Issue 37: Everything Everywhere All At Once
The CCC Accidentally Releases Every MMJ Dispensary Employee's Data, NECANN Recap, Money Woes Continue For Some Big Canna-Companies
Welcome to Issue #37 of Burn After Reading! You can check out last week’s issue here. If you haven’t subscribed already, you can do so here.
Greetings, Comrades! The Daniels weren’t the only ones who had an eventful weekend. Some unexpected circumstances that I have to be vague about (for now) pulled me away from NECANN for a bit. Sadly, I can’t be at everything everywhere all at once.
Hopefully my recap of the conference still does the event justice. But first, some breaking news..
NEW: Cannabis Control Commission Accidentally Releases List of Every Massachusetts Medical Marijuana Employee Ever
A series of documents released by the Cannabis Control Commission last week as part of a public records request accidentally included a spreadsheet containing the names and other personal information of over 20,000 current and former employees at medical marijuana dispensaries, raising questions regarding the Commission’s ability to safeguard the personal information of industry workers.
The spreadsheet appeared to contain the names, phone numbers, and addresses of every employee at a Medical Treatment Center (MTC) from the program’s start in 2014 until the end of 2022, and in some cases even included details regarding the employee’s reason for termination as described by the MTC.
A day after the public records request was released, journalists who received the files released by the Commission were asked by representatives from the Commission’s legal team to voluntarily delete them.
The ultimate reason for this mistake remains unconfirmed, but it’s possible that this document was accidentally included because it contained the names of some individuals who happen to share either a first name or last name with the person who was the subject of the public record request.
On Thursday night, the Commission sent an email to the thousands of individuals who were impacted by the incident, which read (in part):
The Cannabis Control Commission (Commission) is contacting you to make you aware of an inadvertent release of agency documents that may have contained your name, residential address, email address, phone number, and/or date of birth.
While the information disclosed is in fact a public record that may otherwise be available for distribution in response to a public records request, its disclosure in this event was indeed inadvertent.
On March 8, 2023, the Commission fulfilled a Public Records Request and, as part of that production, released documents, which included the following fields:
Names
Residential Addresses
Phone Numbers
Email Addresses
Dates of Birth
The message also said that the Commission is reviewing its standard operating procedures and training for public records production to prevent a similar event from happening again. (Read the full email here).
In responding to a public records request, public agencies such as the Cannabis Control Commission must redact personally identifiable information and prevent unwarranted invasions of privacy. Documents containing such information are supposed to be reviewed carefully before they are handed over.
NECANN RECAP
Here’s a recap of the 2023 New England Cannabis Convention, held this past weekend at the Hynes Convention Center in Boston.
ATTENDEES: Jim Belushi (who hopefully hasn’t seen my review🔒 of his terrible weed-based reality-doc show) gave the keynote speech. All of the Commissioners were there at some point, and CCC Executive Director Shawn Collins gave a presentation alongside Erik Gundersen, Maine’s former executive director of the Office of Cannabis Policy. Calvin Johnson, Rob Sims, and Godser Cherilus were also in attendance to promote their upcoming dispensary in Boston. Conspicuously absent were some of the CEOs of the largest MSOs. I guess they enjoyed the spotlight a bit more when things in the industry were going well.
SESSIONS: I know, attending panels requires you to sit still and shut up for up to an hour at a time, but they really do offer some of the most valuable knowledge you gain at conferences like NECANN. I had A LOT going on last weekend, so unfortunately I did not make it to as many sessions as I originally planned. My apologies to those I missed. That being said, Nathan Kerns over at BDSA gave a really insightful breakdown of cannabis-related sales data (an extremely brief summary: vapes and budget flower are hot, dabs and drinks are not), while MCR Labs CEO Michael Kahn gave some interesting look at some of the ways the state could use data to help diagnose issues that encourage lab shopping and THC inflation. Khan described some disappointment with his interactions with Commission staff, but also expressed optimism that opening up the state’s testing data would offer some clear pathways forward to improving the state’s lab situation. (Full disclaimer: I worked at MCR from 2020-2021 before I made the jump to writing full-time.)
