While the sponsors of legislation creating a retail marijuana market in Virginia say they disagree with Gov. Abigail Spanberger’s recommended changes, the road to persuade colleagues to reject them could be tricky due to provisions spelled out in the Virginia Constitution.
When lawmakers reconvene April 22 to go over Spanberger’s vetoes and recommended changes, the changes to House Bill 642 and Senate Bill 542 are coming to them not as individual amendments. It’s structured as an “Amendment in the Nature of a Substitute.” If proposed changes are extensive enough to touch most sections of proposed legislation, the bill is redrawn as a “substitute.”
A substitute is generally easier to read than a list of amendments and requires only one vote for or against rather than individual votes.
According to Article 5, Section 6 of the Virginia Constitution, there are two requirements for voting on a governor’s substitute.
If the recommendation is to approve the substitute, then only a simple majority is needed in either chamber – 21 in the Senate and 51 in the House of Delegates. But if the recommendation is to reject the substitute, then the vote margin jumps to a two-thirds majority, which would be 27 in the Senate and 67 in the House and is similar to overriding a veto.
Anything less than a two-thirds majority will kill the measure outright for the year. That means if the Senate gets the required votes to reject the substitute but the House vote falls short, the measure is still dead.
On the other side of the coin, the constitution does not give a governor a second opportunity to amend or even veto the rejection. Thus, a successful legislative rejection automatically becomes law.
Sen. Lashrecse Aird, D-Henrico County and the sponsor of the Senate version of the bill, told The Progress-Index she has yet to “determine the pathway forward” on recommending what her colleagues do with Spanberger’s substitute.
“I am exploring all available legislative options at this time,” she said.
However, she and Del. Paul Krizek of Fairfax County, who championed the House version of the bill, were less than complimentary about what Spanberger recommended.
In a nutshell, Spanberger’s suggestions would roll back the start of the retail market from Jan. 1, 2027 to July 1, 2027, restrict the number of stores allowed to sell marijuana from 350 in the original legislation to 200 before January 2029, drop the per-transaction size from 2.5 to 2 ounces, and maintain a 6% cannabis state sales tax that would jump to 8% in 2029. It also calls for local governments to have authority to impose 1-3.5% taxes – all in addition to existing retail sales and use taxes.
“We are working to set up a marketplace that is controlled, regulated, and responsible because legal markets only succeed when there are clear guardrails and enforcement to back it up,” Spanberger said in announcing the amendments.
“To keep our next generation safe, we must also ensure real consequences for vape shops that have spent years targeting Virginia’s kids. We need to rein in these shady businesses and make sure a legal marijuana market does not make the problem worse.”
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Neither sponsor saw it that way.
“The governor’s substitute represents a significant departure from the framework passed by the General Assembly, raising serious concerns about fairness, access and public safety,” Aird said in a combined statement she released with Krizek. “By making the legal market harder to access, this proposal allows the illicit market to continue to thrive in every corner store in our commonwealth. That undermines the core goals of legalization and increases the likelihood of untested products, inconsistent potency, and lacks consumer protections.
She said the substitute “also weakens safeguards designed to prevent youth access and ensure accountability ultimately posing a risk to public health and safety.”
Krizek said Spanberger’s recommendation “creates a less accessible legal marketplace.
“These changes reduce the number of available licenses, delay the launch of retail sales and impose high barriers to entry, resulting in revenue losses, delayed economic opportunity for market participants and the elimination of investment to small businesses. These barriers do not eliminate demand; it simply redirects it back to the illicit market,” Krizek said.
“Virginians have not been waiting since 2021 for a legal retail marketplace that will expand criminal penalties, introduce new felony tiers for cannabis-related offenses and expose individuals to lifelong prison sentences while Virginia is actively correcting these wrongs from the past,” he added.
Krizek and Aird are chair and vice chair, respectively of the Joint Commission to Oversee the Transition of the Commonwealth into a Cannabis Retail Market, a panel charged with overseeing the rollout of the retail market and the work of the Virginia Cannabis Control Authority.
In a separate action but related to the topic of marijuana, Spanberger also recommended several amendments to Aird’s Senate Bill 543.
SB 543 addresses enforcement of Virginia’si regulation of cannabis and hemp, and is geared toward the illicit and gray markets rather than at expanding legal marijuana sales. It strengthens state authority to crack down on illegal marijuana and high‑THC hemp products and to help consumers distinguish legitimate, licensed businesses from illegal operators through state-required labels.
In her recommendations, Spanberger asked for language to clarify enforcement, refine the penalty structure, establish a grace period for first-time violators of the label requirement, and aligns the enforcement with regulations in the Virginia Consumer Protection Act.
Aird said she has not yet reviewed Spanberger’s amendments.
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Bill Atkinson (he/him/his) has won numerous awards during his 40-year journalism career. A Petersburg native, Bill is a 1984 graduate of Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond with a degree in mass communications. He specializes in coverage of breaking news, crime, government, and local/state/national politics. He is an avid history buff and a lifelong Washington Commanders fan. Reach him at batkinson@progress-index.com with news tips and story suggestions.