A new study has found that decriminalizing cannabis reduces racial disparities in possession arrests. Decriminalizing obviously reduces how often people are getting arrested for possessing cannabis in general, but the researchers found it also changes how many people of color are getting arrested for possession compared to white people. People of color are typically arrested for possession at higher rates despite similar usage levels.

“Cannabis decriminalization seemed to be particularly beneficial to [black people], who were suffering the most from the adverse consequences of criminal penalties. Taken together, we recommend that lawmakers and public health researchers reconsider cannabis decriminalization as an option of cannabis liberalization, particularly in states concerning the unintended consequences and implementation costs of medical and recreational cannabis legalization,” the study reads.

Sheila Vakharia, deputy director of Department of Research and Academic Engagement at the Drug Policy Alliance, told Cannabis News Box that the research is mixed when it comes to this issue.

“These findings are pretty consistent with general research on decriminalization reducing overall arrest rates, and research showing greater reductions among white people than Black people in many states,” Vakharia said. “However, ACLU’s “A tale of two countries” report from reiterates the reality that regardless of marijuana laws, and even when it is legalized, Black people will always be arrested at higher rates than white people. Their report found that in some states that racial disparities actually increased.”

Vakharia said there is still a major problem with black Americans being policed more heavily than white Americans. She said changing drug laws alone doesn’t solve this problem and more criminal justice reforms are needed in states that legalize cannabis.

“New York is a great example- we had a pretty lax and generous marijuana law on the books since the 1970s but we were still the marijuana arrest capital of the world before we legalized last year,” Vakharia said. “This was because of stop and frisk policing, racially targeted enforcement, and police taking advantage of a narrow loophole in the state’s decriminalization law re: public view. We had a nice law on the books, but policing practices meant we were still arresting predominantly Black people for marijuana possession.”

All of this is further evidence that legalization has positive effects overall, but it’s only the beginning of addressing the harmful effects of the War on Drugs and systemic racism in law enforcement. Many states that have legalized are seeing this and trying to address these problems.