins 21 other states in legalizing recreational marijuana.
In an opinion piece in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, the Golden Valley Democrat said the legislature has a big head start on crafting legislation to legalize and regulate the drug. He points out Minnesotans elected pro-cannabis DFL majorities in the House and Senate and re-elected a Democratic governor who has supported legalization.
Rep. Winkler told KARE his op-ed piece was meant to highlight the efforts Democrats had already undertaken across several years to lay the groundwork for legalization.
"I wanted to remind everybody that we've gone through a long process of stakeholder involvement, public involvement, getting a real broad sense of what Minnesotans are looking for, for cannabis legalization," Winkler explained.
"This is not just something the new legislature's going to throw together quickly. This is the result of a lot of work."
At the 2019 Minnesota State Fair, Winkler launched the "Be Heard on Cannabis" tour that eventually encompassed 15 public meetings in 15 cities across the state.
"We had public hearings at each and every one of those stops asking people to weigh in. We talked to skeptics, wanted to hear their concerns, mental health people, chemical dependency people, law enforcement."
It became clear Minnesotans didn't want to see a marijuana industry controlled by national players with profits leaving the state.
"Minnesotans overwhelmingly want this to be the kind of craft business for small business that helps Minnesota communities and small businesses. People want us to address the racial equity issues that have been involved in cannabis prohibition."
In May of 2021 House Democrats passed Winkler's legalization bill. It was more a matter of making a statement because they knew it wouldn't receive serious consideration in the GOP-controlled Minnesota Senate.
Winkler chose not to seek re-election to the House so that he could make what turned out to be an unsuccessful run for the office of Hennepin County Attorney.
Winkler, a corporate lawyer, said he won't work as a paid lobbyist on any marijuana bill. But he would like to see his work come to fruition in the form of strong statewide game rules for the legal cannabis industry.
"The vast majority of the US population is living in states with legal cannabis now. It is effectively legalized in most of the US and Minnesota needs to create a system of regulations that will deal with that."
Legalization efforts will face a stiff challenge from a coalition of statewide groups who've joined forces under the banner of Minnesotans Against Marijuana Legalization.
Members include law enforcement and public safety organizations, the Minnesota Catholic Conference, Minnesota Trucking Association, Minnesota Insurance Federation and other groups that have raised red flags about the hazards of drug use and marijuana-impaired drivers.
"We’ve talked to them a lot and tried to understand what the concerns are and how we can accommodate them, but this old system of using criminal law to penalize people for selling or using cannabis is just not viable anymore," Winkler said.
He asserted that legalized marijuana shouldn't be viewed as a revenue source for the state because overtaxing it would raise prices and drive customers back into the black market. At the same time, however, it would need to raise enough revenue to pay for the cost of setting up and operating the market and taking care of the negative results of increased use.
"We just want cannabis to pay for itself. We want to beef up drug recognition expert training for law enforcement. We want to add additional funds for mental health, add additional funds for chemical dependency."