Illinois Cannabis Czar Toi Hutchinson To Lead Marijuana Policy Project As President & CEO

The Marijuana Policy Project, which has played a leading role in reforming cannabis policies on the state and federal levels, is getting a new leader.

Toi Hutchinson, who was Gov. J.B. Pritzker's key cannabis adviser, agreed to replace Steve Hawkins and join the national advocacy organization as president and CEO, Marijuana Moment reported.

Appointed to the Senate in 2009, Hutchinson has long pushed for legalization. In addition to being social equity advocate, she is known for her sponsorship as a state senator of Illinois's adult-use legalization policy that Gov. Pritzker signed into law in 2019.

Hutchinson told Marijuana Moment that when she got the call from MPP, "it was a no-brainer because we know that the march towards federal legalization is going to happen through the states."

"The discussion around cannabis has grown to the point where we have to talk about legalization with the understanding that we have an industry," Hutchinson said, adding that at first the reform discussions "didn't center around equity—it was really about freeing the plant."

Hutchinson brings a myriad of skills and experience in ushering in reform to a state legislature. Previously she served as president of the National Conference of State Legislatures.

Hutchinson said that in order to "normalize and legalize a product for whom the prohibition of that exact same product destroyed generations of communities, you have to center those two things together."

Policy proposals centered around equity are "better," Hutchinson stressed.

"If you center the people who are harmed the most by this—the communities that were harmed the most by this—then you can meet people in places where they didn't even know they were going to agree with you," the new MPP director added.