CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Marijuana has now been legalized in some form, either recreational or medicinal, in 30 states and the District of Columbia.
Similar laws are being proposed in several other states.
The lame-duck session is officially underway in Raleigh. While most of the time will be spent talking about voter identification and Hurricane Florence money, Charlotte representative Kelly Alexander wants a conversation about cannabis.
Alexander is currently working on a bill that would have a local option approach to medical marijuana. The proposed legalization would be just like the legal option with alcohol -- counties that want it can opt in, those that don't can keep things the same.
A recent poll out of Elon University found North Carolinians overwhelmingly support legalizing medical marijuana. So far, the congressman says he hasn't had any pushback on the proposal.
Alexander would like to tax the marijuana at 12 percent, with half of the money going to the state and half of the money going to the community that legalized it.
He says the community could stand to make hundreds of millions of dollars.
"Every year that we defer, that we don't make a change, that's a year that we lose out on tourism, we lose out on being on the ground floor of developing an industry," Alexander said.
According to Alexander, he is going to float the bill to fellow lawmakers over the next two weeks with a goal of bringing something concrete to the floor when the slightly less conservative body convenes in January.
