 That's where we need to go. Oh, sorry. Oh, sorry. All right. Great. Yes. You're up. So we're looking at the new fiscal note, which is you know, Graham? Good morning. Good morning. I'm Graham Campbell from the Legislative Joint Fiscal Office. I'm here to present a fiscal note or an estimate on whatever that's been discussed here in this committee. And well, that's fine. The chair to estimate. Essentially, what I have done is done an estimate on an amendment that would first allow the current medical dispensaries in Vermont to begin retail sale of cannabis in July of 2020. And they would gain this right by paying $75,000 fee for the first year. And then every subsequent year after that, they would go on the sort of commercial licensing fee structure that would be established by when a reward comes out of the bill. And so our revenue estimates are broken down into two parts. The first is the fees. And we believe that where there are five current medical dispensaries in Vermont, we believe that all of them would take advantage of this opportunity. So that would raise $375,000 for fiscal year 20 from those fees and ultimately have those fees get used to the committee or could go to funding the board, et cetera. Stephanie Barrick can help you with the cost and the estimates for the board, et cetera. In subsequent years, as I mentioned, they've gone to the normal commercial licensing scheme that's been discussed in the S54. And you've heard this already, but that I think the bill says that fee structure would have to be set in the equivalent of Massachusetts. It sort of raises the Massachusetts equivalent of fees, which is about $650,000. And then there's the change to the excise tax revenues. So this bill has a 16% excise tax, and we estimate that in fiscal year 21, this will raise between $500,000 and a million dollars. And I'll just put down these two tables here so you can see the comparison. So table one is our estimates for what this amendment would raise. And you can see we're calling year zero here. In fiscal year 21, because in the original S54, there was no revenue flowing in in fiscal year 21 when retail sales were expected to begin in July 21. And so this pushes the revenue generating sales up a year, so you would get between $500,000 and a million. And because those stores, you have five retail stores that are sort of up and running and more mature and have a better idea of the landscape and have less capacity issues. Those five stores have that leg up, and so your subsequent years are a little bit higher than before because you have five stores that are a little bit more advanced in the process. So when we did these estimates, we sort of accounted for factors in the first year of sales to adjust for both regulatory issues that occurred in other states or retail stores understanding the regulatory environment and having potential issues getting the licenses to grow, to cultivate and to sell, but also the capacity constraints that are inherent to the market. You can't bring cannabis across other state lines, so you have to generate the capacity yourself within state. And so one of the issues that a lot of states have is generating that capacity by either setting up farms or indoor facilities. And so there are two factors. In my conversations with Shane Limp, he thought that the regulatory side of that adjustment is smaller, and I agree because they already have the understanding of the regulatory environment for medical and also it's a relatively straightforward regulatory system where they just pay a $75,000 fee. It's the capacity issues that we feel that are sort of holding back this estimate, and we don't believe that they are, the capacity issues that exist under this system are relatively similar to those that would occur under any normal retail system regardless of whether you gave the medical marijuana, because we believe that if these medical dispensaries, let's say they get the right to do retail sales at the end of 2019 or so, then they would have, there's no, they have to somehow get their supply up, and so the one way they could do that is to purchase land and grow it outdoors, but then you have to plant it, put the seeds in, you have to grow, you have to harvest it and produce it, or you have to build an indoor facility which requires raising the capital for it, building it, then planting it. So we think there are going to be capacity issues here that are holding back this estimate, and that's why you might not be as high as some people might think, but I'm still, you're generating a fair amount of revenue in the first year of doing this. Questions? Okay, Nelson, and then I'll have that. I think about the capacity that the medical facilities have now for sale. Do you think any of them are not currently, is there a limit on how much they can grow today in these medical facilities? I'm not sure if I know the answer to that, but our projection is that whatever they can grow right now would not be sufficient to meet normal retail sales or the demand that would come as a result of legalization. So, and that's even, that's just, that's something the chain limit said, that's something that's happened in every other state. We wouldn't be unique in that manner. This sort of going from zero to, like if you're a store, going from zero sales whatsoever to meeting that demand would be tougher than the medical dispensaries meeting that demand, and that's why we think that the capacity constraint here is a little bit less than what it would be from going from zero to full retail sales, but it's still, we're just thinking about the process that they would have to go to to meet that demand, and we just see it as, you know, even though they have the extra year, a good chunk of that year we believe would be having trouble meeting the demand for... I have a clarifying question. Do you know if all five dispensaries are willing to do retail? So, I had asked all of them, my discussions with Shane were that, and I asked them, do you think this would be something that all the dispensaries would take advantage of? He said yes. So, we are assuming that they would. Go ahead, and have you looked at the possibilities for the cultivators in the illicit market wanting to maybe step forward and be part of the start? Do you have any story? We have not explored that. That's an idea that I've heard, although I'm not aware of how, if there's any