STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — A recently resolved court injunction put New York’s fledgling legal marijuana industry on hold for months, but it’s starting to take shape, including on Staten Island.
Michael Gertelman, head of a soon-to-open delivery service called NugHub, said his business is slated to open in the coming weeks around the same time a brick-and-mortar establishment, Flowery, is set to open in Charleston.
Gertelman said Tuesday that his delivery service, headquartered in Port Richmond, just needs an inspection from the state Office of Cannabis Management (OCM) on the way to being fully licensed.
“We’ve been raring to go for a few months now, so we’re not going to lose too much time once the license comes,” he said. “Since the injunction is over, I’ve been daily emailing OCM trying to make this happen.”
A group of veterans sued OCM, the state Cannabis Control Board and the individual heads of the two agencies in August over the initial rollout of New York’s legal recreational weed market.
The group’s lawsuit alleged that the state violated the Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Act, which former Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed in 2021 establishing the legal market.
Under the law, the Cannabis Control Board had to prioritize certain groups for at least 50% of the state’s conditional adult-use recreational dispensary (CAURD) licenses, but had only made them available to people with weed-related convictions and family members of those people. Eligible owners had to have owned a prior business as well.
Albany Supreme Court Judge Kevin Bryant put the halt on the weed industry in place shortly after plaintiffs filed the lawsuit preventing most new retail licenses from being issued or weed shop openings in New York, but the parties announced an agreement in November initiating an end to the lawsuit.
Under the state law, service-disabled veterans are among the benefitted groups, which also includes “distressed farmers” and minority-and-women-owned businesses.
Initially, the state only made dispensary licenses available to people with weed-related convictions or their family members, but officials opened the licenses to the general public in October, likely paving the way for an end to the lawsuit.
Gertelman was one of several business owners who filed affidavits in that case, laying out the hardships their businesses faced because of the injunction.
Last month, Gov. Kathy Hochul announced she expected 37 dispensaries to open by the end of 2023, indicating the industry had gotten back on track.
“As New York expands the most equitable cannabis market in the nation, my administration remains committed to building a safe industry for all New Yorkers that will grow our small business community,” Hochul said. “These new dispensaries continue our mission of strengthening our legal market while at the same time helping to push out the bad actors who skirt our laws and undermine all we are trying to accomplish.”
H/T: www.silive.com
