Cannabis Control Commission

SHIRLEY — People will soon be able to buy marijuana locally, as well as legally, thanks to a new cannabis dispensary on Lancaster Road slated to open by the end of this year, the only such facility in town.

Thrive, the cannabis growing and retail business that’s been building a facility on Lancaster Road over the past year, is set to open its retail facility by late November or early December this year, according to Phil Silverman, an attorney for the firm who updated the Select Board on the company’s progress Monday night.

One of the owners, Anthony Cardillo, also attended the meeting.

“You’ve seen the construction … it’s close to opening (on) the retail side,” Silverman said, adding there are a “couple more” state inspections lined up before the Cannabis Commission signs off on the project, allowing the store to open. He expects no problems, however.

The dispensary part is only one aspect of the two-part business. The cultivation section of the building, where the cannabis is grown, harvested and stored, will take more time to complete, he said.

Actually, construction of the growing facility hasn’t begun yet, with a projected start three or four months out. Asked what the holdup is, Silverman cited “supply chain” stalls and “some other issues we’re trying to work out …”

For example, the changing dynamics of the trade, which is growing fast. There’s more competition now than there was when the company started out, Silverman explained. And the question is how big the facility should be to serve the company’s needs on site. How many “grow rooms,” for example.

Thrive expects to open another cannabis shop in Waltham soon, Silverman said.

Cardillo said that retail — the store where the cannabis will be sold — occupies only a small part of the building’s lower level. The rest is designated for growing space, he said, along with space upstairs, where Thrive’s business offices are located.

Select Board member Debra Flagg commented favorably on the new building’s curb appeal. It presents a more pleasing picture than the vacant lot that the site once was, she said. “It’s nice, it looks good.”

The outcome was as expected, Silverman said, crediting consultants and contractors the team has worked with for a successful project. “It’s a top notch facility,” he said.

Council on Aging short on members

In other business, Council on Aging Board Chairman Marie Elwyn told the Select Board that unless more townspeople come forward to join, the only option would be to trim the membership roster.

Slated for nine slots, the board has only five members now, she said, and not all of them show up for meetings, making it tough to seat a quorum — the number needed for the group to vote.

“Our dilemma is we can’t get enough people,” she said.

Unable to meet the required benchmark, the board hasn’t met since May, Elwyn said. Now she wonders if the council is on shaky ground, legally. “Are we in trouble?” she asked.

Told that the membership number is baked into town bylaws, which only a town meeting vote can change, Elwyn wanted to know if there were “emergency measures” that could close the gap now.

Town Administrator Mike McGovern said the answer was no.

Select Board Chairman Bryan Sawyer pointed out that the fall town meeting is coming up relatively soon — Nov. 28 — and that the warrant for it opened that night, with a closing date of Oct. 17. That’s the window during which warrant articles are submitted for the board’s approval.

Another option would be to call for a special town meeting, but that would take time as well. “There’s a process,” he said.

“Ideally, three more members would do it,” McGovern said. But if the COA board thinks downsizing is the way to go, an article to that effect can be placed on the warrant, he said.

“Hopefully, the five members we have will step up in the meantime so we can have a quorum,” Elwyn said.

The state Senate is planning next week to debate legislation targeting persistent issues with host community agreements and social equity in the growing legal cannabis industry in Massachusetts.

There was no objection Thursday among members of the Senate Ways and Means Committee to favorably advancing a redrafted version of a bill to put tighter restrictions on the legally-required contracts between marijuana businesses and their host communities, establish a Cannabis Social Equity Trust Fund and lay the groundwork for cities and towns to allow on-site cannabis consumption establishments. Five committee members, three Democrats and two Republicans, opted to reserve their rights and did not weigh in favorably or unfavorably.

The Senate placed the bill (S 2801) on the agenda for Thursday, April 7, and established a deadline of 3 p.m. Monday for senators to propose amendments.

The Legislature has long maintained a mostly hands-off approach to marijuana policy. Lawmakers passed up their opportunities to act before voters approved decriminalization in 2008, medical marijuana in 2012 and adult legalization in 2016, but then delayed and rewrote significant portions of the 2016 ballot law legalizing marijuana. Otherwise, the Legislature has largely avoided cannabis issues though some provisions in the bill the Senate plans to take up next week mirror those of a bill that the House passed in early 2020 but which never surfaced in the Senate.