AFTER PARTIES: I didn’t quite have the energy to make it to every event I intended to, but my personal highlight was the Happy Hour at Fenway Park. They usually don’t let bleacher creatures such as myself into the State Street Pavilion Club high up above home plate, and it was pretty dang cool to be at the first legal cannabis event in the building’s 110+ year history. Shoutout to Blaze, New Dia, and the rest of the sponsors/organizers.
NECANN COMMUNITY AWARDS:
Big Hope Project had a big night, winning both the Champion in Diversity and Inclusion - Business and Best New England Cannabis Non-Profit awards.
Different Leaf Magazine rightfully won Best News/Information Source. Burn After Reading was just honored to be nominated in its first year of existence (and I wrote something for Different Leaf’s Summer 2022 issue, so I’m going to chalk this up as a W for me too).
Friend of the newsletter Emily Cotter won Rhode Island Cannabis Activist of the Year. Her company (Lovewell Farms) was very vocal on social media calling out the state’s recent attempt to criminalize smoking weed with other people. She’s one of the many University of Rhode Island and Students for Sensible Drug Policy alumni doing big things in the cannabis space.
Speaking of SSDP, the org’s Executive Director Jason Ortiz won Connecticut Cannabis Activist of the Year.
Dr. Marion McNabb won Healthcare Professional of the Year for her work with the Cannabis Center of Excellence.
Devin Alexander, founder of Rolling Releaf, took home the Massachusetts Activist of the Year award.
Worcester's Ulysses Youngblood won Champion in Diversity and Inclusion — Individual.
Dick Evans won a Lifetime Achievement nod, with Mike Malta also earning a posthumous Lifetime Achievement Award.
People are probably going to get mad at me for not giving them an individual shoutout, but head here for the full list of winners.
PRODUCT AWARDS: Here’s the full list of NECANN Cup winners so you can make your own personal judgement over whether or not this competition is any more or less legit than others. Some day I’ll do a deep dive on MA cannabis competitions to figure out which one has the most scientific method for ranking the Bay State’s favorite buds.
The Floor: It’s clear that NECANN has become a pretty big event in the national cannabis space. So big, in fact, that you could argue it’s beginning to outgrow its usual space on the 1st floor of the Hynes Convention Center. Compared to MJBiz, things felt pretty cramped — particularly at peak hours on Friday and Saturday. Then again, it’s clear that the industry is due for some retraction, so maybe we’ve reached peak attendance already.
WILL THE LAST PERSON AT LEAFLY PLEASE TURN OFF THE LIGHTS? LAYOFFS AND MONEY WOES FOR BIG CANNABIS COMPANIES CONTINUE
Ben Adlin on Twitter confirmed reports yesterday that cannabis/tech company Leafly just underwent another round of layoffs. This time 41 workers were impacted, including some in the Boston area, according to GeekWire.
There’s no doubt that Leafly has always struggled to figure out what it’s main function as a company actually is. It’s also clear that its management team has made some questionable decisions. Still, Leafly’s website has amassed a pretty useful archive of information that helps answer common questions for novice and advanced cannabis users alike. It’s now a sad fact that most of the people who helped create this library of content that Leafly provides are no longer at the company.
If headlines about leafly layoffs seem familiar, it’s probably due to the fact that we’ve seen job reductions from the company earlier this year…and in 2022…and in 2020….and in 2017.
The company is cutting 41 workers, or about 21% of its workforce. They also cut 21% of their workforce during their last layoffs. I’m no math expert, but I believe they can only cut their workforce by 21% a few more times before they have to start literally cutting people in half. That doesn’t sound practical, but with how expendable they’ve been treating their workforce, let’s not put that past them.
Ayr Wellness
I heard that Ayr had downsized their Massachusetts operations amid some serious financial woes, so I decided to investigate. A drive through the industrial park where Ayr’s cultivation facilities are located revealed that two of three buildings they utilize are currently inactive; their newest and largest building still appeared to be operating. With the nearby Amazon warehouse also shuttered, the once buzzing industrial park was now almost completely devoid of traffic.
