Nursing it is always better.
Posted on 06/17/2017 12:05:51 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Cannabis is joining the ranks of the financial, advertising, real estate and alcohol industries with the formation of its first self-regulatory organization.
The National Association of Cannabis Businesses (NACB) launched Thursday with a powerhouse leadership team and an ambitious plan: Develop and enforce national standards that will increase compliance and transparency, spur growth, and shape future federal regulations. The NACB’s slogan is “Be ready,” in anticipation of federal legalization of cannabis.
The cannabis industry is on a historic growth trajectory even as its businesses operate in a fractured regulatory environment and in the face of uncertain federal policy, NACB president Andrew Kline told The Cannabist.
“What we’re saying is, ‘Let’s take control,'” he said. “Let’s set our own standards so we’re not limited by varying state regulations or subject to what the feds come up with.”
“The formation of NACB is absolutely a coming of age moment for cannabis,” said Ean Seeb, co-founder of Denver Relief Consulting and a member of the group’s advisory panel. “The industry has reached a stage where businesses are no longer only beholden to state regulations and obligations. It’s time to take the next step to be proactive so that when – not if – marijuana is legalized, we’re prepared.”
Self-regulatory organizations (SROs) are industry-financed, non-governmental groups working to supplement and replace regulatory activities that might otherwise emanate from local, state, and/or federal agencies.
Kline brings decades of experience operating in highly regulated environments, having previously served as a special counsel in the Federal Communications Commission’s enforcement bureau. Prior to that, he was a senior advisor to Vice President Joseph Biden; he also was an assistant U.S. attorney.
A D.C. insider and self-described “student of history,” Kline said he was drawn to the position because, “Cannabis legalization is the purest form of democracy I’ve ever seen.”
Colorado businesses and the they’ve lessons learned from the state’s “mature” regulatory regime will play an important part in the NACB’s initial efforts, Kline said.
“The state has been at it longer than anybody else, so it provides the largest window into what works and what hasn’t worked,” he said.
As the NACB concept developed over the last three years, the group enlisted two prominent players in Colorado’s cannabis industry to serve on its six-member advisory panel: Ean Seeb, co-founder of Denver Relief Consulting, and Adam Orens, co-founder of Marijuana Policy Group.
Seeb cited Colorado’s pesticide testing and enforcement as an example of a state-developed system that could be exported to a national level. “The state recognized early that clean cannabis was a public safety issue,” he said. “And the testing standards it developed are replicable in other states as we see in Oregon, for instance. But it’s also scalable to a national level,” he said.
Three Colorado businesses are among the NACB’s seven founding members: Boulder’s Green Dot Labs, Denver’s Local Product of Colorado and Pueblo’s Mesa Organics.
The founding businesses are models of state-level compliance and they’ll be pioneers in the NACB’s development of a first-of-its type digital compliance certification platform, NACB chief legal officer Douglas Fischer told The Cannabist. The technology is being built in partnership with IBM and will provide member businesses with real-time compliance management and supply chain tracking.
“It will create an auditable and transparent trail of data for consumers, state regulators, investors and — someday — federal agencies, that shows the business is compliant now and has been compliant historically,” he said.
Beyond providing financial institutions with the data to complete their due diligence, developing a national compliance regime and digital compliance platform that is efficient and effective has the potential to unleash the cannabis industry, said Jim Parco, owner of Mesa Organics and an economics professor at Colorado College.
“Compliance is expensive and time-consuming,” he said. “We’re not in the cannabis business; we’re in the compliance business. If we do it right, we get to sell some cannabis. You wouldn’t believe what I go through to get a clone from my greenhouse to our store, for instance.”
Jumping into the type of self-regulatory environment favored by the financial, advertising and alcohol industries doesn’t faze Parco. He said he was encouraged that the industry would look to Wall Street where the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) regulates the New York Stock Exchange, the NASDAQ and the American Stock Exchange.
“Cannabis cannot be so insular that we miss an opportunity to learn from other highly regulated industries how to make our own (industry) better,” he said.
A cannabis SRO could learn from the history of the Distilled Spirits Council, Seeb noted. That SRO formed in 1970 when three Prohibition-era alcohol-industry groups merged.
“Similar to cannabis, those founding SROs represented a substance that was legal and then made illegal through prohibition,” Seeb said. “When prohibition was overturned, these groups helped spirits navigate the new regulatory and taxation landscape.”
Ultimately, cannabis has been legalized at the state level because voters have approved of doing so in a regulated fashion, Kline said. The nascent cannabis SRO is a logical next step in nationalizing standards to help shore up that consumer and voter confidence.
“It’s an exciting time and a rare opportunity where an industry with such amazing growth potential is on the verge of professionalizing,” he said. “If we do this right, we can take the industry to a place where national standards and regulatory certainty allow businesses to do what they do best.”
Just what this nation needs: more drugs!
Industries with the formation of its first self-regulatory organization.
Looks like a good time to invest in tobacco company stocks they are already geared up for the move mom and pop stoner shops will go bust.
Bravo!
The policy of "you may legally sell, buy, or possess marijuana, but only under the following conditions" is be definition MORE free than "you may legally sell, buy, or possess marijuana NEVER."
and more new taxes.
Jail is the ultimate tax.
There’s got to be a reason why the drug has been illegal for so long. And yeah, freedom is not a black and white issue. Enjoy the regulation and taxation to what is currently an unregulated and non taxed item in most states. It’s like the difference between two women I know. The 1st raised her kid with a message of abstinence, the 2nd went for providing the child with birth control pills. Which one was the conservative and which the liberal? Knowing that people are most likely going to engage in an activity that isn’t good for them do you show due diligence by explaining why they shouldn’t or just throw your hands in the air and say have at it, here’s something to facilitate the deed.
Thanks for that post.
Norman Ohler’s book, BLITZED, Drugs in the Third Reich.
So should we ban alcohol?
bookmark
Blind trust in government is not a conservative position.
Knowing that people are most likely going to engage in an activity that isn’t good for them do you show due diligence by explaining why they shouldn’t or just throw your hands in the air and say have at it, here’s something to facilitate the deed.
A conservative does the former while NOT banning it just because it "isn’t good for them." And for government cease criminalizing an activity is NOT to "facilitate" it; getting drunk and overeating are legal.
I hate to have to break it to you, but this nation already has marijuana: millions have been using it, and that's been the case for decades.
I’d rather have legal, regulated pot production than the money go to drug cartels.
Gimmeee,gimmeee,gimmeee,I want,I want....
Could not have said it better.
Coffeehead nation.
Fatdonunthead nation.
Drinktoomuch nation
ReferMadnesshead nation
The last I heard, it is Congress that legalizing something, not the President.
The cartels will switch to bringing in fentanyl instead-they won’t go away
I love my cocktail & my glass of wine, but I also have seen the damage out of control drinking has done to people I love. I also was brought up by parents, old hippies who got high w/ their friends & my dad......RIP..... was known for his hash brownies. I have been around really drunk people & it has been painful. I need to confront one of my oldest friends over her drinking which has really escalated & is causing her many social problems.
My thoughts,legalize pot already.
I read half the story and was not even the least bit surprised that the National Association of Cannibal Businesses was gearing up for its big business debut.
Change Cannabis to Cannibal and have some fun with me this morning!!
Gimmeee,gimmeee,gimmeee,I want,I want....
You'd prefer that the money go to drug cartels?
Nursing it is always better.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.