The bill would make grants and loans, including no-interest loans and forgivable loans, available to participants in the Cannabis Control Commission’s social equity (SE) program or economic empowerment (EE) priority applicants through a Cannabis Social Equity Trust Fund. Each year, the fund would get 10% of the money in the Marijuana Regulation Fund, which is where revenue brought in by the state’s marijuana excise tax, application and licensing fees, and industry penalties is deposited.

For fiscal year 2021, a 10% share of just the cannabis excise revenue ($112.37 million) would have worked out to about $11.24 million for the trust fund.

Massachusetts was the first state in the country to mandate that equity and inclusion be part of its legal cannabis framework and was the first to launch programs specifically designed to assist entrepreneurs and businesses from communities disproportionately harmed by the decades of marijuana prohibition.

But more than three years since the first legal sale here, just 6%of the licenses issued for the cannabis industry have gone to SE program participants or EE priority applicants, the Joint Committee on Cannabis Policy said when it released its draft of the legislation. Out of more than 1,000 applications submitted to the CCC as of November, just 232 came from SE or EE applicants.

Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz, who co-chairs the Joint Committee on Cannabis Policy, said the bill the Senate will debate next week “will take major steps to change that.”

“By reducing high costs of entry and providing new avenues to capital for social equity entrepreneurs, this bill tackles long-identified problems that have kept the cannabis industry in predominately white and already-wealthy hands,” the senator, who is also running for governor, said. “It’s a major breakthrough, not just for racial equity in this industry, but also towards closing our state’s gaping wealth divide overall and repairing some of the harms from the War on Drugs.”

The Senate bill also includes a provision that appears to redirect 1% of marijuana excise tax collections from social equity businesses to the municipalities where those businesses are located.

The bill text refers to a “sum equal to 1 per cent of the total sales price received under this section [dealing with the state’s 10.75% marijuana excise tax], from a marijuana retailer that is a social equity business” while a Senate Ways and Means Committee summary of the bill refers to “a sum equal to 1 per cent of the total sales received in the marijuana excise tax from marijuana retailers who are social equity businesses.” A spokesman for the committee did not immediately respond Thursday to a request for clarification.

On the issue of host community agreements (HCAs), the bill would direct the CCC to “review and approve host community agreements” and also to “regulate and enforce all host community agreements.” The CCC could only approve applications for provisional licensure or renewal if it has certified that the HCA is in compliance.

The bill would also more specifically define what can and cannot be included in the contracts, and would codify a municipality’s right to waive the requirement to have an HCA as a handful have already done.

HCAs have given businesses, prospective businesses and regulators fits basically since the CCC began licensing businesses here. Entrepreneurs, lawyers, lobbyists and regulators have pointed to stories about cities and towns demanding more from businesses than the state’s marijuana laws allow, up to 3% of gross sales. The CCC began wrestling with the issue in 2018, determined it lacks the authority to intervene or reject an application based on the HCA and voted in January 2019 to formally request that the Legislature give it that authority.

The bill to be considered in the Senate also addresses an issue that has kept social consumption sites — establishments where an adult could both purchase and use marijuana — from becoming a reality in Massachusetts.

More than two years ago, the CCC approved regulations that paved the way for establishments where adults could use marijuana together in a social setting. But the agency says the pilot program it has designed for up to 12 communities “would not be able to begin without a change in state law or the passage of legislation that will first allow cities and towns to authorize social consumption in their communities.”

The Senate bill includes language that would create a process for voters to “request that the question of whether to allow, in the city or town, the sale of marijuana and marijuana products for consumption on the premises where sold, be submitted to the voters of the city or town.”

The Senate on Thursday also teed up its own version (S 2802) of a House-approved women’s rights history trail bill for consideration next Thursday.

BOSTON — There was no opposition in the Joint Committee on Cannabis Policy to fresh legislation targeting persistent issues with host community agreements and social equity in the new cannabis industry, setting the Legislature up to involve itself in cannabis policy more closely than it has since rewriting voters’ legalization law five years ago.

All 16 members of the committee who weighed in on the legislation (H 174/S 72) in the poll that closed late last week were in favor of advancing the bill to put tighter restrictions on the legally required contracts between marijuana businesses and their host communities, establish a Cannabis Social Equity Trust Fund and lay the groundwork for cities and towns to allow on-site cannabis consumption establishments. And all 14 committee members who registered an opinion on a bill (S 73) relative to the expungement of convictions for marijuana possession voted to advance it favorably.

The more wide-ranging bill (H 174/S 72), which a spokesperson said is a priority for House Speaker Ron Mariano, addresses aspects of state laws that cannabis regulators and industry entrepreneurs have been increasingly vocal about taking issue with.

