Political pressure on the state Cannabis Control Commission intensified Thursday, as Attorney General Maura Healey and 78 state legislators joined Governor Charlie Baker in pressing the independent agency to roll out a more limited recreational marijuana industry this summer. In letters sent at the close of a public comment period on the commission's draft rules for pot companies, Healey and the lawmakers urged cannabis regulators to delay their provisional plans to license marijuana cafes, delivery services that don't also operate a physical storefront, and "mixed-use" businesses such as art galleries and theaters that want to sell cannabis on the side. [continues 450 words]
The Baker administration chastised Massachusetts pot regulators this week, saying their draft plan to create one of the world's most permissive regulated marijuana markets goes too far, too fast. The Baker administration chastised Massachusetts pot regulators this week, saying their draft plan to create one of the world's most permissive regulated marijuana markets goes too far, too fast. In a letter to the Cannabis Control Commission dated Monday , the governor's office warned the independent agency that it had reached beyond the core mandate of the state's marijuana legalization law by proposing the licensure of businesses not seen in other states' recreational markets: sit-and-get-high cafes, pot delivery services not tied to dispensaries, and even movie theaters that want to offer patrons cannabis-laced snacks. [continues 921 words]
DENVER - Many college students will tell you that making pot brownies is easy - just sprinkle a little marijuana into a pan of melting butter, then follow the instructions on the back of the Duncan Hines box. But marijuana entrepreneurs in this center of cannabis innovation face a much higher bar. They have no trouble dreaming up creative treats and concoctions infused with psychoactive THC, but meeting hundreds of pages of health and safety regulations means their imagination is handcuffed. And for good reason: the rules demand precise dosing, uniform potency, and warning symbols imprinted on the food itself. [continues 1148 words]
The Democrat-controlled Massachusetts Legislature sent an overhaul of the voter-passed marijuana legalization law to Governor Charlie Baker's desk Thursday - but not before a top Republican lit into the legislation. The Senate enacted the measure on a 32-6 vote. On Wednesday, the House voted 136-11 to move the bill forward. Baker is expected to sign the measure, which would raise cannabis taxes from what the ballot question envisioned, merge oversight of recreational and medical marijuana, and change how cities and towns can ban pot shops. [continues 675 words]
The legislation proposed in Massachusetts wouldn't change the basic marijuana rights of adults that the ballot question put in place. The Massachusetts Legislature is advancing an overhaul of the voter-passed marijuana legalization law Wednesday, when both chambers are expected to accept a House-Senate compromise bill in the afternoon. A final Senate vote, which would send the bill to the governor, is scheduled for Thursday. The legislation would change the legalization law passed by 1.8 million voters in November. [continues 324 words]
Representative Ronald Mariano, a Quincy Democrat and the majority leader, spoke about the revisions to the marijuana law on Monday at the State House. The Massachusetts Legislature is expected to approve a broad overhaul of the voter-approved marijuana legalization law this week after House and Senate negotiators agreed on a bill Monday that would hike marijuana taxes and change how communities can ban local pot shops. But the compromise immediately raised the specter of a serious legal challenge, and the bill drew a rebuke from the top lobbyist for cities and towns who said, should it pass, most municipalities would have trouble implementing the law. [continues 1007 words]
The fate of marijuana legalization, enshrined in law by about 1.8 million Massachusetts voters, is now in the hands of a half-dozen lawmakers meeting in secret. Those legislators' first action on Monday was to kick out members of the news media, close the door, and begin their deliberations to reconcile fundamentally different Senate and House rewrites of the ballot question that legalized adult recreational marijuana's use and sale. "We're going to ask the press to leave," said Senator Patricia D. Jehlen, the Senate's point person on pot policy. [continues 718 words]
Senator Jason M. Lewis proposed legislation that would reduce the amount of marijuana people 21 years and older could possess in their home from 10 ounces to 2 ounces, and the number of marijuana plants people could grow from 12 per household to six per household. The right of Massachusetts adults to possess and grow marijuana would be sharply curbed, and the ability of retail shops to begin selling recreational pot next year would be deeply undercut if legislation filed Friday afternoon by a key state senator becomes law. [continues 705 words]
Will lawmakers gut key parts of marijuana law? A marijuana joint was rolled. Marijuana legalization advocates fear the Massachusetts Legislature, which has already delayed the opening of pot shops, will now gut several key parts of the law approved by 1.8 million voters in November. Public comments from Senate President Stanley C. Rosenberg about potential changes are setting off alarm bells among backers. Rosenberg has raised the prospect of lawmakers sharply increasing the marijuana tax rate, lowering the 12-plant-per-household limit on homegrowing pot, and even raising the legal age for purchase, possession, and use up from 21. [continues 1067 words]
Holyoke has a number of old mill buildings that Mayor Alex B. Morse believes would make an excellent location for the industry. HOLYOKE - Vacant mill buildings along a series of canals serve as constant reminders of this impoverished city's halcyon days as the Paper City of the World. But the mayor has a distinctly 21st-century plan for the old factories. Alex B. Morse imagines marijuana growing in them. Morse, the 27-year-old wunderkind who has been in office for more than five years , believes his hometown is on the upswing, with the lowest rates of crime and unemployment in many years. But the city, with a poverty rate almost three times the state average, requires an infusion of industry. And the state's nascent recreational marijuana business, he says, would be a perfect fit. [continues 1136 words]
