Here comes more New York cannabis program litigation.
After one lawsuit halted a significant portion of New York Conditional Adult Use Retail Dispensary (CAURD) program, a new lawsuit filed on March 16, 2023 by the Coalition for Access to Regulated & Safe Cannabis against the Cannabis Control Board (CCB), Office of Cannabis Management (OCM), CCB Chairwoman Tremaine Wright and OCM Executive Director Chris Alexander seeks to abolish the CAURD program in its entirety and open the retail dispensary application portal now.
As first reported by Brad Racino of NY Cannabis Insider, the coalition includes several New York registered organizations (i.e. medical cannabis providers), including Acreage Holdings, PharmaCann, Green Thumb Industries and Curaleaf, two potential retail dispensary applicants and a medical cannabis practitioner.
Here’s what the “petitioner” is requesting from a legal perspective:
a judicial declaration that the OCM’s creation of the CAURD program exceeded the OCM’s authority under New York’s constitution (i.e. abolishing the CAURD program completely); a judicial order requiring the CCB and OCM to open the adult-use retail dispensary application window immediately (i.e. letting anyone apply now); and a judicial order requiring the CCB and OCM to take action to stop illicit and unlicensed cannabis businesses.
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