Episode 14: Tokerdamus for 2022!

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HIGHLIGHTS: Tokerdamus 2022: States that will legalize this year, the rise of delivery, California state progress?

+ More?!? CT to open license applications + Ohio ballot initiative signature debacle

Hybrid News/Analysis Extract from 420+ Sources: Featuring all the developments this past week in the cannabis world on the federal level, state legalization/implementation, science/technology, business deals, international scene, social equity, celebrity cameos, and miscellaneous ridiculousness.

DISCLAIMER: All opinions are my own, and not those of my law firm Zuber Lawler. Even though I drop knowledge bombs, the show is NOT legal advice.

Send comments to: jp@globalcannabistimes.com

Transcription

WE NOTE THAT THE FOLLOWING TRANSCRIPT WAS CREATED BY A ROBOT THAT MAY NOT HAVE APPRECIATED THE FINE POINTS AND NAMES SPOKEN BY JON, SO PLEASE FORGIVE ANY TYPOS, OR BIAS IN FAVOR OF OUR FUTURE ROBOT OVERLORDS:

Welcome to the January 10th episode, the first episode of 2022 of cannabis last week from global cannabis times hybrid news analysis extract from over 420 sources each week. I’m your host, John Pirro and our highlights stories as well. And highlight for anyone really. I play Toca dominance for 2022, making some predictions for the industry this year.

And Connecticut is opening up applications for adult use licenses. Now, before we get down to business, I need to make my standard. Disclaimer, by day I practice cannabis and IP law at the law firm, Zuber Lawler. So I did note that any views expressed during this podcast are my own and not those of Zuber Lawler.

For example, if I was to say that. Oh, Macron is unbelievably contagious. That would be a fact. And that would be a very good example. So that wouldn’t be an example of my opinion versus out of my law firm. So next time I’ll do better. And as I need to note, this podcast is not legal advice, so don’t be a dumdum and treat it like it is as always, if you have any feedback, please send it to jp@globalcannabistimes.com all right on to the news and by news, the first part is I’m going to be Toker dominance for 2020.

Or smoke or dominance? I don’t know. I like them both, but when you’re going to say for 20, 22, I’m always going to go with alliteration. So this week it’s Toker Domus for 2022. So what I’ll say is this to a certain extent this year is going to be a bit more of the same. Unfortunately, I think that on the federal side, There’s no reason to expect anything meaningful this year, because it is a midterm election year Republicans smell opportunity.

They smell blood in the water from Biden and the other Democrats. And I don’t think that they’re going to be handing Democrats any wins really unnecessarily, even though there could be bipartisan support for something like the safe banking act. If the democratic senatorial leadership like Chuck Schumer, wasn’t holding it back.

So I don’t really expect anything major on that front now. In terms of other trends that we’re going to see. I think that already delivery is going to continue to rise. When I moderated a great panel. Benzinga Peter Barsoum of 1906. Talked about how delivery is important because it’s convenience. And that’s what people expect when they’re buying in the illicit market.

And so as Amazon has proven, you know, you either kill people with price or you can kill them with convenience and delivery is going to continue rising. And the question is, how’s it going to affect things? One thing is it enables greater product diversification. So I’m a member of the cannabis beverage association.

I’m on their marketing committee. And one of the wonderful companies making awesome beverages, they’re pointed out to me that delivery was great for them because it’s easier when beverages don’t have to take up shelf space, then they could be put in a large refrigeration unit and then shipped out and delivered to different places so they can makes product diversification easier.

But it’s also going to place a premium on uniform. Right. Which was something we were always chasing in this industry is a uniform experience. Because if people are ordering things by delivery, you know, they want a uniform experience. They want to know what they’re getting. And so I think that that’s going to lead down that road of uniform.

If people aren’t going into the actual stores to try out different products than perhaps smaller cost products so that people could sample and see what they like is something that would make sense as delivery rises. You know, speaking of delivery, keep in mind, Uber and Amazon are alerting. Amazon is already.

Lobbying on the federal level. And Uber CEO has already said that they’re going to move into delivery when federal legalization happens. And another trend that I think we’re going to see in 2022 playing Toca Domus, as I would say, if I was from the new England. I think that the continued rise of terpene that’s going to happen, the industry is beginning to understand broadly that the sativa versus indigo distinction is bullshit.

And so turpines and how they interact with people’s physiology or whatever can create a much more consistent uniform results. As I was talking about with respect to delivery. And so I think there’s going to be a lot more emphasis on terpene mixes and ways to kind of figure out how to make those uniform for person to person.