PUEBLO WEST, Colo. - Out here, in this unincorporated community of 30,000, there are miles of barren scrub-brush dotted with wild sunflowers. Low-slung houses sit on East Gun Powder Lane and North Cougar Drive. There's a Walmart Supercenter, a Little Caesars, a Safeway with a small Starbucks tucked inside. And, throughout the area, a revolt against retail marijuana sales smolders in a state awash in $1 billion of legal pot. Four years ago, Coloradans voted to legalize marijuana for adults, and gave individual localities the opportunity to decide if they would allow retail marijuana shops. [continues 1529 words]
Boston City Council President Michelle Wu and Councilor Tito Jackson will formally endorse the state ballot push to legalize marijuana for recreational use. The move, to be announced at a State House event Wednesday morning, puts them directly at odds with Mayor Martin J. Walsh, who is helping to lead the charge against the referendum. A 2007 graduate of Harvard College, Wu said she never used the drug but recalled some classmates did during their years in Cambridge. "It just seems ridiculous that kids at Harvard can smoke pot and have incredibly successful careers while blacks and Latinos, particularly men and boys, who are using the same substance are sent to jail," she said, voice rising. [continues 757 words]
A top retailers group, worried about worker productivity declining and plumes of pot smoke deterring customers from Main Street businesses, came out Wednesday against a ballot question that would legalize marijuana. Jon B. Hurst, president of the Retailers Association of Massachusetts, had earlier said he and his members were torn on the controversial issue and likely to stay neutral. But he said Wednesday, after learning more about the potential drawbacks of the proposed referendum - from the proliferation of marijuana-infused edibles like brownies, to its generous limits on the home growing of pot - his group decided, on balance, it would be best if the ballot push is defeated. [continues 528 words]
The Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents, saying it is worried legalizing marijuana for adults will make it easier for kids to gain access to the drug, came out Wednesday against a likely ballot question to make marijuana legal for recreational use. "As superintendents, our primary focus is on helping each and every student reach their full potential, and we believe the commercial legalization of marijuana runs directly counter to that goal," the executive director of the association, Tom Scott, said in a statement. "Where marijuana is legal, we see increased use and abuse by young people." [continues 339 words]
Advocates of marijuana legalization are accusing Governor Charlie Baker and Mayor Martin J. Walsh of hypocrisy for supporting the expansion of alcohol sales while backing an effort to stop the legalization of marijuana. A day after the two announced they are launching a political effort to kill a likely legalization ballot question, the campaign backing the pro-cannabis referendum will hold a Friday news conference. There, the group will assert it's contradictory to support the expansion of one and not the other - because, it argues, alcohol is far more dangerous than marijuana. [continues 389 words]
For a year, state Senator Jason M. Lewis maintained strict neutrality as he studied marijuana legalization - interviewing 50-plus experts, scouring the research, and observing firsthand a state where it is legal. But now he is speaking out against the expected November referendum in Massachusetts. His position carries special weight. Lewis chairs the special legislative committee on marijuana. His concerns, voiced just after his committee submitted its report on the topic, arise from his role as both a father and a public official, he said. [continues 1157 words]
A scathing Senate report to be released Tuesday says that if residents legalize recreational marijuana in Massachusetts this fall, the state should promptly temper their vote by outlawing home cultivation, imposing a significant tax on the drug, and prohibiting some marijuana-infused edible products. The report by a special Senate committee does not take an official stance on the proposed ballot question but warns of legalization's dangers. The authors note that it could make it easier for children to access the drug and create difficulties for law enforcement officers in determining and proving someone is too high to drive. [continues 1010 words]
DENVER - Nestled between a 7-Eleven and a store selling Broncos jerseys, the door to the generic-looking retail establishment is easy to miss. But once inside, the smell is unmistakable. At Euflora, tables are filled with glass containers of marijuana next to interactive tablets describing each strain ("sweet floral aroma," "intoxicatingly potent"). An array of marijuana-infused products beckon behind locked cases: from energy shots to sour gummies, brownies to bacon brittle. And if you're 21 or older, it's all legal to buy. [continues 1638 words]
DENVER - Standing in a retail marijuana dispensary Tuesday, amid cannabis-infused candy and big jars of "Sour Diesel" and "Bazooka Joe," eight Massachusetts senators had some questions. "If I were to buy this, what would I do with it? Do I crush it? Roll it? Do I -" asked Senator John F. Keenan, pointing to a jar with a potent-smelling strain, his voice trailing off as if he weren't sure of the other options. "Is this medicinal?" asked Senator Michael O. Moore, who then lifted up a jar filled with Purple Alien OG, smiling and posing for a photo on his phone. [continues 854 words]
DENVER - Eight state senators are flying into Colorado this week for a primer on life in a state that has already legalized marijuana, in case Massachusetts voters follow suit this November and lawmakers have to decide quickly how to respond. They're poised to see a cultivation facility, tour a marijuana dispensary, and pepper top state, municipal, and law-enforcement officials with questions about the implementation of the voter-approved law. The four-day trip is being arranged and paid for by the New York-based Milbank Memorial Fund, which describes itself as a nonpartisan health policy foundation. [continues 1033 words]