On a potentially related note, a recent reddit post complained that the quality of the flower from Ayr has declined over the last few months. I usually take random complaining on reddit with a massive grain of salt, but considering the company has made big cuts to their cultivation team, it would make sense that a decline in quality has followed.
Rev Clinics
Things also seem to be going wrong at Fitchburg-based Revolutionary Clinics. Grant Smith Ellis is reporting that a source told him that the company’s entire cultivation was shuttered in November.
I can’t independently confirm Grant’s reporting about the cultivation facility, but there’s been plenty of other evidence that something is seriously astray at Rev. An internal email leaked to Mike Crawford seems to confirm the company has laid off workers, and reporting by Seeking Alpha confirms that the company has fallen behind on rent payments.
All of this news comes just over a year after the company claimed in a gushing profile that they were expecting 30% growth in 2022 and seeking to expand beyond Massachusetts. It’s tough to explain this sudden drastic reversal of fortune for a company that was reportedly profitable as recently as 2021, even with the headwinds that the industry is facing.
I can also report that Planet 13 Holdings were at one point considering some sort of business partnership or merger with the company, although that apparently never came to fruition.
Rev Clinics is perhaps best known among casual consumers for their partnership with David Ortiz, which I covered back in my Worcester Magazine days.
Hopefully they do not owe Big Papi any money. As I’ve noted before, you do NOT want to make that guy angry.
Regardless of Rev’s past transgressions, let’s not get too gleeful; it’s usually the workers who suffer the most when companies falter.
HEADLINES
New England
NORTH SHORE COMMUNITY COLLEGE TO OFFER CERTIFICATE IN CANNABIS CULTIVATION, SALES (CBS Boston): ”Required classes include: Plant and Soil Science, Fundamentals of Plant Health, Cannabis Law and the Regulatory Environment, Greenhouse Crop Production, Cannabis Cultivation and Management, and Cannabis Retail Product Development and Management. Students will pay about $4,200 to complete the program, which opens in the fall. However, financial aid is available.”
MAINE AGENCIES BRISTLE AT CANNABIS SOCIAL CLUBS PROPOSAL (Steve Mistler | Bangor Daily News): “A proposal by Democratic Rep. Lynne Williams of Bar Harbor, and sponsored by several Republicans and Democrats, reintroduces the concept and would allow for cannabis consumption in an area separate from a cannabis retail store. But the proposal is running into opposition from Attorney General Aaron Frey, who said in written testimony to the Veterans and Legal Affairs Committee that the proposal is in direct conflict with Maine’s 14-year-old ban on public smoking.The proposal also received a tepid reception from John Hudak, director of the Office of Cannabis Policy.”
Rest of U.S. / National
INFLATED [NY] MARIJUANA POTENCY LABELS PROMPT CHANGE TO TESTING RULES (Rebekah F. Ward | Times Union): “Last week, after they were confronted with lab results showing New York cannabis products had significantly less THC than advertised, state regulators revoked a stop-gap testing measure they'd designed to speed up the recreational market's kickoff. The shift came after NY Cannabis Insider shared lab tests with state cannabis regulators which showed that five of the eight highest-potency strains of legal marijuana in the state's fledgling retail industry contained at least 25 percent less THC than their labels indicated.”
WHY NEW YORK’S CANNABIS EQUITY PROGRAM IS STRANDING WOMEN ENTREPRENEURS (Mona Zhang | Politico): “Since launching the program in August, New York regulators have awarded dozens of licenses to entrepreneurs who had an immediate family member convicted on marijuana charges or have a record themselves. While those priorities were written into the program to make up for decades of disproportionate criminal enforcement, particularly in communities of color, the rules are having the unintended consequence of leaving women entrepreneurs out.”
CLASS ACTION LAWSUIT OVER TRULIEVE LAYOFFS DISMISSED (WCTV): “Ranjill O’Neal filed suit against the medical marijuana company in December 2022 claiming she and another 50-plus employees had been laid off “without cause on or about November 29.” O’Neal and the other workers were suing for unpaid wages, holiday pay, bonuses and more.