sort of regulatory framework that would be involved with that, whether there could be sort of, I don't know, informal sales from individual cultivators to the dispensary, but right now I'm just asking, but we're assuming that all their supply is going to have to come from themselves rather than from outside as well as this. Shiffy, will that concern me with that question and their response? I think under the attacks of regulatory systems should it pass. Do we actually going to consider taking homegrown from somebody that doesn't have or perhaps doesn't have the capabilities of drawing it to the extent that we're trying to do here and make it a very safe product? I mean, unless I miss in something here, that person might not have the capability very well. I think that's a good pot, a bad pot. A good pot again. A safer pot. Okay. Yeah. A pot blocker is a safer pot and I'm just wondering, if the demand is high enough is somebody else going to sell to one of these dispensaries and have them take it in and they don't do their thing. Right. I'm assuming I can make it into animals because I don't know a lot of these homegrown people and they don't take the animals because they're not. Right. Yeah. Michelle, I think you'd be best for you to address that question. Sure. I think it's a bigger discussion and maybe when we start to go through and mark up and maybe talk about it in broader context. I know there's been a lot of discussion about is there a way to bring some small growers into that would be selling to the dispensaries as part of the early sales model. And I think if you've identified one of the main issues, biggest issue, I think for me, which is that under what regulatory structure would they be operating and there essentially isn't one for them now and to adopt rules would take all the time that we're talking about and so that doesn't really work for the early sales. And so, you know, but there are a lot of issues around, you know, traceability. So right now you have, you know, with vertical integration with dispensaries, you know, you have that tracking. There's no, you know, you would have to set up tracking so that you would know how much is being grown with a grower and then how much is then going to a dispensary, which dispensary, making sure that half of it's not going out the back door, things like that. So there are a lot of regulatory compliance issues and I know that there's also been, and I don't know because I haven't been in the discussions really, but the idea of whether or not we can take folks who are currently registered under the hemp program and somehow maybe finesse it a little bit and work it under that. And again, I haven't had the time yet to have a more in-depth conversation but I touched base with Michael O'Grady, who is the attorney who's been working on that and his initial sense was that if you did that and you allow people who were registered under the hemp program to be growing cannabis for the sales to the dispensary, that you would essentially kill the state's chances of being able to have it approved under the farm bill language. So I can have somebody come in and I can have him come in and address that later but again, we just kind of had a five minute conversation down there because I heard that idea being floated around and he works on the health stuff. What numbers of customers were you working with to come up with these numbers? So we didn't use the number of customers. The way this is structured is it's from data from Oregon and Colorado about the size of their marijuana retail or cannabis retail establishments and what they have averaged in terms of sales in a fully mature market. And so this kind of assumes that the medical dispensaries, once they are operating, will be operating along the same lines as a normal retail store in Colorado or Oregon. We talked about an office where we thought they would be greater than a Colorado or Oregon store or less than. We ultimately decided that they would be similar. Some of the larger dispensaries might be higher than some of them might be lower. So we didn't have any data to indicate that they would be greater than the Colorado or Oregon retail stores. So you're placing your numbers on sales from other states. Yeah. Go ahead. This might not be for you. We currently don't place any limitation on the medical side. It's growing faster. Yes, we do. So much capacity for the amount that's grown by the dispensary. Yes, they are tagged. So the current law is that a patient has to designate one particular dispensary that can't go to all of them. And so the DPS keeps track of how many patients have designated each dispensary. And then there's a formula that's in statute for how much they can then grow. And it's the per patient limit that they're allowed to grow personally. It's two mature and seven immature plants. So that's the formula that they use. So if one dispensary has, you know, 1,500 patients, you would do, you know, two times 15 for the number of mature plants that they could have any one time, seven times the 1,500 for the immature plants. And that's what they're allowed to have as inventory at any one time. So it's tagged to that. There's a bill S117 that's up that eliminates that particular cap. And it doesn't, and it requires that, it's a way with the requirement that patients have to designate one dispensary. But one of the things that I have a list, and I've been talking with the dispensaries about, like what are the things that if you did do early sales that I would want to specifically say that for purposes of being able to meet the retail market for that one year period, what would they be exempted from? And certainly plant counts are one of those, and that's in the language that was in 196. But in listening to the discussions also and thinking about their currently in statute only allowed to have one grow facility in addition to the places, the two locations where they can serve patients. And so you'd want to say they could have a second grow facility because you can imagine right now, imagining that they probably only have a physical space that allows them to really meet their patient needs, right? But then if they're going to need to grow a lot more, that actual warehouse or whatever it is they use, they may need a second facility and things like that. So I'm keeping a running tally of the things that we wanted to kind of address to say