New York’s top cannabis regulators held their first meeting of the new year on Tuesday and they’re doubling down on outreach, both in the legislature and with stakeholders across the state.
The Office of Cannabis Management’s Cannabis Control Board’s meeting also focused on equity and on jurisdictions that have opted out of cannabis retail and consumption spaces.
Tremaine Wright, head of the CCB, said during the meeting that the Board has met with members of the Legislature, including the Black, Puerto Rican, Hispanic and Asian Legislative Caucus, to share progress and to “seek their partnership in raising awareness for a series of community outreach and education events that we’re calling ‘cannabis conversations.’”
Those Cannabis Conversations so far include 11 “regional discussions” on a wide spectrum of topics related to the upcoming launch of New York’s adult use cannabis market.
Wright said that she was “thrilled” that Gov. Kathy Hochul’s executive budget, which was released last week, includes the creation of the New York Social Equity Cannabis Investment Fund. The public-private partnership fund will “promote equity and economic justice in New York’s cannabis industry,” Hochul noted in her budget documents. The seed money will come from licensing fees and tax revenue, according to the State of the State book, and the fund will also “leverage significant private investment.”
The fund will “provide capital funding to eligible equity applicants for communities impacted by disproportionate policing during decades long cannabis prohibition,” Wright said during Tuesday’s meeting.
“When I speak to other states about what some of the biggest challenges were in implementing social equity in their adult use markets, by far and away, the most common response is the lack of access to capital. I’m thrilled that New York will be working to address this right out the gate,” Wright said.
Board member Reuben McDaniel thanked lawmakers like Assembly Majority Leader Crystal Peoples-Stokes and Sen. Liz Krueger because “they were so aggressive around social equity.” McDaniel also thanked Hochul for her “support and recognition that access to capital is one of the real difficulties.”
McDaniel described the fund as the “beginning” of the Board’s work on “helping candidates get access to capital. We certainly have more work to do in other parts of the areas of cannabis, but I’m very excited about this one,” he said. McDaniel also said that he’s been working with other Board members on additional equity efforts for the past few months.
“We’ve also worked with several folks inside of the state, and we believe we’ve created a mechanism that allows us to get going quickly so that these funds will be available to start as we begin issuing licenses,” McDaniel said. “So we still have a lot of work to do on the final development of the fund and getting everything in place.”
Chris Alexander, OCM executive director, gave an update about the final tally of localities that chose to opt out of allowing certain cannabis business activities. A total of 10% of cities and 34% of all municipalities have submitted information to OCM that they’ve opt-ed out of all cannabis sales. Alexander noted that those cities that opted out of all sales “reflect a collective population of about 118,000 New Yorkers.”
“We are sure that there will still be wide access to cannabis and to the business opportunities that we’re creating here,” Alexander said, adding that any municipalities that have chosen to opt out can opt back into the program “at any point in time.” Alexander also reminded localities that they cannot ban certain activities made legal through the Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Act, including possession and consumption of cannabis.
Alexander also mentioned the recent OCM move to allow doctors to recommend cannabis for any condition, a change that will make medical cannabis much more widely available. The development “will greatly improve access and allow patients to see if medical cannabis can be right for them. This is a huge additional improvement to the program,” Alexander said.
The Board also approved a resolution to enter into a service level agreement with the Office of Children and Family Services related to call center functions. While the call center has been around for some time, Alexander said, and has been a source to help answer questions about the medical cannabinoid hemp programs, this would be an expansion to include the adult use program.
