NEW YORK (AP) — Impatient, anxious and frustrated, Yuri Krupitsky waits to see if he can open one of the first legal recreational marijuana stores in New York state.
He has been vying for a long bid to become one of around 900 candidates in a first round of 150 licenses, to face further uncertainty following a court ruling last week. It temporarily blocks the state from greenlighting dispensaries in Brooklyn’s Krupitsky Territory and some other areas.
Meanwhile, unlicensed pot shops have sprung up in droves.
Stores openly selling marijuana are now found throughout New York City, operated by people who ignored licensing requirements.
“It’s unfair competition,” Kuritsky said. “Everyone just says, ‘Sit and wait,’ and in the meantime, I see store after store, and they make their money. I’m sitting around waiting to do it the right way.”
Under pressure to launch one of the nation’s most anticipated legal marijuana markets, the state’s Cannabis Control Board is expected to consider awarding dispensary licenses to entrepreneurs and nonprofit groups on Monday — a major milestone that comes as cannabis regulators point out they are trying to shut down unlicensed sellers.
“There can be no legal, regulated market operating side-by-side with an illegal market – this defeats the purposes of the state’s cannabis law to protect public health and create a fair market. who is working to repair the damage caused by the disproportionate enforcement of cannabis prohibition,” Office of Cannabis Management spokesperson Aaron Ghitelman said in a statement.
New York legalized the recreational use of marijuana in March 2021, but is still in the process of allowing people to sell it.
It has reserved its first round of recreational pot retail licenses for convicted marijuana applicants or their relatives, as well as certain nonprofit groups. It also included a $200 million public-private fund to help “social equity” candidates.
Officials have even set out to find, design and renovate storefronts for for-profit contractors, who must sublet state-designated space and reimburse renovation costs.
Ten teams of design and build companies have been chosen, and the state is talking to owners of dozens of locations. About 20 are in preliminary design evaluation, said Jeffrey Gordon, a spokesman for the state’s construction arm, known as DASNY. To pay for all this, the state created the equity fund and is trying to raise private funds, he said.
Gordon said the agency aims to have several clinics ready by the end of the year, but has encountered ‘unexpected delays’, including the court case, which calls into question parts of the criteria. state for applicants.
“However, many elements are in place and ready to move forward,” he said.
While these efforts materialized, some people simply rented storefronts and started selling cannabis without permission.
Empire Cannabis Club already has a location in Brooklyn, two in Manhattan, and plans for more. Owner Jonathan Elfand says the year-old club sells marijuana products at cost to thousands of members who pay a daily or monthly fee.
He maintains that the operation is legal. The state disagrees, but Elfand is undeterred and says he would welcome a court battle.
“If you think there is something we are doing wrong, please take up the fight. We are ready,” said Elfand, who also applied for a dispensary license.
The Cannabis Bureau has told Empire and dozens of other companies to stop selling pot, and the agency is working with local law enforcement officials to crack down.
Enforcement can take the form of notices of violation, but there have also been arrests. Searches of a suburban Buffalo store in February and a Brooklyn store on Wednesday led to pot possession charges.
“We will take every legal step available to us” to make sure people understand they cannot sell unregulated pot with impunity, New York Sheriff Anthony Miranda said.
His office and the New York Police Department have also cited parking and selling laws to tow trucks suspected of selling weed.
Craig Sweat and his partners operated a fleet of “Uncle Budd” trucks which were seized in September. He says they did not sell marijuana, but rather gave it to people who donated. Despite the seizure, he doubts that the authorities want to carry out a general dismantling of illegal stores; it would amount to “criminalizing marijuana again,” he says.
The state Senate passed a proposal in June to increase fines for illicit sales and make unlicensed sales a criminal offence. The measure has stalled in the Assembly, but the sponsor, Senator Liz Krueger, a Democrat, says she is “optimistic” the issue will be resolved next year.
Among the dispensary candidates hoping to be approved on Monday is Jessica Naissant, who thinks she is an ideal candidate. A first-generation Haitian-American, she until recently owned a store that sold CBD, a non-intoxicating, federally legal cannabis-based chemical. She volunteers to speak to religious groups and others about the legalization of marijuana. And she has a qualifying arrest record — a 2016 pot possession charge, she said.
“It was out of the question for me to pass up this chance,” said Naissant.
But now she worries about how last week’s court ruling will affect her prospects, as she has listed her native Brooklyn as her prime location.
“It’s bittersweet, that’s for sure,” she said.
Besides would-be sellers, hundreds of hemp growers who recently grew New York’s first legal marijuana crop are trying to find out when dispensaries will open to market their crop.
“They don’t really have many options but to wait and hope they don’t suffer losses,” said Dan Livingston of the Cannabis Association of New York, a trade group.
Whatever the wrinkles, New York’s approach to legalization has been praised for being innovative and emphasizing fairness, and plaintiff and cannabis lawyer Scheril Murray Powell advises patience. As COO of the Justus Foundation, she works to help long-time sellers become legal.
“They’ve waited decades for this moment to happen, and I think everyone is committed to making it happen right,” she said. “A few more months is not that long to get it right.”
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