Illinois residents are rejoicing because as of Jan. 1, recreational cannabis use will be legal in the state. People who live in Chicago public housing, however, aren’t able to celebrate quite as fully. Why not? As reported by The Chicago Sun-Times, the Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) sent notices to public housing residents reminding them that the agency can end public aid if anyone—including tenants, household members, and even guests—uses (or even possesses) cannabis for recreational or medical purposes on CHA property. While recreational use will be freshly legalized, medical cards have actually been recognized in Illinois since 2014.
Why is this happening to public housing residents? According to the CHA, because cannabis is still illegal under federal law, the agency must abide by federal law to receive federal money. But for people who actually live in public housing, this loophole feels like a deep injustice.
“Marijuana is sometimes the only thing that ameliorates someone’s disability because they’re allergic to certain types of medication,” said Mary Rosenberg, a staff attorney with civil rights organization Access Living, told the Sun-Times. “It’s unfair not to allow these folks to use it essentially because they’re poor and live in subsidized housing.”
The CHA includes roughly 63,000 households. To put that into perspective, it’s the third-largest housing agency in the country. What the CHA decides not only impacts a ton of vulnerable people but could also have a role in setting a precedent for other agencies. For example, similar issues have already cropped up in San Francisco and New York.
On the bright side, Washington D.C. Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton introduced a bill in April advocating that medical cannabis use should be allowed in public housing in states where cannabis is legal. The bill has failed to pass in prior years.
Another complication is that Illinois is still working out the details on where people can consume cannabis in public. While some residents, understandably, don’t want public spaces to become smoke clouds, the obvious solution is to encourage people to partake at home. But that goes back to the circular problem for people who live in public housing—if they can’t use cannabis at home, and they have limited options to use it in public, where can they use it?
For people who live with disabilities or have certain medical needs, cannabis isn’t just about fun or relaxation, either. For example, as 67-year-old senior public housing resident Jacqueline Reynolds says, she plans to keep smoking in spite of the rule. Why? She says cannabis is a replacement for blood pressure medication.
“I’m gonna do it anyway,” Reynolds told the Sun-Times, “because I’m more afraid of dying than I am being put out of my apartment.”
“Residents who live in subsidized housing don’t have the same rights as the rest of us do,” Kate Walz, vice president of advocacy at the Shriver Center on Poverty Law told the Sun-Times. “They can’t consume marijuana in their home even though the state legalized it or they’ll lose their housing subsidy. And the majority of people who live in federally assisted housing in Illinois are people of color, so it’s creating a racial equity issue in the state.”