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HB 19-1090

House Bill 19-1090, or HB 19-1090 is regarding publicly licensed marijuana companies. This bill, introduced to the House in January of 2019, was signed into law in May of the same year. Essentially what this bill does is improve investment flexibility in marijuana related businesses (CO General Assembly, 2019). Prior to this bill, ownership in a marijuana based company was limited to only private companies with fifteen or less owners (Rodriguez et al. 2019).  Owners of these companies were also required to pass background checks enforced by the Colorado Marijuana Enforcement Division (Rodriguez et al. 2019). What this bill does is repeals multiple provisions such as requiring investors to go through a background check, prohibiting publicly traded corporations from having a marijuana license, and limits on the amount of out of state direct beneficial owners to 15 people, to name a few. 
This bill went through quite the process in the Colorado General Assembly in order to become a law. While it only took about four months to become a law from its original introduction, it was engrossed and reengrossed before being revised twice and finally being signed in May of 2019. While researching this bill, it was interesting to me to see how the different committees work and pass bills down the line to refine a bill into a law. Something that surprised me was that there were a good amount of Republicans in support of this bill. This may be because of the economic impact this bill could have, but Republicans don’t usually vote in favor of marijuana related legislation. In my opinion, this bill was passed as easily as it was due to democrats having “trifecta” control over the House, Senate and Governor. Due to their “insecure majorities” in congress, they are able to pass legislation like this that they might not normally be able to (Adler et al. page 245). This bill was moved through the “stages of floor consideration” very quickly because of this “insecure majority” in Colorado (Adler et al. page 246). 
The passing of this bill is good for multiple different reasons. Chart 2 shows the increase in a variety of different marijuana business licenses, while Chart 3 shows the increase in total marijuana occupational licenses over the course of the last few years. While these figures have been growing every year, the passing of HB 19-1090 creates more opportunity for investment from out of state entities, which will not only improve Colorado's marijuana industry, but shine light on the legitimacy and money in the marijuana industry as a whole. As many know, Colorado uses tax revenue from marijuana sales for a variety of positive causes such as improving education systems, and helping the homeless. This improved investment into marijuana companies allows them to grow and, in turn, generate more money for these programs.
The passing of this bill will drastically change the marijuana industry not only in Colorado but the entire United States, because of increased out of state investment into the industry (Rodriguez et al. 2019). In my opinion, this increased support for investment in the marijuana industry could lead to more states accepting marijuana as a legitimate industry. 


Work Cited
“Publicly Licensed Marijuana Companies.” Publicly Licensed Marijuana Companies | Colorado General Assembly, 27 Apr. 2019, leg.colorado.gov/bills/hb19-1090.
Rodriguez, Nabil A, and Stuart Knight. “What Happened on Nov. 1 with Colorado House Bill 1090 and New Marijuana Enforcement Rules?” Bizjournals.com, 5 Nov. 2019, www.bizjournals.com/denver/news/2019/11/05/what-happened-on-nov-1-with-colorado-house-bill.html. 
Adler, E. Scott, Jeffrey A. Jenkins, and Charles R. Shipan. 2019. The United States Congress. New York: Norton. ISBN 978-0-393-68019-5.


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