How many CAURDs made the cut?
As we recently reported in this newsletter, a judge halted NY cannabis regulators from processing any more Conditional Adult Use Retail Dispensary (CAURD) licenses with the exception of “licensees who, prior to August 7, 2023, met all requirements for licensing.”
Regulators had until last night to provide that list, which includes entities that “met all requirements for licensing but had not yet received approval to open a retail dispensary location,” according to Office of Cannabis Management First Deputy Director Patrick Mckeage. (In other words, this list is in addition to the 23 entities that are already operating.)
How many entities are on the list? 30.
(You can see the full list here.)
This is a starkly low number. Just a few days ago, OCM said they expected that 100 CAURDs would have final approval by January. But now, with only 30 of 429 CAURDs making the cutoff to join the 23 licensees open for business, this means that 399 CAURDs are stuck in provisional approval purgatory.
Meanwhile, last night, the plaintiffs (veterans) submitted a memorandum of law in response to the judge’s Friday ruling, effectively pushing back on the efforts of CAURDs and related stakeholders to intervene in the suit.
They wrote:
“In light of the Decision and Order issued by the Court on August 18, 2023—which granted in part Plaintiffs’ request for a preliminary injunction and created a process by which Defendants can seek exceptions from that injunction for individual provisional CAURD licensees—the applications to intervene for a limited purpose are now moot and should be denied.”
More to come.
Health Canada data show more Canadians buying legal cannabis.
New data from Health Canada show a post-legalization trend that regulators want to see: more people buying legal cannabis.
Specifically, on the “displacement of the illicit market over time,” in Q1 2022, Canadian households spent a total of $1.26 billion on “licit” cannabis and products, and $639 million on unregulated cannabis.
New Mexico’s top cannabis regulator comes from Colorado’s industry.
The new director of the New Mexico Cannabis Control Division is Todd Stevens, who most recently worked as a manager at Native Roots Cannabis Co., a Colorado cannabis company.
“Director Stevens’s experience as an industry leader made him the ideal candidate to take the lead at the CCD,” said Regulation and Licensing Department Superintendent Linda Trujillo in the announcement. “I am confident in his ability to lead this team and make New Mexico’s regulated cannabis industry one to rival.”
Stevens will be the Division’s fourth director since it was formed in 2021, when adult use became law.