And I could not play Toca Domus without looking at which states we think are going to go legal. So, as I’ve been saying for a long time, I think that the most likely stay with the largest population. That’s going to make a major step forward next year is going to be Ohio, but it’s going to be by ballot.
And I’ll actually go over to that when we start recapping the news for this week a little bit. So I think Ohio will go by ballot and that’s 11 million people, right? Yeah. I think that Missouri also is promising to potentially go legal by ballot as well. Missouri is also a nice little population there.

It has St. Louis. That’s a nice step. And in terms of other states, I think that Oklahoma will go adult use. They have such a fascinating market there. And I think that it’s going to be time for that to crossover and to adult use because medical markets set up there as effectively don’t use than a lot of ways.

I think that Rhode Island is going to go legal by the legislature following a trend that started in 2021. But I don’t think a lot of states are going go legal by legislature. This year, Rhode Island will, they are close. And the only issue that’s holding up right now is who’s going to govern it. I’ll touch upon that really, really briefly thing under state news.

And then I also think. I mean let’s circle back. Right. And in the words of the Beastie boys, listen, all y’all sabotage. Let’s look at the two states where governors and legislators and courts sabotaged, things that were approved by the voters. You have South Dakota where adult use was sabotaged by the governor and then her opposition to the ballot passed by voters was held up in the courts.

I think that South Dakota will go back on the ballot again, and I think that’ll be legalized as time for adult use. And the other example of sabotage was Mississippi, which was held up in a court system by ridiculous technicality. I think that Mississippi is going to go medical by ballot again this year.

And the other one that certainly be an interesting development is Maryland. I think it could go legal if it gets on the ballot, people are seeming to think that this is going to happen. So I’m going to go in with that too, but I don’t think necessarily that we’re going to see movement on Pennsylvania, which would be really exciting.

Despite all the other movement on the Northeast, by me where I’m based. And I don’t know if Florida is going to happen or not. Florida is too quirky for me to want to stick out my neck, uh, make any predictions on that. And the last thing that I’m going to predict when it comes to Toca Domus in 2022 is California has reached the point where something’s got to give.

Yes. And I mean that in the sense of the Nancy Myers movie, that’s the reference I’m making her preferencing and Nancy Meyers movie. I’m cool with that. So let’s say that, you know, California has Jack Nicholson is choosing between Diane Keaton, the more practical legal market and Amanda Peet, the A-list.

You know, more dangerous element market. I think that finally, this is the year where California things are getting so ridiculous that something’s going to be done. And I do think that there is some hope that the cultivation tax, which is the obvious thing to tweak in order to give the legal market a better chance of succeeding.

I think that something hopefully will happen to the cultivation tax. You have provisional licenses that are not. Being transitioned to over at any rate. And so actually recently, a hundred million dollars bullets handed out by California to different municipalities to move those along to actual full licenses.

I think that’s something might happen where perhaps they, you know, continue figuring out a way for provisional to become full as I’m reading. And perhaps there’s also some way that California incentivizes municipalities that have opted out in order to opt in. So there’ll be more legal. Licenses handed out in certain areas.

So that’s my other thing. There will be progress made in California substantive progress to fight against the illicit market. All right.

STATE NEWS

Now, moving on to the actual news of the week in Ohio. Right. Uh, adult youth coming to Ohio is what Neil young would sing if he was me on a cannabis podcast. So in Ohio I’ve been tracking the story cause it is like my big thing that I think is going to happen this year in terms of legalization there.

So to recap, to go back, right, they have this quirky system of an initiated statute. So. Activist need to get 130,000 signatures in order to take it to the legislature in order to get that in front of them, in order for them to say no most likely, most likely. And if they say no, then they need another hundred and 30,000 signatures in order to get it onto the ballot in November.

So here we are. Right. And before the end of the year, they announced that they got 210,000 approximately. And in order to take it to the legislature, but, and I was like, oh wow, that’s a lot.

That’s way over the 130,000, why they have to go so much over because they apparently knew what was going to happen because election officials looked at those approximately 210,000 signatures and knocked out.

Kenya guess it remember prices, right? Rules. You don’t want to go over. If you predicted 86,000 signatures, you be correct because they rejected 87,000 signatures. Meaning if you do the math, you crunch the numbers really quickly, which they don’t like to do because I became a lawyer solely to not have to do any.

They actually needed more signatures after the elections officials went through the count. And so they have a need to approximately get another 14,000 signatures before January 14th. So if you’re in Ohio signed something. Right, get this going. And then they’re just going to have to go back to the well again, when the legislature rejects it, moving on to other exciting state news, Connecticut is opening up applications for adult use licenses within 30 days or so.

