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Legal MO, the initiative that would legalize marijuana for personal use for those 21 years old or older and allow individuals convicted of non-violent marijuana-related offenses to petition to be released from incarceration and/or have their records expunged will be on the ballot in November. What does this mean?

Recent research shows that Black people are 2.6 times more likely than whites to be arrested for marijuana possession in Missouri. And marijuana possession arrests during that same time period accounted for 50 percent of all drug arrests in Missouri, placing the state just outside the nation’s Top 10 for the highest cannabis possession arrest rates.

To help illustrate the issue further, NCJWSTL is teaming up with JCRC to welcome John Payne, Campaign Manager of Legal MO and Sharon Geuea Jones, the founding member of the Jones Advocacy Group. Payne graduated with a degree in history from Washington University in Saint Louis in 2005. In 2018, he managed the successful campaign to legalize medical marijuana in Missouri. As an attorney and lobbyist, Geuea Jones has advocated on behalf of her clients in the Missouri General Assembly, at the ballot box and in the courts since 2002. In conjunction with the Missouri NAACP and the Missouri Educational Equity Partnership, she is leading the "Let Them Learn" coalition in Jefferson City.