Thumbs up to Minnesota lawmakers looking to tweak parts of the law legalizing cannabis.
Legalizing the sale, purchase, possession and recreational use of marijuana was a major change and with any new law that big there are bound to be issues that pop up and need addressing.
The changes legislators are looking at range from limiting the number of retail dispensaries in the state to allowing medical cannabis patients to grow twice as many marijuana plants as other adults.
One area of change is the social equity portion of the law. Most people who want to start a cannabis business won’t be able to get a license until early next year. But social equity applicants — people who were harmed directly or indirectly by previous criminal enforcement of marijuana laws — could get a temporary business license as early as this summer.
State regulators are also asking lawmakers to limit the number of retailers and grower licenses in the first two years so that regulators don’t get overwhelmed and have time to evaluate market demand.
Another proposal would let patients enrolled in the state’s medical cannabis program to grow up to 16 plants at their private residence, rather than the maximum of eight plants allowed for other adults.
The proposed changes seem well thought out.
The gift of time
Thumbs up to Mankato area volunteers who have once again proven the generosity of this community.
A report in The Free Press Thursday showed that while volunteers were hard to come by one year ago, nonprofits now appear to have all the volunteers they need.
Volunteers are bringing meals to the homeless, they’re helping build Habitat for Humanity houses, they’re packing food backpacks for kids who are in need, and they’re comforting and visiting the elderly and isolated and driving them to medical appointments.
Volunteers are mowing lawns, shoveling snow and delivering meals on wheels.
Time is a commodity of limited value for all of us, and you only have so much of it. So the volunteers’ gift of time is even more remarkable.
The bridge disaster
Thumbs down — obviously — to the Baltimore bridge disaster.
Unlike other notable bridge collapses in the recent past — such as the I-35W bridge in Minneapolis in 2007 — this calamity cannot be blamed on design flaws or deferred maintenance.
No bridge is ever going to be built with the intent of making it invulnerable to the massive weight of a container ship. The Dali weighs 95,000 tons empty, and when it drifted into the support column of the Francis Scott Key bridge had some 4,700 containers on board.
There is, and should be, a sense of urgency to resolve this situation, with the first priority being to clear the shipping channel and, in the process, recover the remains of four members of a pothole-filling crew that was caught on the bridge at the moment of impact.
Giant cranes are being positioned this weekend to remove the rubble of the 1.4-mile bridge.
The debris must be removed not only to recover the remains of the unfortunate workers, but to reopen the Port of Baltimore, a key nexus for trade in automobiles, coal and other products.
While that work goes on, the process of replacing the bridge should be equally expedited. The 35W bridge was replaced in less than two years, but the Key Bridge is a much longer span, and some estimates suggest that it may take as long as five years and $400 million to rebuild it.
President Joe Biden says the federal government will bear the expense. Congress, obviously, will have to agree, and these days that is hardly a certainty. We can’t make this good; we can make it less bad.
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