“You don’t wish to penalize people who find themselves legitimately taking medical marijuana who aren’t impaired.”
By Victor Skinner, The Heart Sq.
A Louisiana legislative process pressure held a number of conferences on Tuesday to discover and craft suggestions to resolve employment points regarding medical marijuana.
Three subcommittees of the Employment and Medical Marijuana Activity Power convened to debate quite a lot of employment points involving medical marijuana, from employment protections in different states to present testing choices, to particular considerations for “security delicate” jobs like firefighters and first responders.
Members of the duty pressure outlined laws adopted in New Jersey, Indiana, Connecticut, Alabama and different states lately to guard staff from discrimination for medical marijuana use, in addition to provisions to guard employers.
Kevin Caldwell, process pressure member representing the Marijuana Coverage Challenge, famous that Alabama acknowledges medical marijuana as medication, however doesn’t prohibit employers from drug testing, whereas Arkansas protections “don’t require employers to accommodate ingestion in a office or an worker working below the affect.”
“Our neighbors to the north are simply ensuring staff are usually not coming in below the affect, and so they’re not ingesting or utilizing their medication whereas they’re at work,” he stated. “I believe that’s language we should always most actually be in suggestions.”
Caldwell additionally highlighted laws adopted in California this 12 months that takes impact in 2024 that “does embody staff in constructing and development trades and situations the place federal contracts, licenses or funding require in any other case, and positions requiring a federal background clearance.”
“I believe this language is essential, as effectively. I believe it will shield plenty of the industries which have considerations about this, significantly the oil and gasoline trade,” he stated. “You’re going to have federal codes that supersede what the state does.”
Legal guidelines within the District of Columbia additionally particularly cite exceptions from medical marijuana protections for staff impaired on the job, or in the event that they work in a security delicate place, Caldwell famous.
“I believe these are just a few fundamental examples of the place we will successfully go within the quick time period, after which presumably look down the street for additional protections,” he stated, including that any change to marijuana scheduling on the federal stage may change what’s essential.
Activity pressure member Troy Prevot, a doctor assistant concerned in employment drug testing, highlighted how testing for impairment will issue into any suggestions, and famous there’s quite a few efforts to develop expertise to do this.
“We’ve to one way or the other…take care of impairment,” he stated. “You don’t wish to penalize people who find themselves legitimately taking medical marijuana who aren’t impaired.”
One other side is defining security delicate positions that could be exempted from protections, he stated.
“There’s plenty of dialogue about what which means,” he stated. “It’s a reasonably broad definition.”
Caldwell famous that the duty pressure will hear from first responders, firefighters and others in doubtlessly security delicate positions who wish to use medical marijuana within the coming weeks.
Activity pressure member and staff compensation legal professional Denis Juge urged requiring staff to inform employers about medical marijuana use, each for security and to guard employer rights.
“I’m involved that any regulation that allows a employee to have marijuana, what influence that will have on the protection of intoxication,” he stated. “I believe on the very least, the employer can be entitled to have discover from the worker that they’re taking medical marijuana, in order that absent that discover the employer would be capable of elevate the protection of intoxication.”
Peter Robins-Brown, process pressure member with Louisiana Progress, questioned whether or not the discover could possibly be used to discriminate towards staff, and whether or not the problem must be expanded to opioid customers.
“I believe that’s one thing that must be thought-about as a result of proper now we don’t have that,” Juge stated.
Different discussions centered on accounting for large worker shortages in a number of industries, and the way any suggestions may make the hiring challenges worse, significantly for firefighters and first responders.
The meetings Tuesday are the newest in a collection main as much as the 2023 legislative session spawned by a decision authored by Rep. Mandie Landry, D-New Orleans. The decision requires the duty pressure to ahead suggestions to lawmakers by February 1. The following session begins on April 10.