The option to buy marijuana is coming to a store near you soon. But do not get your hopes up, marijuana has not been legalized in Louisiana. Only medical marijuana, which means that all the residents who are currently incarcerated based on marijuana related charges, will have to stay there.

Meanwhile, residents of Natchitoches can buy their lab grown marijuana with a sense of safety. Can you support medical marijuana and the profit it brings into town while also not advocating against the thousands of marijuana charges incarcerating people across the state?

As you may have heard, a medical marijuana pharmacy is coming to the city of Natchitoches. This is the first of its kind in the city; previously, anyone with a medical marijuana prescription had to get it shipped or travel outside the city to purchase – usually to Alexandria or Shreveport. While the majority’s response to this announcement was good, there is a collection of people who are always against marijuana as a whole because of its label as a drug.

No matter how people feel about it, it’s coming to Natchitoches. This will give easier access to medical marijuana users, who use it for many reasons. Marijuana is known to help with chronic pain, and since it is a plant that is grown locally, it can be more enticing to people than prescription opioids, which can be addicting.

Marijuana is typically believed by people not to be addictive and does not have as many possible side effects, as compared to medical pain pills. In some instances, it can also be cheaper to have a medical marijuana prescription, some people can continue to work under the influence of marijuana but cannot after taking pain pills.

Southern University and A&M College and Louisiana State University are the only places with licenses in Louisiana that can grow medical marijuana. They have private partners who own the farms where the marijuana is grown. While I am unsure about the Southern’s agriculture center, I know that the LSU’s agriculture center receives payment for the work that they do.

Being able to own and grow marijuana medical farms creates jobs for these universities, and in turn creates profit. I am glad that it is being grown in the state, and I know that plans are being made to more than double the size of the medical marijuana fields to keep up with the demand that is coming in. The state of Louisiana is making profit from the sales of medical marijuana, yet we are still spending so much money to keep people in jail for marijuana charges.

In 2021, Gov. John Bel Edwards decriminalized the possession of marijuana under 14 grams, but this is only the first step. Previously, you had to wait at least five years to petition to expunge something off of your criminal record. However, Edwards signed a bill three months ago to allow people that got a charge for first possession of less than 14 grams of marijuana to petition to expunge their record after only 90 days.

Hopefully, the people that are excited to use their medical marijuana card at the new pharmacy when it opens are also willing to advocate for further bills supporting the expulsion of marijuana possession crimes on records. Of course, there will be some people who take advantage of the pharmacy, who still think people who recreationally use marijuana should be charged.

Gentrification is spreading everywhere, and the Natchitoches police will most likely still be arresting people for possession of recreational marijuana while others are driving around with their fresh bag of medical marijuana from the pharmacy.