On Wednesday June 30, the Maine Senate narrowly defeated a drug decriminalization bill with a vote of 14-18 despite compromise attempts. This bill, LD 967, would decriminalize the possession of all currently illicit drugs. This setback comes two weeks after the House approved the legislation.
As passed by the House, the measure would have made possession of controlled substances for personal use punishable with only a $100 fine and no threat of jail time. The court could waive the fine if a person completed a substance misuse assessment within 45 days of their citation. Since LD 967 didn’t pass, fines for possession of controlled substances remain high with threats of jail time present.
Amendment
The Senate adopted an amendment to limit the civil violation to a first and second offense. A second offense would be punishable by a maximum fine of $200, again with no threat of jail time. Along with the fine would be a referral to a substance misuse assessment. The third and following offenses would remain criminal violations. In spite of this compromise, the amendment did not conjure enough support for the bill to pass.
“This amendment decriminalizes addiction,” Senator Craig Hickman said on the floor. “And the people of Maine – and law enforcement officers on the ground in Maine – need us to pass this bill.”
Even if the proposal passed in the Senate, advocates expected the Governor to veto the bill. Neither Governor Janet Mills’ administration nor the state attorney general supported the bill.
“We need to change our drug laws if we want to save lives. LD 967 would have saved the state money and reinvested resources from the criminal system into access to recovery services,” Courtney Allen said. She is the current director at the Maine Recovery Advocacy Project. “People need treatment and support to enter sustained recovery, and not arrest and a criminal record.”
The Conflicting Recommendations
This defeat in the Senate comes weeks after they held a joint committee with the House. There, they advanced the decriminalization bill with multiple conflicting recommendations. Those in support of LD 967 include the American Academy of Pediatrics’s Maine Chapter, the Maine Medical Association, the Alliance for Addiction and Mental Health Services in Maine, and the Maine Council of Churches.
While advocates are disappointed state lawmakers couldn’t enact LD 967, numerous reform proposals are moving forward federally.
For the first time, two congressional women introduced a bill to decriminalize the possession of controlled substances last month federally. Also, in Maine, a bill to legalize psilocybin mushrooms for therapeutic purposes was introduced recently.
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