Mayor Bill de Blasio is all for legalizing recreational use of marijuana, as long as corporations don't get rich in the process.
The mayor on Thursday announced his support for a state plan to make recreational marijuana accessible to adults, but his instructions for Gov. Andrew Cuomo were clear—don't let corporate cannabis take over the market.
De Blasio invoked his own father's struggles with addiction to alcohol and cigarettes during Thursday's news conference to describe the ways corporations aggressively market their products and downplay the negative effects.
"Because I saw someone victimized by the tobacco industry, I can tell you over my dead body will big corporate marijuana do that to New Yorkers," he said.
Instead, de Blasio said, the industry should be led by local small businesses, and efforts should be made to promote the involvement of black and Hispanic residents who have accounted for a disproportionate number of arrests for possession of marijuana despite similar consumption rates as white New Yorkers.
"We have a chance to create a brand-new industry that will lift up everyday New Yorkers, and we have a chance to choke off corporate America in the process and not let them get them get their greedy hands on this industry here in this state," de Blasio said.
New marijuana startups would compete with the 10 companies that have been licensed by the state to produce medical marijuana. These businesses received licenses to participate in the state's highly regulated industry, and they weathered a rocky start to the program in 2016, when doctors and patients were slow to flock to the industry.
The mayor's report, which was produced in collaboration with a city task force, said these companies should receive "no preferential treatment" when licenses for the recreational marijuana industry are issued.
One such company is MedMen, based in Culver City, Calif., which entered the New York market when it acquired licensee Bloomfield Industries last year. It made a splash with the opening of a dispensary on Fifth Avenue and is planning another, at 33 Ninth Ave. The company has been open about its interest in selling marijuana for recreational use if New York makes the drug legal.
MedMen said it has licenses for either manufacturing or retail in 12 states, with four manufacturing facilities and 16 stores operating. Its licenses allow it to open as many as 70 retail locations, including eight in New York.
The company was mentioned at Thursday's news conference as a potent lobbying force behind legalization.
"We want to make sure they don't gobble up everything," said state Sen. Luis Sepúlveda, a Bronx Democrat.
Not all the companies de Blasio wants to hold in check are publicly traded like MedMen. Etain, a female-owned, medical marijuana company based in Westchester County, was among the initial five companies to receive a license from the state. It has local dispensaries in Murray Hill and Yonkers.
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