Fulop, Davis say their off-duty police officers can’t use weed

Amid a growing debate about off-duty marijuana use among New Jersey police officers, two Hudson County mayors, Jersey City Mayor Steven Fulop and Bayonne Mayor Jimmy Davis, have said cops in their departments can’t partake in legal marijuana. Sales of recreational weed are set to begin tomorrow.

“As a retired police officer myself, I know that sworn law enforcement officers must be held to a higher standard and I believe that allowing marijuana use by off-duty personnel would lead to lawsuits that would endanger both taxpayers and public safety by making it harder to win criminal convictions,” Davis said in a statement released today.

Fulop concurred, writing on Twitter that “trust is fragile between communities/police [and] we should make sure that there isn’t compromised judgement.”

The issue was first raised when acting Attorney General Matt Platkin issued a memo advising law enforcement agencies that off-duty officers should be allowed to partake in the state’s incipient marijuana industry. State Sen. Paul Sarlo (D-Wood-Ridge) quickly said he would introduce legislation to ban off-duty use, and Gov. Phil Murphy has ambivalently said he’s open to a “legislative fix” to the dispute.