O’Neal’s attorney, Tiffany Cruz, telling WCTV, “The case was dismissed as the matter was resolved between the parties.” WCTV has reached out to try to clarify how the case was resolved.”
POT SOCIAL EQUITY PLAN HITS MAJOR MILESTONE — AND COULD EXPAND (Melissa Santos |AXIOS Seattle): “Washington state is opening up 45 cannabis retail licenses this month to people who meet social equity criteria — part of an effort to diversify the state's legal pot industry — and more social equity licenses could be on the way. More than 10 years after Washington voters legalized recreational marijuana use by passing Initiative 502, the industry remains dominated by white entrepreneurs.”
International
🇬🇧 ILLEGAL WEED DELIVERY START-UP DISPENSEROO SEES METEORIC GROWTH IN THE UK (Anthony Cuthbertson | The Independent): “An illegal cannabis delivery start-up in the UK is generating millions of pounds in revenue less than a year after it was created, according to its founder. Dispenseroo, which unlike other online drug markets operates on the open web, has attracted thousands of customers in recent months through guerilla advertising campaigns and word-of-mouth. The unorthodox approach of shunning the dark web means the site is easily found through popular search engines like Google and DuckDuckGo, allowing it to grow tenfold in recent months.”
🇩🇪 GERMANY WILL MOVE FORWARD WITH MARIJUANA LEGALIZATION AFTER RECEIVING ‘VERY GOOD FEEDBACK’ FROM EU, TOP OFFICIAL SAYS (Kyle Jaeger | Marijuana Moment): “Officials with the European Commission affirmed that the country could take the step, Lauterbach said. However, he added that some changes would be made to the government’s initial plan. He didn’t specify what those revisions would look like, but said it will “take into account European regulations and what should or should not be notified.” The coalition government will seek to “comply with European legislation while maintaining their own objectives,” the health minister said. The primary objectives will be “reducing crime and to make cannabis use as safe as possible,” EuropaPress reported.”
🇨🇦/🇯🇲 BC COMPANY SHIPS 20 KG OF CANNABIS TO JAMAICA (David Brown | Stratcann): “Pistol and Paris, a BC cannabis brand with products for sale across Canada say they completed a historic first shipment of 20 kilograms of BC-grown cannabis to Jamaica on February 13. The indoor cultivar, Tranquil Elephantizer, is one not currently available in Jamaica, says Kris Walton, who assisted Pistol and Paris with the shipment, through a BC-based partner, Cannaviva.”
Welcome Distraction
The Cuban National Baseball Team will play in the Semifinals of the World Baseball Classic on Sunday.I’m not sure if this game will be a “welcome” distraction, but it will certainly be an interesting spectacle.
This will be the biggest game in the Cuba’s 155 year love affair with the sport, and it’s happening in Miami — a place where the country’s politics will certainly be a hot topic of discussion.
While this year’s squad includes both players who reside in Cuba and MLB players who fled the country, that will likely matter little to many Cuban-Americans who still resent anything to do with the Cuban government. To add even more gasoline to this fire, it seems very possible that Cuba’s opponent in this game will be the United States; Team USA plays Venezuela in the quarterfinals on Saturday.
Will Cubans, Americans, and Cuban-Americans be temporarily united by our mutual love of this pastime, leading to a new era of dialogue and growth? One can hope, but it’s more likely that this game of baseball will be turned into a political football (so to speak). Either way, first pitch will be at 7pm on Fox Sports One.
Cat of the Week
Macho, who is currently up for adoption at Baypath Humane.
Unlike his name, Macho is all love! Macho has come a long way in his foster home and routine and patience is to thank! Macho was very timid when he first arrived, but daily socializing sessions and lots of food got this kitten out of his shell.
Special Bulletin
Cara Crabb Burnham and other folks involved with the upcoming North East Regional Cannabis Symposium put together this anonymous survey for cannabis industry workers. (You can learn more about the NERCSymposium here)
That’s a wrap on this issue. Thanks for reading! If you have any suggestions or feedback, email me here. Be sure to subscribe if you haven’t already, and if you can afford to support my work, please consider a paid subscription.