Pennsylvania lawmakers advance legalization bill 🌿

PA
Pennsylvania moves cannabis bill forward 🌿

What happened: A Pennsylvania House committee on Monday passed a bill that would legalize cannabis for adults over the age of 21 and sell it out of state-run stores, similar to the state’s alcohol industry. 

Pennsylvania’s House could take up the bill as soon as today. 

Calling on the GOP: The bill, HB 1200, passed committee on Monday along partisan lines 14-12. 

The State House is currently split 102 Democrats to 101 Republicans, meaning every single Democrat will have to vote in favor if no Republicans join the effort.

Back up for a second: Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro and many state lawmakers have sought to legalize cannabis for years. Shapiro has stepped up his support in recent months, asking lawmakers to deliver him a bill. 

It appears that the Keystone state is finally poised to move legalization forward and potentially join two dozen other states with retail sales, despite some disagreements on implementation and certain rules

The state’s existing medical market generated over $600 million in sales throughout 2024, per state data. 

Pennsylvania has a population of 13 million — a big prize for the industry, which is sorely looking for a regulatory win. Of the six states it borders, West Virginia is the only one that has not legalized cannabis for adults.

What they’re saying: “Prohibition was never about public safety — it was about control and punishment, targeting and devastating Black and Brown Pennsylvanians,” State Rep. Rick Krajewski, a sponsor of the legislation, said. 

“The cannabis industry has been monopolized by corporatized private equity and it is time to propose an alternative retail model that will benefit all Pennsylvanians. We need to repair the harms of criminalization, create family-sustaining union jobs and make this industry work for all of us.”

And: "Letting this business operate in the shadows doesn’t make sense. And by doing nothing, we’re making Pennsylvania less competitive. Besides, let’s not kid ourselves. Pennsylvanians who want to buy cannabis are just driving across the border to one of our neighbors," Shapiro said during his Feb. 4 annual budget address. 

"Five of our neighboring states have legalized adult-use cannabis. I've talked to the CEOs of the companies right across the border in New Jersey, Maryland, and New York who tell me that 60 percent of their customers in those shops are Pennsylvanians. We’re losing out on revenue that’s going to other states instead of helping us here."

What’s in the HB 1200 bill? 

• The state will operate dispensaries, which can be co-located with a state liquor store.

• Vacate all existing state-level cannabis convictions.

• Homegrow is allowed with a permit – up to two mature plants and two immature plants.

• The bill will also place a 25% cap on THC for flower, a 200mg per package limit on concentrates, and a 25mg per package limit on other THC products. 

• The state will score and rank applications for cultivation and processing and award licenses to the highest scoring applicants.

• The state will use a lottery system to select licensees for micro-cultivators, microprocessors, transporters and on-site consumption.

• The state will award licenses in two rounds, with the first round open exclusively to social and economic equity applicants.

• Applicants must have secured a labor peace agreement, a pro-union move that other states, including New York. 

A word of caution: If the bill passes, Pennsylvania will so far be the only state that sells cannabis out of state-run shops. It’s likely to face legal challenges, given the federal government still treats cannabis as a Schedule I controlled substance.

In other words, state employees would be directly violating federal law.

And big cannabis firms known as multistate operators (MSOs) are also opposed to the state-run model, as, of course, they want to profit from sales. Supporters of the bill say this would prevent MSOs from monopolizing the industry, as they’ve sought to in other states.

But detractors say the state-run system is unpractical, given the existing medical cannabis industry in the state, and legally risky. We’ll keep you updated as things unfold this week.

Read more: Recreational cannabis would be sold at state-run stores under bill advanced by Pa. Democrats.

-ZH

“We really believed in this vision of truly creating economic growth and empowerment within our organizations,” Michelle Ringold, an Illinois social equity cannabis licenseholder and the owner of Galaxy, a suburban dispensary, told WGN Chicago.

“[But] nobody sleeps at night when everything you own is tied up into uncertainty, and that’s where we are,” Rick Ringold, her husband and co-owner said. 

Illinois social equity license holders are calling for change. Read the full story from WGN Chicago here. 

INSIGHTS
4/20 Weekend’s Top Brands

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Lit Alerts crunched the numbers in six key markets and in three key categories and are sharing the results directly with Cultivated readers.

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Flower Brand Winners🌷

Edibles Brand Winners 🍬

Vapes Brand Winners 💨

Minnesota sets June 5 for license lottery 📅

Minnesota’s Office of Cannabis Management (OCM) will hold lotteries for cultivators, processors and mezzobusiness —  which can operate up to three retail locations, on June 5. Each license type will have two lotteries, one for social equity applicants and one for general applicants. OCM originally planned to hold a lottery for social equity licenses last fall, but the state abandoned efforts in response to a legal challenge. 

Illinois operators call for regulatory relief 😓

Illinois cannabis business owners, led by state Rep. La Shawn Ford in a news conference on Sunday, demanded equitable access to capital, a moratorium on licensing fees, lower taxes and the ability for medical patients to buy discounted cannabis from adult-use dispensaries. 

Mendocino Sheriff defends his raids on tribal land 👮

Round Tree Valley Indian tribes in Northern California are suing Mendocino County for what it calls "illegal raids" on allegedly illicit cannabis operations on tribal land last year. The plaintiffs argue that the raids are targeting tribal land. Mendocino Sheriff Matthew Kendall told SF Gate that his office targeted "non-tribal people" who just happened to be operating on tribal land. 

Cannabis earnings season kicks off this week. 

Big companies like Trulieve, Green Thumb Industries, and Curaleaf will report their results. We’ll get a better look at their first-quarter financial situation and how they’re thinking about federal regulation under Trump. 

Here’s the calendar:

• Trulieve — Wednesday 8:30 AM

• Green Thumb Industries — Wednesday 5 PM

• Cannabist — Thursday 8 AM

• Cronos Group — Thursday 8:30 AM

• Verano Holdings — Thursday 8:30 AM

• TerrAscend — Thursday 5 PM

• Cresco Labs — Friday 8:30 AM

Researchers discover new cannabinoid 🔬

Scientists in South Korea have discovered a new cannabinoid, or compound found in the cannabis plant, called cannabielsoxa. The study identified seven cannabinoids that researchers hope to use to treat tumors in neuroblastoma cells, but cannabielsoxa was not one of them. 

Cannabis and pregnancy risk 👀

Using cannabis during pregnancy is linked to poor fetal development, low infant birth weight, dangerously early deliveries and even death, according to a new meta-analysis published in the journalJAMA Pediatrics. CNN has more.

Why one-time cannabis darling Tilray is now high on beer | Forbes

Cannabis could be bad for your heart | Undark Magazine

Nebraskans express frustration with proposed changes in medical marijuana amendment | Nebraska Public Media