Andrew Cuomo, the pro-legalization governor of New York, is now seeking to forge a pact with the neighboring states of Connecticut and New Jersey to coordinate on cannabis policy and even establish mechanisms for common purchasing of products. A summit of the three governors, and possibly others from Northeastern states, is slated this month to begin talks on the proposal.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy wouldn\u2019t New York and Connecticut work together? We\u2019re neighbors. We have the same problems. We have a common border,\u201d Cuomo said at the Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont\u2019s mansion, according to an account in the\u00a0Press & Sun-Bulletin<\/a>. \u201cWe\u2019re better together than we are separate. It makes all the sense in the world for us to work together.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s an interesting plan, and no other states have enacted anything similar in their cannabis industries.<\/p>\n Cuomo especially invoked the wave of\u00a0serious illness apparently related to vaping<\/a>\u00a0as an imperative for inter-state cooperation. \u201cIt makes no sense to pass one set of rules in New York when they can just drive across the border to Connecticut and have a different set of rules and vice versa,\u201d Cuomo said, according to a local NPR affiliate\u00a0WRVO<\/a>.<\/p>\n Lamont in his comments also cited the gridlock in Washington, D.C. as mandating such compacts between states.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe states are stepping in and filling a void left by the federal government, and that\u2019s why we are taking the lead on a lot of these issues,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Lamont raised the prospect of \u201cjoint purchasing\u201d of cannabis, which could mean a \u201creal savings\u201d for participating states. He decried the state-by-state \u201cpatchwork of rules and regulations, different qualities in terms of public safety and public health.\u201d<\/p>\n He added, \u201cGov. Cuomo has been really forceful in saying \u2018We want to do this together and we want to do it on a timely basis.\u2019 We don\u2019t want to give up marijuana to the black market, we\u2019ve seen how dangerous that can be.\u201d<\/p>\n New Jersey\u2019s Gov. Phil Murphy, another pro-legalization Democrat, offered a statement saying his office \u201cis open to collaborating with regional partners on these issues.\u201d<\/p>\n Among states bordering New York, only\u00a0Massachusetts and Vermont have legalized<\/a>. The Empire State\u2019s own legalization bid\u00a0failed in the state legislature<\/a>\u00a0earlier this year, although Cuomo pledges to try again in 2020. Anonymous sources tell the\u00a0New Jersey Advance<\/a>\u00a0that lawmakers in the Garden State will also be introducing a legalization bill by year\u2019s end.<\/p>\n Things have not advanced so far in Connecticut, but Lamont in April\u00a0called for legalization by year\u2019s end<\/a>. When lawmakers failed to introduce a bill by the end of the legislative session in June, he\u00a0called for the issue to be put directly before the voters<\/a>\u00a0in a referendum.<\/p>\n Other of Cuomo\u2019s recent comments, however, betray some serious confusion on the whole vaping dilemma, which seems to inform his desire for cannabis regulations, \u2014 and the critical distinction between vaping cannabis extracts and smoking herbaceous cannabis.<\/p>\n In a Sept. 15 interview with MSNBC, noted by\u00a0Marijuana Moment<\/a>, Cuomo was aggressively questioned on whether the wave of vaping-related illness has made him reconsider pursuing legalization. \u201cNo,\u201d he replied \u2014 but added that his administration is \u201cnot in favor of smoking marijuana,\u201d and that there are \u201cways to get THC without smoking marijuana.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cPeople are vaping THC, yes that is true,\u201d a seemingly flustered Cuomo said. \u201cWe think that from a public health point of view, that is not something that we recommend and we think it\u2019s dangerous \u2014 smoking of any kind.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYou can legalize marijuana and sell THC in compounds that do not require you to smoke the marijuana, and we do not support smoking of marijuana,\u201d he added. \u201cThere are compounds that have the THC, which is a compound in marijuana, that you don\u2019t smoke.\u201d<\/p>\n We can only hope Cuomo was momentarily befuddled under the pressure. The evident dangers of vaping illicit-market extracts constitute no argument against legalizing the smoking of herbaceous cannabis \u2014 a perfect non-sequitur. On the contrary, the states hardest hit by the vaping-related illnesses have been those where cannabis remains illegal,\u00a0such as Wisconsin<\/a>. As we can imagine, the illegality of herbaceous cannabis drives many to seek illicit-market dab carts as an alternative. None of the illness cases have been tied to smoking herbaceous cannabis.<\/p>\n Let\u2019s hope Cuomo is not actually considering a counter-productive pseudo-legalization that excludes smokable cannabis flower \u2014 as New York\u2019s\u00a0medical marijuana program currently does<\/a>.<\/p>\n Cuomo, in a more lucid moment, issued an emergency executive order banning all flavored vape products (excluding menthol) in response to the wave of illness. But on Oct. 3, a day before the ban was to take effect, a state appellate court put the kibosh on it \u2014 at least until a final ruling in the case challenging the ban.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are very pleased with the New York State Appellate Division\u2019s decision, which acknowledges the strength of our claims about the State\u2019s executive overreach,\u201d said Tony Abboud, head of the\u00a0Vapor Technology Association<\/a>, according to the\u00a0New York Post<\/a>.<\/p>\n TELL US,<\/strong>\u00a0does your state have legal cannabis? Do your neighboring states?<\/p>\n The post New York Proposes a Cannabis \u2018Common Market\u2019 in the Tri-State Area<\/a> appeared first on Cannabis Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Andrew Cuomo, the pro-legalization governor of New York, is now seeking to forge a pact with the neighboring states of Connecticut and New Jersey to coordinate on cannabis policy and even establish mechanisms for common purchasing of products. A summit of the three governors, and possibly others from Northeastern states,Continue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":190,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[50,737,3920,4552,4318,215,208,81,12696,11860],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38968"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/190"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38968"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38968\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":38969,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38968\/revisions\/38969"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38968"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38968"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38968"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Confusion Between Smoking & Vaping<\/h4>\n
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\nRead More: New York Proposes a Cannabis \u2018Common Market\u2019 in the Tri-State Area<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"