So the department of consumer protection is the one that’s in charge of regulating the market in Connecticut. And so for certain licenses, they’re going to be accepted. They’re actually still in the process of drafting rules to govern the adult use industry. And with the timetable that they’re talking about, it seems as if they’re going to try and get sales going before the end of this year.

And so they actually announced that they’re going to be the minimum amount of licenses awarded in this round. It’s going to be 12 retailer licenses, 10 delivery licenses, and four hybrid retailer licenses. And the licenses are going to be split amongst the general and the social equity applicants. But this isn’t, this is not a cap.

This was the initial round that they’re saying, they’re going to hand out now in related news, the Stepford wives released a statement. So. Well, if we’re going to be brainwashed leaves the robots for our husbands, at least we get to get high. So, I guess I didn’t need to do a spoiler alert cause that’s what a 50 or 60 year old book and a couple movie adaptations, the 2041 with Nicole Cayman.

Not supposed to be very good. All right. I’m not going to feel too guilty for not sending spoiler alert as a bottom line on that. Moving over to my birth state, New York still can’t totally wrap it around in New Jersey. I for so long, New Jersey. I don’t even know how to call myself. So I guess I still not fully there in my brain in New York, December 31st was the deadline for New York municipalities to opt out of hosting retail, dispensaries, or onsite consumption in the end, it appears approximately 42% of municipalities opted out.

But keep in mind that the regulations are now. So can you really blame them for opting out with the ability to opt back in? I can’t so not so unreasonable and it doesn’t mean that it’s going to end up. And moving over to New Hampshire, Republican controlled house of reps said nine to a new legalization bill, which would have set up an adult use market.

However, there was another bill that passed out of the house, the related to home cultivation, everything because New Hampshire keep in mind, their motto is live free or die. So they’re very, very down for you to be able to do certain things themselves, but the market is going to take a little bit more time to get up and running, uh, by legislation or otherwise and Kansas Democrats and the Kansas house and belt three proposed constitutional amendments.

And one of them would legalize medical and adult use cannabis. I’m not holding my breath on the chances of success for that one. Moving over to Kentucky. There’s actually a Republican led bill to legalize medical marijuana and Kentucky and Atlanta and the state legislature. And this is kind of an update on prior legalization efforts by representative Jason NIMS themes, Nemo.

That guy he’s moving forward with a new proposal. That’s based off of stuff that he’s done in the proposed in the past with some tweaks to try and make it a little bit more luring to his Republican colleagues,

BUSINESS NEWS

Moving over to business or green new deals, or Merimbula however my want to call it that week.
MJ biz has sold to Emerald X, which is a subsidiary of Emerald holding a media and event company. And MJ biz home with MJ biz con home of MJ biz daily for a total of $120 million. Cure leaf, one of the largest MSO in the country, perhaps I guess the largest by certain measures, Cura leaf has a couple pieces of news this week and the world of business.

They have entered into a definitive agreement to acquire bloom. Dispensary’s a vertically integrated cannabis company in Arizona and all cash transactions. A value up to $211 million. They’re get expecting to close by the end of the month. And the transaction will include four retail dispensary’s and Phoenix, Tucson, Peoria, and Sedona.

And also it’s going to add to their growth there, where it’s going to have let’s see, adjacent cultivation processing facilities, totaling, approximately 63,500 square feet of space. And other cure leaf news, they announced that they’re going to settle 10 lawsuits brought after there was that little snafu in which CBD, supposedly CBD, only products actually contain THC.
So yeah, so those 10 of those lawsuits were settled.

PSYCHEDELIC NEWS

Moving on a little bit of psychedelics news that I want to report a bill to legalize psilocybin was introduced in Washington. It would include supported psilocybins experiences by professionals licensed by the state. They don’t have to be doctors, but essentially these would be your Sharman for the trip.
And this has been introduced. So let’s see if Washington can move forward in similar fashion to Oregon. And legalize psilocybin and

CELEBRITY CAMEO

My one funny little celebrity cameo of the week or past two weeks, really Kevin Smith, the director, the maker of clerks. And. And many things since that did not rise to that level.

Unfortunately, in my opinion, there’s an opinion. I showed a leg with Kevin Smith, ran into his own daughter at a dispensary. And what did he say afterwards? Someone raised that kid. Right? Alrighty. And with that I say, as usual stay grassy, my buds and I will see you next week.

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