Pubdate: Wed, 26 Feb 2014
Source: Boston Herald (MA)
Copyright: 2014 The Boston Herald, Inc
Contact:  http://news.bostonherald.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/53
Page: 16

MASS. GOING TO POT

State officials are now pedaling backwards as fast as they can to get
themselves out of the mess they've made of the licensing process for
those "medical" marijuana shops.

That would be mess number what for the Patrick administration?

Now Secretary of Health and Human Services John Polanowicz is
promising to pull the plug on applicants who lied on their
applications. Of course, there's lying and then there's hiding the
truth - like dropping the names of convicted felons from the rosters
of corporate officers. Or soliciting letters of "non-opposition" from
hapless politicians like City Councilor Steve Murphy, but never
disclosing that the pot shop is in the heart of the Back Bay.

And it wasn't as if state officials screwed up the process all by
themselves. No, they actually hired two outside firms to help them vet
applicants and score applications.

The list of lies, half-truths, obfuscations and misrepresentations
unearthed by the Herald, the Boston Globe and the Boston Courant
(apologies if we left out any of our other media colleagues) that were
suddenly "news" to officials at the Department of Public Health is
already long and growing among the 20 successful license applicants.

So did no one at DPH notice that Green Heart Holistic Health and
Pharmaceuticals listed Stephen R. DeAngelo, a convicted felon, as its
president until the day before it filed its application to run a
Roxbury pot shot? And what about the ex-DPH staffer who helped write
the medical marijuana regs, then signed on as medical director of New
England Treatment Access that wants to open pot shops in Northampton
and Brookline? Hey, no conflict there.

Now state Rep. Jeff Sanchez (DJamaica Plain), assigned by the House
speaker to investigate the licensing mess, has filed a list of
questions he'd like answered too by DPH Commissioner Cheryl Bartlett,
who let's not forget had to pass the final decision-making on to yet
another staffer because of her own fundraising for former U.S. Rep.
Bill Delahunt, whose firm won three licenses.

In fact, Sanchez is asking a lot of uncomfortable political questions
about why firms with such heavy hitters did so well, including another
outfit that lists former U.S. Rep. Barney Frank as its director of
government and community relations.

Polanowicz has said, "If an applicant lied or misrepresented in their
applications, they are not going to get a license." You'd think they
might have figured that out before. Or do we have to do all their work
for them?
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MAP posted-by: Matt