The launch of Latest York’s legal cannabis industry is popping into a foul trip — even before the primary official marijuana stores have opened for business, social justice critics claim.
A gaggle advocating for the primary licensed marijuana storefront sellers with prior weed convictions said Friday they’re being arrange for failure.
The Cannabis Social Equity Coalition said the primary sellers can be required to purchase cannabis products from NY hemp farmers of “questionable quality and safety,” should not being adequately trained for the market and can face a mountain of debt.
Under Latest York’s “seed to sale” cannabis law, the product sold by licensed dispensaries must come from marijuana plants grown by local farmers.
However the group said the “biomass” sort of cannabis grown by farmers shouldn’t be an appropriate flower for smoking.
“This sort of cannabis is taken into account low grade, best suited to processing into oils, vapes, topicals and edible cannabis products. It shouldn’t be suitable as a smokable flower on the market at dispensaries,” Reginald Fluellen of the Cannabis Social Equity Coalition said.
He also claimed cannabis grown by these Hemp farmers incorporates a “high amount of bacteria, yeast and mold.”
Office of Cannabis Management’s Damian Fagon argues Latest York’s first adult-use dispensaries will sell products tested for a lot of potentially harmful elements.Getty Images
The state Office of Cannabis Management disputed the claim that it has authorized the expansion and sale of bad weed.
“Let’s stick with the facts, and so they’re clear: Latest York’s first adult-use dispensaries can be selling products grown by Latest York family farmers which have been tested for a big selection of doubtless harmful elements, including heavy metals, e-coli, aspergillus, and other contaminants consistent with practices in other states,” said Damian Fagon, OCM’s chief equity officer.
Meanwhile the Cannabis Social Equity Coalition claimed dispensary owners haven’t been given the adequate training and incubation support needed to run a highly regulated cannabis business and can be strapped with “high debt and high rates of interest on debt repayment, on day one.”
The state Office of Cannabis Management refutes the claim it authorized the sale of bad weed.AP
OCM disputed these claims as buzz kill.
“These dispensary owners will receive support from the Social Equity Cannabis Investment Fund, breaking down barriers to capital within the complex industry; and so they’re capable of jumpstart the legal market with delivery sales, growing their capital before they open a storefront,” said OCM’s Fagon said.
He said the primary dispensary owners already had a history of running other successful businesses and “jumping to conclusions concerning the products they may sell and their ability to achieve success will only be damaging to them and our effort to determine essentially the most equitable cannabis market within the nation.”
He also took a shot on the Cannabis Social Equity Coalition as MIA throughout the public comment process regarding the cannabis regulations.
“We sit up for their input on the regulations for a lot of the remaining market that were advanced by the Cannabis Control Board last month since we didn’t receive comment from them on the regulations for this dispensary program,” said Fagon.
Under Latest York’s “seed to sale” law, the product must come from marijuana plants grown by local farmers.ZUMAPRESS.com
Still, there’s little doubt that the budding cannabis program is facing challenges.
The newest criticism comes a day after revelations surfaced that former NBA star Chris Webber, chosen by the state to assist raise $200 million in a public-private partnership for the emerging legal weed industry, has failed to boost any money.
Two days ago, a study revealed that there are “likely tens of hundreds of illicit cannabis businesses” currently operating out of bodegas, smoke shops and other storefronts in Latest York City — with lots of the pop-up shops selling bad or dangerously tainted weed.
A lot of these black market weed sellers are paying little or no tax while the 36 state retail operators awarded licenses by the state last month can have to pay a steep cannabis tax.
That can make it difficult for the legal operators to compete on price with illicit sellers that have sprouted everywhere in the city — including tidy, middle class neighborhoods corresponding to Kew Gardens.
