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When Delaware legalized marijuana nearly two years ago, lawmakers didn’t extend that tolerance to smoking weed in public.

Instead they took pains to stress that getting high in public would remain a crime. That meant no puffing in vehicles, stores and restaurants, as well as on streets and sidewalks in neighborhoods or towns.

Anyone caught lighting up in any of those places can be arrested and charged with a misdemeanor. Penalties include imprisonment of up to five days and a fine of up to $200.

That prohibition hasn’t stopped people from smoking joints in public, however, in a state that now has several cannabis retail stores. For example, someone walking down Market Street in downtown Wilmington can often detect the pungent odor of cannabis in the air.

Even though possessing up to an ounce of weed is now a legal right, police still arrest people for imbibing outside of their home — the only place it’s permitted. State Rep. Eric Morrison, a Democrat who represents the Bear area, said about 600 people were charged with public consumption in 2024.

Morrison thinks that’s too harsh a punishment for someone to face for using a legal product, albeit an intoxicating one.

He has introduced a bill to decriminalize the act, making public consumption a civil violation subject to a fine of up to $50 for a first offense and up to $100 for subsequent violations. His bill does not prevent police from charging people for driving under the influence of marijuana.

Morrison said the proposal is a sensible one that still carries a legal consequence for a prohibited act.

“An important thing to note is that this is not sending a message that it’s okay to consume cannabis in public. It’s not,” Morrison stressed. “What it’s doing is reducing the current penalty.”

Morrison pointed out that several other states, including New Jersey, California and Illinois, have adopted similar statutes that still ban public consumption but don’t make it a crime.

“It doesn’t make sense for folks smoking cannabis in public to have a criminal record for that,’’ Morrison said. “Criminal records hurt people in terms of finding housing and finding jobs. That’s not good for society.”

Morrison said he hopes the bill, which has been assigned to the House Health and Human Development Committee, will pass during the General Assembly session that begins next week.

“I’m really hopeful that folks will see this for the kind of common sense legislation that it is,’’ Morrison said.

The administration of Gov. Matt Meyer is not taking a public position on the proposal at this time, said Mila Miles, the governor’s spokesperson.

Nor has Attorney General Kathy Jennings, although her spokesman Mat Marshall said in a statement that she “has been outspoken about keeping basic marijuana cases out of the criminal justice system and focusing law enforcement’s limited resources on keeping people safe.”

But state Sen. David Lawson, a conservative Kent County Republican and former state trooper, thinks Morrison’s measure sends the wrong signal and hopes it gets snuffed out by lawmakers.

“The decriminalization of marijuana is a problem, number one, and now we’re not going to abide by the rules that we made to make sure that people who don’t want to smoke marijuana are now going to be subject to it?’’ Lawson asked.

“And what about our kids? What about all of that? Those who want to imbibe will be doing it out in public and without regard for people who don’t want to use it and that’s a problem.”

Lawson doubts the measure will clear the House committee and reach the House floor, let alone make it to the Senate, even in a state where Democrats dominate both legislative chambers.

He also suggested that the progressive Morrison is using the bill “to feather his nest with the marijuana folks’’ during an election year.

“I always look at that with a jaundiced eye when people come up with these things,” Lawson said.

State Sen. David Buckson of the Dover area of Kent County also has concerns, though not as strident as those of fellow Republican Lawson.

“My challenge is going to be protecting the rights of those that choose not to use marijuana and their right to have what would be described as clean air in public spaces,’’ Buckson said.

If violating the law is reduced to a civil infraction, Buckson said, “then the fine system has to be a high enough threshold or a tiered approach that ensures that repeat offenders don’t continue to be a problem.

“The public itself has the right to expect what they might perceive to be a smoke-free environment on public grounds and I don’t think that’s unfair.”

Zoe Patchell of the Delaware Cannabis Advocacy Network noted that most of the 24 states that have legalized marijuana have decriminalized public consumption, and a few, such as New York, have no penalty for it.

“What most people don’t realize is that consuming cannabis in public is currently still an unclassified misdemeanor [in Delaware], which results in an arrest, prosecution, a criminal record,’’ she said.

Asked about Lawson’s view that more parents and children will be exposed to marijuana smoke, Patchell stressed that under the bill, public consumption would still be prohibited.

“It simply reduces the penalty,’’ said Patchell, who likes the bill’s chances of passage.

“We’re optimistic that the Delaware General Assembly will move Delaware’s laws more in line with other states that have adult use laws.”