By Benjie Cooper
IG: @nuglifenews
YouTube: Lucid’s Vlog
As legal cannabis continues to make its way into an increasing number of states every year in medicinal and recreational forms, the issue of marijuana and job security is one that some are attempting to address.
Cannabis is legal in Massachusetts and recreational sales began in November, but employees in the state can still be fired from their job for using marijuana as the law currently provides them no protections.
Senator Jason Lewis [D-Middlesex] plans to introduce legislation in January to solve the issue and prevent employers from terminating workers who choose to use cannabis legally on their own time.
“This is not intended to be a blanket protection for people to use cannabis whenever and wherever they like,” Lewis told the Boston Globe. “But as long as they’re not impaired and it’s not impacting their work, employers should not be able to discriminate against them in hiring or promotion, and companies certainly should not be terminating people simply because they use marijuana on their own time.”
Lewis was inspired to write the bill after learning of Bernadette Coughlin, an occasional cannabis user from Methuen who had been fired from her administrative job with Sodexo for testing positive for THC after she fell and injured herself at work.
Coughlin, who is still unemployed and maintains that she was never impaired at work, intends to testify at the State House next year in support of Lewis’ bill.
