New York’s first weed shop opens today
More than a year after the state legalised the drug, and after delays in setting up the legal market to benefit people previously arrested for marijuana crimes, the first licenced marijuana store opened in New York on Thursday.
Housing Works, a charity that helps the homeless and those with AIDS, opened the dispensary in New York City’s East Village. The state issued retail marijuana licences to only 36 applicants in the first month, and the nonprofit was one of them.
Chris Alexander, the first executive director of the New York State Office of Cannabis Management, told a packed news conference, “We’re prioritising repairing harm, harm that’s been done even by the state’s own policies.” “It’s no accident that Black, Latino, and Latina people make up a disproportionate share of those in prison for drug possession and sale,” one expert said.
When New York state legalised recreational marijuana use in March 2021, they stipulated that it could be sold only by licenced retailers to adults over the age of 21, and that the first licences would be given to business owners with arrest or conviction records related to marijuana. Only marijuana that has been grown and processed by licenced New York producers may be sold in stores.
Some licences may be available to non-profit organisations that work with formerly incarcerated people, such as Housing Works, because New York had previously promised to find ready-to-open storefronts and business loans for the first licensees. However, it has taken more time than anticipated.
In the meantime, a flourishing grey market has sprung up across New York City, with unlicensed retailers illegally selling cannabis from stores and slickly branded vans.
Democratic Mayor Eric Adams has stated that he will not stand for businesses operating without proper licences. The state marijuana director, Alexander, said that local and state law enforcement have been informing gray-market vendors of the licencing rules, sending them cease-and-desist letters, and, most recently, seizing their inventory.
Despite the fact that cannabis has been legalised at the state level in twenty additional jurisdictions, federal law still prohibits its commercial sale; this can make it difficult for retailers to obtain bank loans and other financial services.
Some of the flower and pre-rolled joints sold at Housing Works are made from marijuana grown by Florist Farms in Cortland in upstate New York. The price per eighth of an ounce (about 3.5 grammes) ranges from $20 to $30.
“This is a game changer for our company,” said the farm’s co-founder, Karli Miller-Hornick. “We’re going to be able to hire more people.”
Marijuana sales in New York will be taxed at 13.5 percent, with the money going toward education, affordable housing, drug treatment, and mental health programmes.