A landmark marijuana banking bill long championed by former U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter and Gov. Jared Polis cleared a major hurdle Wednesday in Washington, when the legislation passed a Senate committee for the first time.

Dubbed the SAFER Banking Act, the Secure and Fair Enforcement Regulation Banking Act would let legal marijuana businesses access the federally regulated banking system. The bill won bipartisan approval in the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs and heads to the Senate floor before an expected move to the House, which has passed earlier versions of the legislation with broad, bipartisan support seven times in recent years.

“Forcing legal businesses to operate in all-cash is

dangerous for our communities; it’s an open invitation to robberies, muggings, money laundering, and organized crime — and the only people benefiting from the current system are criminals,” said U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-ore., in a statement after the bill passed the committee.

Merkley, the bill’s lead sponsor along with U.S. Sen. Steve Daines, R-mont., added that he is “committed to building bipartisan momentum to finally get a bill signed into law that ends the cannabis cash economy and improves public safety across the nation.”

Perlmutter, who retired this year after nine terms and was an original sponsor of earlier versions of the bill, said Wednesday that the Senate committee’s action marks “a major rite of passage for this legislation,” which he called “so logical, so necessary.”

Letting legal marijuana-related businesses use banking and other financial services, he added, “has been a long time coming, because we’ve had a lot of robberies because there’s so much cash.”

“States all across the country have some level of cannabis use,” Perlmutter said. “And this legislation allows banks to give ordinary banking services to companies that are legitimate, that have legal cannabis operations in a particular state, so they can have credit cards, deposit accounts, checking accounts, payroll accounts — normal things.”

Polis applauded the lawmakers who advanced the bill, saying in a statement that it will “provide more certainty to our small businesses and marijuana industry.”

“This bill supports cannabis-related businesses, supports minority, women, and veteran-owned small businesses, will help create jobs, and strengthen public safety in our communities and across the country,” he said. “We look forward to seeing a full vote in the Senate and passage in the House again soon.”

Last year, Polis and other statewide officials called on Congress to pass Perlmutter’s bill, known in its earlier incarnations as the SAFE Banking Act.

“The bipartisan SAFE Banking Act provides a critical pathway for banks, credit unions, and other financial institutions to offer broad scope banking services to legally operating, state regulated cannabis businesses without fear of punishment by federal regulators, while also enhancing transparency by providing broader access to reliable sources of information for purposes of regulatory oversight,” wrote Polis, Lt. Gov. Dianne Primavera, Attorney General Phil Weiser, State Treasurer Dave Young and Colorado Department of Public Safety Executive Director Stan Hilkey in a letter to congressional leaders.

“We urge Congress to take real stories, such as those in our state of Colorado, to heart and to efficiently prioritize policy approaches that promote safe banking and public safety.”

Perlmutter’s bills won approval year after year in the House but stalled each time in the Senate, with some senators complaining the bill went too far and others unwilling to support it because it didn’t do enough.

Sponsors this year appear to have struck the right balance, Perlmutter said.

“They realized that to be able to move the bill, it’s not going to be as much as some people want,” he said. “Some think it’s too big, some people think it’s too small. But there appears to be an agreement among Democrats and Republicans to move it in the Senate to get the 60 votes.”

Speaking by phone from Chicago, Perlmutter noted that he had just participated in a panel discussion about the legal marijuana industry with former U.S. Sen. Cory Gardner, the Colorado Republican who sponsored earlier versions of the bill in the Senate.

Daines, the current bill’s lead Republican sponsor, “has really been persevering and getting that bill done,” Perlmutter added. “Cory got it started, and Daines is finishing it. I described Cory and myself as sort of starting pitchers, and now we’ve got some guys that are going to have to be closers.”