Weed Wanted

Friday, March 29, 2024

Cannabis Just Got A Little Greener in Washington

Washington state took a big step in making the cannabis industry a little greener when the legislature passed SB 5376 which will allow the sale of cannabis waste and cut down on landfill waste. The bill was signed into law by Gov. Jay Inslee, with the help of sisters McKenzie and Avery, on Monday, March 25, 2024.

SB 5376 allows a licensed producer or processor to sell cannabis waste to the public to be used in gardening applications such as composting or as insecticides, in industrial materials such as “hempcrete,” or many other uses that seem to be growing along with the industry.

The Need for a Greener Industry

Washington state currently has roughly 2,200 cannabis producer and processor licenses. While not all are the same and waste generated from each can be significantly different, Zero Waste Washington estimates cannabis producers can produce roughly 500-1,000 pounds of organic cannabis waste every week. Further records from Washington state show that cannabis operations as a whole can produce tens of thousands of pounds of organic cannabis waste each year.

Prior to the passage of SB 5376, Washington law required producers and processors to render all cannabis waste unusable before it was to be destroyed, typically in landfills.

Producers and processors would routinely mix the organic cannabis waste with anything from food or cat litter to chemicals or harmful additives and oil as required by law to make render the material unusable by bad actors. This unusable mixture would then be disposed of as dangerous waste, usually sent to the landfill. Instead, this waste is now able to be diverted from the landfill and used for more environmentally safe purposes.

Proponents of the measure have long since argued that this is only the first step in making the cannabis industry more ecofriendly by cutting down on waste and associated pollution. Another area of focus is on limiting or eliminating plastic packaging for cannabis products like edibles and raw flower.

Restrictions Still Apply, Although a Greener Future Is Ahead for Washington

The new law does have a few restrictions but for the most part, should provide a much more ecologically friendly option for waste products to the Washington state cannabis industry. Restrictions in the bill include (a) the waste to be sold would not be designated as hazardous or hazardous waste; (b) the seller notifies the Washington state Department of Agriculture before the sale; and (c) the seller of the waste product makes all sales available to the public on an equal and nondiscriminatory basis. Additionally, any unsold cannabis waste must still then be rendered unusable before leaving the producer or processor.

Washington’s passage of SB 5376 signals a significant shift toward sustainability in the cannabis industry. By repurposing cannabis waste and reducing landfill reliance, the state is not only embracing ecologically safe practices but also setting a precedent for an environmentally responsible cannabis industry.

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420 in Maryland means buy one, get one for $10 on Curio Wellness

420 in Maryland is coming to you hot from Curio Wellness with a buy one, get one for $10 sale on these special Curio Wellness products.

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Thursday, March 28, 2024

Leafly Buzz: 13 top cannabis strains of March 2024

Leafly Buzz’s premium marijuana strain roundup heads to Barcelona for Tea Time, Luna, and piatella hash.

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Wednesday, March 27, 2024

California’s Cannabis Industry Conundrum and the Road Ahead

Despite continuously surpassing every other state with recreational cannabis in terms of total retail sales, California’s cannabis industry has faced continuous and far-reaching issues on multiple levels that have only spread even further. From declining sales that result in hundreds of millions less in total retail sales to a massive illicit market that the state ignores, problems abound. California has even seen a pattern of dispensaries and cultivation facilities across California being burglarized and robbed. Suffice it to say, the state’s industry has colossal problems, the magnitudes of which haven’t been seen by any neighboring state.

The issues don’t even include the many internal issues that the California industry is facing, such as unpaid debts and taxes equaling millions and a lackluster effort at social equity inclusion. In fact, issues regarding the illicit market are moving into other states and impacting their total sales as well. In just the first year of operation, the Unified Cannabis Enforcement Taskforce seized over $312 million in illicit cannabis in 2023, which amounts to more than the total cannabis sales of entire states combined. But as an aside, you can read my colleague, Griffen Thorne’s take on why those numbers are insignificant. Either way, given how admittedly widespread the illicit market of cannabis in California is, those several hundred million dollars in illegally grown cannabis seized by the state is just a miniscule fraction of the colossal amount of the total scope of that illegal and unregulated market.

Internal Struggles and Regulatory Hurdles

The ramifications of these many shortcomings and industry-wide problems are being felt like ripple effects that never truly stop flowing. Like the heads of a hydra beast, hardships and disadvantages spring up from one another when dealing with an industry as large yet frequently impeded upon such as the California industry. Worse even, the billion-dollar industry continues to considerably drop in total annual sales. In 2022, sales dropped over eight percent, equaling over $400 million and the total sales figure from 2023 shows an unfortunately similar pattern. In 2023, California dispensaries sold a total of $5.1 billion in total sales, which itself is a 4.7 percent decline in sales from the already slumping 2022. In total, sales are down a considerable 11 percent from the highest point of sales in 2021 and month over month show painfully little sign of improvement.

Even among fully legal and compliant operators in California, delayed and delinquent tax payments are a growing issue, with hundreds of different tax liabilities being owed by various cannabis businesses. With the exorbitant taxes that California cannabis operators must already regularly pay, the penalties caused by these delays and tax debts could very easily put a business under.

