New York’s Workplace of Hashish Administration (OCM) has posted the cease-and-desist letters despatched to 66 companies it accused final February of gifting hashish unlawfully. The company had refused to publish the letters – even denying a FOIL request from Gothamist – however backed down after public stress from the information group.
The letters have been despatched to companies all through the state, together with these in Syracuse, Bathtub, Elmira, Elmira Heights, Barton, Lackawanna, Lyons, Horseheads, Watkins Glen, Penn Yan, Webster, Waverly, Lockport, Buffalo, Depew, Amherst, Rochester, Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx. The company additionally despatched a letter to an organization based mostly in Wayne, New Jersey.
The letters are all uniform, warning the addressee that failure to conform may put their “capacity to acquire a license within the authorized hashish market at substantial threat,” though it’s unknown whether or not any of the companies or people intend on making use of for a license.
The letters declare that “unlicensed gross sales undermine the authorized market that’s being constructed by introducing merchandise that aren’t lab-tested and probably threaten public well being and security.”
The letter additionally warns that landlords “internet hosting criminal activity” on their premises are “jeopardizing” their “capacity to accommodate a licensed retail dispensary or on-site consumption lounge sooner or later.”
Steve Zissou, an lawyer representing Empire Hashish Golf equipment, which was focused with two letters, instructed Gothamist that he believes the membership mannequin – promoting a each day or month-to-month membership somewhat than hashish – is authorized beneath state legislation. He described the membership’s mannequin as a “non-charitable, not-for-profit hashish dispensary that doesn’t obtain compensation for the switch of hashish.”
“There’s an outdated saying: If you would like peace, put together for warfare,” Zissou instructed Gothamist. “And so Empire needs peace, however they’re ready for warfare if and when it comes.”
OCM Government Director Chris Alexander instructed Gothamist that along with breaking New York’s hashish legislation, the companies are “breaking state tax and a number of other municipal legal guidelines.”
“I sit up for working with different regulatory our bodies throughout the state to carry these shops accountable for his or her flagrant violations of the legislation,” he mentioned.
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