Author: News Room

Americans spend $60 billion a year on weed—so what do the people growing the 6th biggest cash crop in the country spend their money on? Functional and decorative art, of course. The art world’s major annual Art Basel Miami Beach turned 20 this year. Galleries from five continents and countless US collectives flocked to medically legal Florida for three days, transforming the city into a place where ATMs rank you by wealth and bananas taped to walls sell for $120,000. Cannabis makes fine art even finer, of course, and weed money has long-helped pay artists’ bills. Legalization and normalization just…

WAKEFIELD, Massachusetts, Dec. 7, 2022 – PRESS RELEASE – Curaleaf Holdings, Inc., announced a first-of-its-kind cannabis education partnership for its Grassroots brand with Ganjier, the Cannabis Sommelier Certification Program.Similar to the Sommelier’s role in the wine industry, the Ganjier is trained in the art, science and appreciation of cannabis craft, consumption, and connoisseurship, possessing a multidisciplinary knowledge and astute professionalism serving to raise the standard of excellence throughout the cannabis industry. Following the overwhelming response to Ganjier’s third year of record enrollments, the 2023 edition of this groundbreaking cannabis sommelier certification will feature the first-ever partnership for cannabis education and training…

The New Mexico Department of Health (NMDOH) is adding a new qualifying condition to its medical cannabis program for the first time since June 2019–bringing the total to 29.The NMDOH announced at the Medical Cannabis Advisory Board meeting Dec. 6 that it is adding anxiety disorder to the list of qualifying conditions for enrollment starting Jan. 1, 2023.A petition requesting for anxiety disorder to be added as a qualifying condition was submitted to the board in March for consideration and was approved in November by David R. Scrase, Ph.D., Acting Cabinet Secretary for the DOH, according to a press release…

Vertically integrated multistate operator Ayr Wellness announced its intention to donate $100,000 to restorative justice initiatives as part of its second annual “12 Days of Giving” holiday donation campaign.Ayr is donating $1.12 of every transaction made at its retail locations between Dec. 5 and Dec. 16 to Freedom Grow, a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting prisoners with cannabis-related charges and their families through its “The Wish Program;” and to the Minorities for Medical Marijuana Project Clean Slate initiative, a program that provides record expungement to adults with select cannabis-related charges, according to a press release. The company’s goal is to…

No matter the exact cause, from post-COVID economic volatility to the marked financial doldrums of cannabis stocks, there are signs support for the “legacy farmer” is on an upswing. Legacy farmers are proving to be an enduring competition for the regulated and certified market. According to the 2021 International Cannabis Policy Study, about 43% of all American cannabis sales still go to the illicit market, although this figure varies greatly by state. Calculations based on total consumption and legal sales suggest that between 60% and 75% of the sales in California, for example, are not coming from the regulated legal…

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) took to the Senate floor on Wednesday, gloating about how Republicans managed to keep marijuana banking reform out of a large-scale defense bill that was released on Tuesday night. And he said the “lesson must carry over” to forthcoming omnibus appropriations legislation that some lawmakers are now looking at as an alternative way to enact the cannabis reform. Separately, a Democratic House member said on Wednesday that the fact that cannabis banking wasn’t included in NDAA meant that “at least” one Democratic senator “had a problem” with the reform as well. Advocates and pro-reform…

A group of four cannabis business entities and three individual owners in Southern California were issued $128 million in civil penalties Dec. 5 after admitting to illicit operations in court, according to a summary judgement ruling. The ruling by Judge Stephen Pfahler in the Superior Court of California, County of Los Angeles, stems from 2019 and 2020 investigations conducted by state authorities in Canoga Park, Calif. The defendants admitted to engaging in unlicensed commercial manufacturing and distributor cannabis activity on 527 separate days, according to the court ruling. Specifically, the investigations revealed that the unlicensed activity was tied to Vertical…

Congressional lawmakers didn’t include marijuana provisions in a must-pass defense bill that was released on Tuesday, but a joint explanatory statement attached to the bill does contain a number of drug policy reform components, including a directive for the military to examine the potential of “plant-based therapies” like cannabis and certain psychedelics for service members. The statement that accompanies the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) goes over the bill’s various provisions, detailing what is included in the legislation and which provisions that previously cleared either the House or Senate were excluded from the final bicameral deal. For advocates, the omission…

The Ohio House Finance Committee heard an adult-use cannabis legalization bill Dec. 6, despite time running out in the current legislative session, which is set to adjourn Dec. 21.Ohio Reps. Casey Weinstein, D-Hudson, and Terrence Upchurch, D-Cleveland, introduced House Bill 382 last year to allow adults 21 and older to purchase and consume cannabis, as well as grow a limited number of plants at home for personal use.RELATED: Buckeye Duo Formally Files Adult-Use Cannabis Bill in OhioAt Tuesday’s House Finance Committee hearing, Weinstein said legalizing adult-use cannabis in Ohio would increase public safety and boost the state’s economy, according to…

The House sponsor of marijuana banking legislation said on Wednesday that following its lack of inclusion in the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) he will be immediately getting to work to attach the reform to pending omnibus appropriations legislation—though he added that he’s lost sleep over recent setbacks and has “unrepeatable” things to say about the Senate over their inability to advance the bill. Rep. Ed Perlmutter (D-CO) made the remarks at a House Rules Committee meeting on Wednesday, where members took up the large-scale defense bill, which advocates and supportive lawmakers hoped would be used as the vehicle to…