Bay Area Shutdowns and Rising Crime

Any industry professionals who felt falsely optimistic that the precarious conditions and problems that plague the California cannabis industry wouldn’t trail into 2024 were proven entirely wrong, as those widespread and multi-faceted issues have followed nearly every legal and compliant cannabis operator well into the new year. Already dealing with several other systemic and engrossing issues which are the aftermaths of ineffective policies, the Bay Area in particular has been once again hit with a new problem caused by the cascading effects of the many previously mentioned issues.

Cannabis businesses across the state have been either permanently or at least temporarily shutting down. This is bad news for everyone with a stake in the industry – from owners, to employees, to customers, to even neighbors who could benefit from the now-lost tax revenue.

Enforcement Failures and Policy Repercussions

Throughout the tumultuous year of 2023, Bay Area law enforcement continued to conduct several million-dollar operations, with these raids easily surpassing $10 million and thousands of illegally cultivated cannabis plants. Even more concerning, multiple firearms and thousands in cash were also found in these illegal grows. But again, this enforcement is declining and not nearly enough.

What has occurred, and continues to unfold, is an existential crisis for the entire cannabis community. The cannabis industry and legalization were founded on the premise of ending the failed War on Drugs and ceasing the incarceration of mostly black and brown individuals for victimless crimes. However, the current strain on cannabis communities, influenced by the illicit market, has reached a critical point, and business owners are experiencing the increasingly negative impacts of long-term enforcement gaps.

The Path Forward: Challenges and Solutions

What activists fail to acknowledge is that we are now facing the consequences of policies promoted for decades. The rallying cry, “Nobody should go to jail for a plant,” must now evolve. It’s time to end the War on Drugs and begin enforcing regulations to protect the industry. Creative enforcement strategies, beyond imprisonment, must be explored. Enforcement agencies and the cannabis industry, despite their historical distrust, will need to collaborate to achieve this. A short-term policy of stronger enforcement through collaboration can help reduce predominantly illicit sales. Eventually, this will lead to broader consumer acceptance of safe cannabis, purchased from reputable sources. This combined with tax relief can prevent this industry from falling into further despair.

As 2024 progresses, the multifaceted crisis confronting the California cannabis industry is expected to deteriorate further unless substantial changes are implemented by key organizations such as the Department of Cannabis Control, the Attorney General’s Office, and various law enforcement bodies. The shift from advocating the end of the Drug War to calling for enforcement marks a significant turning point. However, for meaningful change to occur, former advocates must collaborate with the government to creatively address these challenges and navigate the current storm.

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Tuesday, March 26, 2024

California Cannabis Litigation: Threats of License Loss and Injunctions

An injunction is a request to the court for immediate relief from harm or potential harm. Its purpose is to stop harmful activity, prevent future misconduct or maintain the status quo during the pending litigation. While courts are often hesitant to grant such relief, recent trends suggest a shift in attitude, especially within the cannabis sector.

As any of our litigators will tell you, securing an injunction in California is no easy feat. But California courts may be willing to grant them if cannabis licenses are at stake, in addition to other circumstances such as actual or threatened intellectual property infringement.

What are the legal standards for injunctions?

To receive an injunction, a plaintiff must convince the court, among other things, of the likelihood of success on the merits of its claims and that it will suffer irreparable harm without the relief. As to the first part, the plaintiff must show it will likely succeed on at least one cause of action in its complaint. This does not mean a certainty of success, simply that the facts and the law demonstrate a good possibility of prevailing. While this may seem daunting, a well-pled complaint usually meets this threshold requirement.

The toughest hurdle is demonstrating irreparable harm to the court. If the harm is not imminent, or if the injured party can be made whole via a monetary award, an injunction will be denied. For example, if there is simply a threat of lost money, as opposed to some kind of intangible or non-monetary harm, the injunction will probably be denied.

But, if the loss of a cannabis license is at stake, California courts have shown a willingness to issue narrowly drawn injunctions – probably because they have started to realize that a cannabis license is unlike other business licenses.

What’s so special about cannabis licenses?

In the California cannabis space, there are only a finite number of licenses (while that’s not exactly the case at the state level presently, it is true at the local level where licenses are often explicitly capped or at least capped via restrictive zoning and undue concentration requirements).

Cannabis licenses involve a strict, and often very lengthy application process. Windows of opportunity are by definition narrow. In some locales, business owners may have to forgo other opportunities to apply for a specific license. And in many cases, if a license is lost – for any reason – reapplication may be difficult or even impossible.

Based on factors like these, California courts may be more inclined to believe that the threat of loss of cannabis licenses presents a unique, non-monetary, and irreparable harm.

Balancing hardships and public interest

A final hurdle to secure an injunction involves demonstrating a balance of hardships in favor of the plaintiff, and considering the public interest. In business disputes, courts weigh the possibility of a license loss and the ease of granting relief against the hardship of the party opposing the injunction. For example, imagine a partnership dispute where one party threatens to take some action that would result in loss of licensure. The other party may want an injunction prohibiting that action. The original party may oppose the injunction on various grounds, and the court would then balance those potential hardships. If a license is at play, that will likely factor into the court’s ultimate decision.

Where appropriate, the courts also consider the public’s interest in the relief requested. This might not always be a hotly contested factor in a B2B or partnership dispute, but it’s certainly possible.

The tide is turning for Cannabis injunctions

Obtaining an injunction to protect a cannabis license in California can be challenging, but recent developments suggest the tide is turning in favor of such relief. With courts increasingly recognizing the significance of cannabis licenses and the irreparable harm caused by their loss, seeking an injunction in the right circumstances can be a prudent investment.

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