The post California Threatens Hundreds of Unlicensed Cannabis Businesses appeared first on High Times.
California’s Bureau of Cannabis Control (BCC) has sent out more than 500 warning letters threatening legal action to unlicensed businesses. The letters were sent last week to retail dispensaries and delivery services who have not yet received licenses to operate under the state’s cannabis regulations that went into effect on January 1. In the letters, California threatens hundreds of unlicensed cannabis businesses.
A Formal Warning
The letters, from Assistant Chief of Enforcement Paul Tupy, warn the businesses that the BCC believes they are participating in commercial cannabis activity contrary to provisions of the Medicinal and Adult-Use Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act (MAUCRSA). The letters also demand that all such activity immediately cease. Criminal and civil penalties are threatened if violations continue.
MAUCRSA was passed by the legislature in 2017 to reconcile differences in the state’s medical marijuana laws and Prop 64, which legalized marijuana for adult-use in California when it was passed by voters in 2016.
The BCC had previously indicated that enforcement of the new regulations would not begin immediately in 2018. But nearly two months into the new year, the agency and law enforcement have been receiving complaints about businesses who have not yet received licenses but are still operating. Many of those complaints are coming from the more than 3,000 companies who are operating legally after already completing the costly and laborious process of obtaining a license.
Natalia Thurston, a cannabis law attorney with a practice in Oakland, California, told High Times that one of her clients received warning emails from the BCC on February 14 and 20. The anonymous client operated a medical cannabis