These are homegrown just as our growers. This is an industry that is growing here thoughtfully, intentionally, deliberately—and it needs to reflect that.”
Christopher Shea of Rhode Island Current
After nearly two years of formation, the three-member Cannabis Control Commission in Rhode Island only required 18 minutes on Friday to pass an initial set rules for the budding state cannabis market.
Regulations are set to take effect on May 1. This will bring the state one step closer towards issuing licensing for twenty new retail marijuana shops, and transforming the Office of Cannabis Regulation into an independent entity.
The new rules establish new packaging and labeling requirements, outline how licenses will be awarded, and set the criteria to apply for one of the six social equity retail licenses.
Kimberly Ahern is the Chairperson of the Commission. She acknowledged it will take time to develop the final rules, but stated that it is important to strike a balance between the growth of industry and the safety. She said that the entire work of drafting regulations was completed in-house and not by an outside contractor.
She said, “These are homegrown just like the cultivators,” following the vote of panel. “This is an industry that is growing here thoughtfully, intentionally, deliberately—and it needs to reflect that.”
After the approval of regulations, the Commission can take official control over Rhode Island’s marijuana industry in accordance with the law that legalized cannabis for recreational use by 2022. The Department of Business Regulation oversees Rhode Island’s fledgling cannabis market since the recreational use of marijuana was legalized.
Nearly a dozen representatives of the cannabis industry who were present at the meeting attended with minimal fanfare, though many expressed excitement to finally see governing regulations become a reality.
“It’s awesome that this finally happened—we’ve been waiting years for this,” Peter Kasabian, co-founder of Sensible Cultivators for Intelligent Reform co-founder, told Rhode Island Current.
Rhode Island has had a very long journey to create its legal recreational cannabis market. The state legislature legislated this in 2022. Over a year passed before the three-member commission was impaneled, which then needed to hire staff to draft proposals and conduct a review of rules adopted in other states.
In the meantime only seven of the previously licensed medical marijuana dispensaries could sell cannabis for recreational purposes. In 2022, under legalization the commission may offer up to 24 licenses of recreational dispensaries. Of these, six will go to applicants with a social equity background and the other six are for worker owned cooperatives.
According to the regulations, applicants for one of the new 24 retail licenses will be first evaluated based on their qualifications and then placed into a random lottery.
A $7,500 application fee and an annual licensing fee of $30,000 would be charged to all prospective retailers. Each license must cover six zones geographically, and each zone can have a maximum four stores.
Ahern informed reporters that Ahern has not yet determined the exact date on which applications will be accepted.
She said, “Probably this year and possibly even sooner.”
Social equity criteria to be clarified
Draft rules were posted in January, where the public had 30 days to provide their feedback. More than 380 individuals submitted comments.
Ahern commented, “They made the regulations better, I thought, because they were so helpful and thoughtful.”
She added that the public’s feedback had helped her close some loopholes in determining who was eligible to apply for social equity, which generally is reserved for people who have suffered adversely from the drug war.
Ahern said to reporters following the meeting that applicants for social equity will have to show documentation proving their eligibility under the Rhode Island Cannabis Act 2022. The majority of the ownership and control in a cannabis business must belong to individuals affected directly by prior cannabis laws or disparities. Qualifying factors include convictions for nonviolent cannabis offenses or residency in disproportionately impacted areas — which can be determined by federal poverty level, unemployment rate, the number of students in a free school lunch program, and historic arrest rates by census tract.
A preliminary analysis presented to the commission last October found of the state’s 39 municipalities, only three met the criteria for a social equity zone set in Rhode Island’s 2022 law: Central Falls, Providence and Woonsocket. Some census tracts from Pawtucket, Newport and other cities also met these criteria.
Ahern stated that the Commission plans to narrow down social equity criteria at future meetings.
This article was originally published in Rhode Island Current.
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