As we beforehand broadly summarized on December 27, 2022 (right here), in late December 2022, the Workplace of Hashish Administration (“OCM”) launched its first proposed adult-use hashish guidelines and regulation for New York (the “Proposed Rules”). The official document is 282 pages, so we gained’t cowl each element. However we’ll spotlight the big-ticket objects, important points that every one candidates ought to pay attention to, and the license utility course of as a complete. Additionally, understand that the Proposed Rules are nonetheless pending as OCM receives the ultimate public feedback to the Proposed Rules.
One of many much less outlined and nonetheless ambiguous parts of the Proposed Rules pertains to these making use of for a hashish license as a microbusiness, as we await on the willpower of the scale and scope of eligible microbusinesses.
What are microbusinesses and their licenses?
A microbusiness is a hashish enterprise topic to sure dimension and operational restrictions. The Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Act (the “MRTA”) permits sure companies with much less entry to capital to enter into the authorized hashish market by making use of for a microbusiness license which authorizes the small-scale manufacturing, sale, and supply of hashish.
A microbusiness licensee could, to a restricted diploma, have interaction in cultivation, processing, distribution, supply, and sale of the microbusiness’ personal hashish and hashish merchandise. Such licensees can not maintain an curiosity in every other license; nevertheless, they might distribute their very own hashish and hashish merchandise to licensed retail dispensaries.
How you can qualify for and acquire a microbusiness license
The New York Hashish Management Board (the “CCB”) will difficulty microbusiness licenses to a hashish institution that qualifies as a hashish producer for the cultivation of hashish, a hashish processor, a hashish distributor, and a hashish retailer. A microbusiness license authorizes the restricted cultivation, processing, distribution, supply, and sale of the microbusiness’ personal adult-use hashish and hashish merchandise.
The scale, scope, and eligibility of hashish microbusinesses has but to be decided by the CCB, nevertheless, the CCB will doubtless difficulty licenses to microbusinesses in a fashion that promotes social and financial fairness candidates.
What can a microbusiness licensee do?
A microbusiness shall have interaction in cultivation and a minimum of one of many following extra actions licensed by the Proposed Rules for a microbusiness: (1) processing, (2) distribution, or (3) retail sale. Moreover, a microbusiness could promote hashish to a processor or distributor; promote hashish merchandise it has cultivated or processed to customers; and ship hashish or hashish merchandise to a processor for processing with out relinquishing possession of that hashish or hashish product.
What can’t a microbusiness licensee do?
A microbusiness shall not, amongst different issues, buy hashish cultivated by one other cultivator until the microbusiness suffered a big crop failure and acquired prior written approval of the Workplace. As well as, no microbusiness or its true social gathering of curiosity is permitted to have any direct or oblique curiosity in, together with, however not restricted to, being a real social gathering of curiosity, passive investor, landlord, financier, or administration providers supplier to a retail dispensary, on-site consumption, supply, ROD, registered group, or hashish laboratory licensee or permittee.
Conclusion
For anybody contemplating making use of for an adult-use license, we reiterate our suggestion of hiring an skilled, native hashish legal professional. At a minimal, understanding the general framework of the licenses and the licensing course of is a precursor to an in-depth session on a license utility.
Keep tuned for future posts on this sequence, in addition to protection of New York hashish typically.