Attorneys tell NY dispensaries to start defending their locations 👀

NY, NY
Attorneys chime in on OCM changes in a sign of likely lawsuits to come 👀

Driving the news: New York’s Office of Cannabis Management told over 100 operators earlier this week that they may need to move as they are located too close to schools, despite those locations already being approved by the agency.

What happened: Expect lawsuits to come. 

Multiple law firms have informed clients they should meet to start preparing to defend their locations, including Foley Hoag, and others are discussing the changes and what comes next on social media and in (many) calls to me. 

The law firm Holland & Scriever, along with cannabis attorney Michael McGuire, is arranging meetings for affected operators on Thursday, Friday, and over the weekend. 

If the OCM’s directive applies to your business, you might want to join. 

What they’re saying: “Much like how OCM has revealed their previous errors, you should not assume that OCM is correct in its conclusions now if you are impacted by this recent development,” Foley Hoag’s Jeffrey Schultz and Michael McQueeny said. 

They urged clients to take their own measurements for the distance rule, and prepare their defenses and potential justification for damages. 

And: “You followed THEIR process, secured THEIR approval, and invested YOUR time, money, and trust — and now they want you to move because they suddenly decided they misapplied the law?”

“Let’s be clear: This is an existential threat, not just a regulatory hiccup,” McGuire said.

The OCM’s response: The OCM said it is now “correctly following the law,” on approving dispensary locations, and added that dispensaries that are already open will not need to move “right now.”

Difficulties compound for social equity: Some social equity operators and advocates fear that these changes could be dire for their livelihoods. They say it amounts to a broken promise from the state.

“This decision methodically dismantles the framework for cannabis equity in New York. It follows a clear pattern of punishing people who have already borne the impact of criminalization,” The Bronx Cannabis Hub, which partners social equity licenseholders with pro bono attorneys, said in a statement.

“New York’s cannabis law was meant to end that legacy, not recreate it. We demand that the OCM reverse this destructive decision.” 

Our take: I’ve done a lot of reporting on this over the last few days. 

To be fully transparent, there are a lot of competing narratives about what went wrong. I’ll carefully share what I know over the coming days, but I won’t pretend to have all the answers. Expect the facts to change quickly and what may be true today might not tomorrow. 

But hopefully I can help Cultivated readers put the pieces together. If you have something you’d like to share, reply to this email and we’ll talk. 

The final word: “This is exactly one of the reasons why I always tell my clients, don’t fall in love with real estate,” Fatima Afia, an attorney at Rudick Law Group, told Hell Gate.

-JB

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Jay and Jeremy were joined by Leafwell founder and CEO Emily Fisher and senior research director Mitch Doucette on Cultivated Live on Wednesday. Leafwell’s mission is to educate and destigmatize the use of cannabis in healthcare. 

“ Somewhere between 15 to 20% of the dispensaries we partner with are adult-use dispensaries and they partner with us because they say that a significant number of people that walk through their doors are looking for a therapeutic outcome,” Fisher said. 

“They're not patients. They don't have a medical card, but they're looking for a therapeutic outcome.” 

Watch it:

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