for purposes of that one year retail sale, they're exempted from these laws in statute and rules for that temporary period. No. I have a question. Yes. So Graham, in putting together this, you're using a model, right? Based on Colorado and Oregon data. And Washington. And Washington, too. And Massachusetts. Oh, OK. So if this changes, how hard is it to plug in? So I should say what the medical dispensaries will sell is based upon Colorado and Oregon. The whole model for how much revenue for retail sales is based upon those four states. So the question about if this is changed, how difficult would it be? It depends on the change. If it's a change to the tax rate, or that's relatively easy to put to change. If it's a change to timing or things like timing and things that we sort of give thought to and then make judgment calls from there. So it kind of depends on what the change would be. OK. I was just wondering. Yesterday we had legislative counsel come in and talked about the tax sections of the bill. And I just wanted to follow up on that because she referenced you a couple of times with respect to some of the policy decisions that were made with respect to the tax rate. So, you know, how did the Senate arrive at 16%? What left the Senate usually was a 10% tax. And then when it went to Senate Finance, they were arguing, they were discussing whether they wanted to place the sales tax on top of that as well. And then furthermore, would there be a local option available to municipalities? And whether, if you did that local option, would it be subject to the 30, 30, 70 split with the pilot fund? And basically it just came down to, we're not going to do the sales tax, but we're going to just make it 16%. It puts us under Massachusetts. And that's basically how it was arrived at sort of a committee discussion about whether it sort of came out of whether we should have the sales tax on it. Because if you did do the sales tax, then all that revenue would go to the education fund. And they ultimately decided not to do that, but at the same time to raise the rate at the equivalent of the additional 6%. And that's what they said. So, Senate Finance's goal was to be under Massachusetts tax rate? I don't know if it was their goal, but they were, and I, you might want to have one of the members come up, but it was one of the considerations that they had in their discussion is when they arrived at 16%, the reason they were happy with it was that it was under Massachusetts tax rate. Did either Senate Finance or Senate Judiciary discuss the tax? How the tax would influence or impact the black market? They did, yeah. And I testified briefly on that. And what I told them was that the experience in other states is that the tax rate is relatively important for the black market, but you have much higher tax rates in other states than what's being proposed here. And they believe that their black market has been not completely squeezed out, but brought down to a very much less than it was. And so my experience speaking with other states is that the tax rate is not necessarily the thing that drives the black market is fully existing. It plays a factor, but I think ultimately it comes down to lots of different things, like how easy is it for you to get? What's the overall price? Because even across the country, even if we're legal everywhere, there would be differences in price. And even in the black market, before any legalization, the cost of cannabis out on the west coast was significantly lower than it was in New England. So those types of factors will play a role. In every state where cannabis was legalized, regardless of what the tax rate was, up to 35% in some states, as low as Massachusetts, I can't quite remember, in Massachusetts, they see precipitous drops in prices of cannabis. So that seemed to indicate that you're squeezing your black market quite a bit. In our model, we assume that about 20% of the market will still be in the black market. That is higher than what Oregon estimated at their black market. I think they had their black market at about 15% or 16%, so they'll be conservative. Did the Southern Discuss-It-All tax based on weight of product? Not incentive finance that I can recall. No, I think that there were earlier discussions around that, and there were some complexities with that, and it really hadn't built up enough steam. And so I think they were just mostly looking at the three kind of pots about whether or not you have the excise tax, whether there should be a sales tax and then the local option. Yeah, I agree. Any way tax is much more, from the administration standpoint, is much more complex. Do you have all your questions answered for now? Okay, Nelson. Was it founded in all states that legalized the sales that basically there wasn't enough supply for the initial startup that they were running out, or were there some states that did better than others? I probably don't know the answer to the second question was some states that did better. Actually, some states definitely did better than others. Washington is like, in my experience, it's sort of a poster child of both capacity and regulatory issues. Their first year of cannabis sales were really slow. And so once they sort of reformed, in the second year they sort of reformed their regulatory structure, and then they'd gotten up to steam since then. Colorado's was relatively, I wouldn't say seamless, but they had capacity issues at the start, and you probably read in the news, Massachusetts I think is having capacity issues. So I don't think I could give this a super educator's sponsor, which states did it the best way and avoided the capacity and regulatory issues. But I'm not sure if any other state is considered doing what's being proposed here, but I don't know if any other states have had their medical go first. Almost all states have had their medical go first in some way. It could be that they just, they rolled them out in different ways, or they might have issued them a new permit, like what they're doing in Massachusetts, they're the first ones that get the new permits. But other states kind of did more of a bridge, but we've got some information on that if you guys wanted to hear from the problem, if I could somebody talk to you about that. Another question, Nelson? Yeah, my follow-up question would be, did any of them, the dispensaries that are medical now, did