MJBizMag January 2023 - 28

New York
Maryland
Start
Spreading
the News
A $2.7 billion market awaits
those who can endure
a long wait on the runway
By Omar Sacirbey
A
s this issue goes to print
in mid-December, it's still
possible that New York state's
recreational marijuana program could
launch before the ball drops in Times
Square, signaling the start of 2023.
But that is no slam dunk.
New York cannabis entrepreneurs and
advocates expected the state's marijuana
market to be up and running by now.
The plan was to award " conditional "
marijuana cultivation and processing
licenses to New York-licensed hemp
cultivators and processors.
Those conditional cultivators and
processors would then supply roughly
150 conditional social equity retail license
holders-selected from a pool of roughly
900 applicants that regulators are still
wading through-who would receive
funding from the New York Social Equity
Cannabis Investment Fund.
Things have not gone exactly to plan,
however.
WHERE THINGS STAND
About 270 growers and around 25
processors received licenses last
summer, but so-called " Conditional
Adult Use Retail Dispensary " -or
CAURD-licenses weren't awarded
until Nov. 21, 2022. Regulators said 28
28 January 2023 | MJBizMagazine
of the first 36 CAURD licenses went to
individuals with marijuana convictions
or those whose family members had
been arrested for cannabis.
The other eight licenses went to notfor-profit
groups. Most CAURD licensees
won't start with brick-and-mortar
stores but with deliveries.
Tremaine Wright, chair of the New
York State Cannabis Control Board
(CCB), is confident that will happen soon.
" We're talking to the businesses that
have been licensed, and we expect that
they're going to be able to get some
sales going before the end of the year, "
Wright said in a Dec. 8 interview.
Since then, regulators have provided
some guidance on delivery operations,
restrictions and allowances.
Meanwhile, many conditional
growers already had harvested
cannabis with the expectation that
retailers would be open to sell their
products. But as of mid-December,
those retailers weren't yet open,
leaving many growers stuck with excess
product and causing financial stress.
" These conditional growers are in a
full-fledged panic because many of them
are small farmers who spent their life
savings ... to launch these businesses, "
said Katie Neer, a New York-based
cannabis attorney and general counsel at
Lantern, a cannabis-delivery company.
Complicating matters is a federal
lawsuit challenging the requirement
that marijuana operators must have
a significant presence in the state. In
December, a federal judge ruled that
New York regulators were prohibited
from issuing several adult-use
marijuana licenses in five areas.
The New York Times reported that
63 of the 150 planned licenses
earmarked for Brooklyn, Central New
York, the Finger Lakes region, the midHudson
area and Western New York
were impacted by the decision.
While this conditional phase seems
glum, many observers are optimistic
Katie
Neer
Missouri
NY
MJBizMag January 2023

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