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As Phil Murphy swept the governor’s race in 2017 on a promise to legalize marijuana and clear pot convictions, New Jersey was arresting tens of thousands of people for marijuana offenses.

Police in the state arrested 34,501 people for marijuana possession and 3,122 people for pot sales in 2017, according to recently released FBI data. That’s 2,500 more arrests for weed than in 2016. Texas and New York were the only states who arrested more people for marijuana possession than New Jersey in 2017.

The arrest rate increased as well. About 38 in every 10,000 residents were arrested for pot possession in 2017, compared with 35 per 10,000 in 2016. That rate is more than double the national average, according to analysis done by NJ Advance Media. Only Wyoming and South Dakota had a higher marijuana arrest rate than New Jersey.

The arrest numbers were released at a time when New Jersey state lawmakers are having serious discussions about marijuana reform. Legislators, having dropped legalization for the time being, will soon vote to allow people to wipe away their old marijuana convictions. Two bills that would decriminalize marijuana possession are also floating around Trenton.

But even though it looks like lawmakers will allow people to clear their old marijuana convictions, there figure to be plenty of new pot convictions to replace them.

“We are living in a time when the frequency of marijuana arrests and the number of marijuana arrests are going up annually,” said Amol Sinha, the executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey. “It doesn’t seem feasible that we can expunge all the records we’re creating.”

There’s also still a big disparity in who police arrest for marijuana. Black residents comprised 13 percent of the New Jersey population but 39 percent of pot arrests in 2017. That discrepancy is nothing new.

The ACLU of New Jersey published a report in 2017 that found black New Jerseyans were more than three times more likely to be arrested for marijuana than white people in the state, despite similar usage rates.

These were some of the biggest reasons that Murphy, the state’s Democratic governor, cited for his interest in legalizing marijuana.

“Gov. Murphy has repeatedly said that he believes legalization of adult-use marijuana is critical to eliminating disparities in the criminal justice system,” said Alyana Alfaro, Murphy’s press secretary. “Each week that marijuana remains illegal, approximately 600 people in New Jersey will be arrested for low-level drug crimes, with the majority of those being people of color.”

But with legalization no longer being considered in the Legislature, it remains unclear how the state can reduce these low-level marijuana arrests.

Both Murphy and state Senate President Stephen Sweeney, D-Gloucester, have said they don’t favor decriminalization, which would stop police from arresting people who have small amounts of marijuana. There are decriminalization bills in both the Assembly and the Senate, but neither bill has gained much momentum.

State Sen. Ronald Rice, D-Essex, is the main sponsor of the decriminalization bill in his chamber, and he has said multiple times that the unwillingness of the governor and the Senate president to consider his bill shows him that they care more about making money off marijuana than keeping people from getting arrested.

For their part, both Murphy and Sweeney have said they don’t favor decriminalization because they feel it legitimizes the illegal market.

“The attorney general has already issued guidance directing prosecutors to use discretion in these cases," said Alfaro, Murphy’s spokeswoman. "While this is an important step, Gov. Murphy believes that legalization must be the ultimate end goal in order to prevent continued injustices. Up to and until legalization, this business will remain in the shadows without the regulation needed to ensure public safety.”

But, as it stands now, marijuana arrests continue in the state unabated, even as lawmakers are set to vote on a plan that would let people clear their marijuana convictions.

The Legislature is set to take up a bill on expungements in June.

That plan would allow people with marijuana convictions to immediately apply to have those records cleared, among other broader changes to the state’s problematic expungement system. But the state is arresting more than 30,000 people each year for marijuana possession and it only clears about 10,000 convictions every year.

That math troubles Sinha, the ACLU of NJ director.

“We’re in a situation where it feels like one step forward and two steps back,” he said. “We’re agreeing that expungements are necessary, but we’re still arresting people” for marijuana crimes.

“It’s a vicious cycle.”

Erin Petenko may be reached at epetenko@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @EPetenko. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

Payton Guion may be reached at PGuion@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @PaytonGuion.

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