“The gap between the law’s stated commitment to equity and the on-the-ground reality of the industry shows just how much work we have left to do,” Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz, D-Boston, co-chair of the Joint Committee on Cannabis Policy, said. “There’s universal agreement about the problems: high costs of entry and lack of access to capital create a near-impossible barrier for many talented entrepreneurs. This bill addresses both sides of that coin. I’m thrilled we’re finally advancing it.”

The Legislature has long maintained a hands-off approach to marijuana policy. Lawmakers passed up their opportunities to act before voters approved decriminalization in 2008, medical marijuana in 2012 and recreational use legalization in 2016, but then delayed and rewrote significant portions of the 2016 ballot law legalizing marijuana. Otherwise, the Legislature has largely avoided cannabis issues though some provisions in the new committee bill mirror those of a bill that the House passed in early 2020 but which never surfaced in the Senate.

Massachusetts was the first state in the country to mandate that equity and inclusion be part of its legal cannabis framework and was the first to launch programs specifically designed to assist entrepreneurs and businesses from communities disproportionately harmed by the decades of marijuana prohibition.

But more than three years since the first legal sale here, just 6% of the licenses issued for the cannabis industry have gone to social equity program participants or economic empowerment priority applicants, the committee said. Out of more than 1,000 applications submitted to the CCC as of November, just 232 came from social equity or economic empowerment applicants.

The committee’s bill would make no-interest loans, forgivable loans and grants available through a Cannabis Social Equity Trust Fund that would be seeded with $10 million and refreshed with 20% of the revenue brought in by the state’s marijuana excise tax. For fiscal year 2021, that 20% share of cannabis excise revenue ($112.3 million) would have worked out to about $22.5 million for the trust fund.

Similar funds have been or are being created in Connecticut, New York, Illinois and Virginia. The committee said that the creation of the trust fund “is responsive to advocacy by the Cannabis Control Commission, whose commissioners voted unanimously to endorse the idea earlier this legislative session.”

In a statement the CCC issued minutes after the committee’s poll closed Friday, the agency said it was grateful for the committee’s work and “looks forward to reviewing” the legislation and “continuing to collaborate” with the Legislature as it progresses.

“For several years, we have been intentional about advocating for urgently needed changes to Massachusetts’ cannabis laws. Among them, Commissioners past and present have called for 1) the authority to regulate, review, and enforce host community agreements, along with clarification about what state law allows within those contracts; 2) a state-administered fund composed of public and private resources for equity businesses to receive low- or zero-interest loans or grants; and 3) a technical amendment to state law that will allow municipalities to adopt social consumption licensing,” the CCC said.

The committee’s bill also addresses the other two priority issues the CCC highlighted. The bill authorizes and directs the CCC to review host community agreements as part of the license application process and to only approve applications after certifying that the agreement is in compliance, would more specifically define what can and cannot be included in the contracts, and would codify a municipality’s right to waive the requirement to have a host community agreement as a handful have already done.

Host community agreements have given businesses, prospective businesses and regulators fits since the CCC began licensing businesses. Entrepreneurs, lawyers, lobbyists and regulators have pointed to stories about cities and towns demanding more from businesses than the state’s marijuana laws allow, up to 3% of gross sales. The CCC began wrestling with the issue in 2018, determined it lacks the authority to intervene or reject an application based on the host community agreement and voted in January 2019 to formally request that the Legislature give it that authority.

Under the bill, the CCC would be directed to implement a “safe harbor period” during which host communities, marijuana establishments and medical marijuana treatment centers “shall renegotiate in good faith any existing host community agreement that is out of compliance with this act.” The bill also instructs the CCC to “review all host community agreements that have received their final license and commenced operations as of the effective date of this act and strike any provision of a host community agreement that is not in compliance.”

The committee bill appears to address a quirk (the committee referred to it as “technical errors”) that has kept so-called marijuana cafes — establishments where an adult could both purchase and use marijuana — from becoming a reality in Massachusetts.

More than two years ago, the CCC approved regulations that paved the way for establishments where adults could use marijuana together in a social setting. But the agency says the pilot program it has designed for up to 12 communities “would not be able to begin without a change in state law or the passage of legislation that will first allow cities and towns to authorize social consumption in their communities.”

The bill includes language that would create a process by which residents could “request that the question of whether to allow, in such city or town, the sale of marijuana and marijuana products for consumption on the premises where sold be submitted to the voters of such city or town.”