Marijuana impairs a driver’s reaction time, decision-making ability, capacity to accurately track objects, balance and equilibrium. Still, it is difficult to measure when a person is impaired. The intoxicating ingredient in cannabis, tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), is metabolized differently by individuals and remains in the body long after its psychoactive effects have ceased. Currently, there is no way to reliably measure whether a person who has ingested cannabis an hour earlier is impaired because THC concentration does not correlate well with subjective impairment.

The Pennsylvania Department of Health (DOH) reported that almost $100 million in medical marijuana sales occurred between February 15, 2018, and February 15, 2019, the first full year that medical cannabis was available to Pennsylvania patients. More than $40 million in sales occurred between growers and dispensaries. Pennsylvania does not tax sales to patients, but does tax transactions between growers and dispensaries at a rate of 5%. Thus, in the first year of licensed sales, the Commonwealth received approximately $2 million in tax revenue from medical cannabis.

The 2018 U.S. Farm Bill has opened the gates to industrial hemp farming. Hemp, a crop that has been banned in the United States since 1937, now may be legally grown. While the most popular product of hemp − oils containing cannabidiol (CBD) and other naturally occurring non-psychoactive cannabinoids − are still subject to conflicting federal and state regulations, the plant itself may be grown across the United States.

The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania wants medical researchers to study cannabis at Pennsylvania medical schools, eight of which have been certified as Academic Clinical Research Centers (ACRCs). ACRCs can contract with Clinical Registrants (CRs), entities that the Commonwealth will license to cultivate, package and dispense cannabis for medical research. An entire set of regulations, commonly referred to as “Chapter 20,” has been drafted, redrafted and amended to make medical research of cannabis a reality in the Commonwealth.

On December 18, 2018, the Pennsylvania Department of Health (DOH) issued 23 cannabis dispensary permits (Phase II licenses). Fifty entities have been awarded dispensary licenses, which is the total number allowed under Pennsylvania’s Medical Marijuana Act. Each licensee can operate up to three dispensaries, bringing the total number of possible dispensaries in Pennsylvania to 150.

As the legal status of cannabis evolves, state legislatures are confronted with a difficult moral issue – how should local and state governments treat persons convicted of offenses that are no longer illegal? Below is a discussion of some of the options.