they do anything previous to the actual, and would they allow the expansion of grow areas and things of that nature? And was there a licensing issue with that, or was it just that they bought a license and they would automatically be able to build a better growth of facility for theirself to larger? I don't know the logistics of how they did that. I have just some basic data about which states did and didn't let their medical facilities go first, but we could certainly pick a couple states and check with them, and check and see technically how did they do it, and how did it work, and what were their experiences for that. But that was, we didn't spend any time on it, that in the Senate because it wasn't part of the Senate proposal. I just, I guess, I just see that if you allow the growth facilities to expand, the short instance of why it wouldn't be there, and it'd be a higher return on the product going through these dispensaries. I think that's a valid statement. I would say that even if you make, if you allow them to expand and like build facilities, it takes time for them to do that, and so their advantage of that in the first year is not as much as you would think on the face of it. They need to sort of, first get the license, they need to, well, A, possibly raise the capital for the $75,000 fee, and they have to raise the capital to either purchase land for an outdoor growing facility or an indoor growing facility, then construct it, and then plant it, then harvest it, and they have, on this proposal, they have essentially from July of this year through July of 2021 to get that up and going. So we estimate that, you know, by the end of 2020, then maybe they could sort of be close to up and operating. Even if they did that, they would probably run into supply issues as well because there's obviously a large demand for cannabis in this state, and there's only five dispensaries, even the largest of the dispensaries could have built such a massive facility to meet that capacity. So folks, in your email inbox is a memo from John Holler at Downs Raffin Martin, and John's looking at it, John Gannon is looking at it right now, and has answered to some of these questions. Yeah, so it indicates which states gave a head start to their medical marijuana dispensaries, and it's everyone that's legalized marijuana, except for Alaska, which didn't have medical marijuana dispensaries to give a head start to, and it actually explains how long of a head start they had in each state, and it references either the legislation or the rule which permitted that to happen. So that came in on April 12th, when I was researching with email for the document, and I'm sure Kelly can post it to our page too. How? So do you know how states compare in terms of their startup timeline? You know, from, you know, I'm assuming that the states that had the most problems with supply possibly had a compressed start. I don't know the answer to that question, how long the other states took for their timeline? Because I imagine Oregon maybe had enough time to put everything in place and then not have all the hiccups when they opened up for themselves. Yeah, I mean, I don't fully know what their timelines were, although I don't know if there's any state that hasn't had or even Canada that hasn't had startup issues, not startup issues, capacity problems, even with a large lead up time. Canada, the lead up time was not lead up, they were talking about this in legal, I was almost at least a year before the first retail sales went into place and they had capacity issues there as well. So, but I don't know what the form was. I don't have any research that I've done that I just looked at. One, they either passed a ballot initiative and how long it was and how what their timeline was for that stuff. That's something we can look into. If you go out there and look at data, I mean, I think once states started legalization, there were capacity issues, but then as the market matured, there became oversupply issues in some states. I mean, I think what you're seeing is a new business or a new business model getting off the ground and trying to figure out what's the appropriate amount of product and how much demand is there for that product. So, I think you're going to see these supply-demand shifts as the market matures in each state. I think even though some of these states have been out for a long time, it's still a very immature market in many ways. Michelle? I just wanted to mention that I don't know if we're able to speak to this or not, but something that I was thinking about is that you probably want to hear from the tax department on anything that they might need in order to be able to collect taxes on those early sales, because the way that it's structured now is contemplating that they're not going to be collecting taxes, essentially until two years out. And the idea that you're going to be coming back and considering appropriations and does somebody need new software? Does somebody need a new FTE? Things like that, but even though we're only going to have five retail shops that would be selling and it's going to be as much smaller, I think that is an issue because that isn't contemplated in the bill as drafted now, but you want to be thinking about that and I don't know whether I could have some thoughts on that. Yeah, I think that's a very important issue written. Thank you. So, I don't believe the tax department collects the revenues that are produced by the medical dissentries right now. I don't think that's the case. Well, it's not taxable. It's not taxable. It's not taxable. Right, so there's no tax on cannabis or cannabis products. Right, so if this was a retail tax that would be collected by the tax department they can speak to this, but the general rule of thumb is that I think they told me like $250,000 to implement a new tax collection system and also there were concerns in the senate about the payments, how these payments were made would be made cash, would be made electronically, how would they handle the payments, because if they have to be handled if the tax department has to handle cash payments then it increases the cost of the tax department. So, yes, it would be, the community should have the tax department come in and talk about the cost. The governor's marijuana commission I believe they put $500,000 or so in their budget to collect taxes, but I don't know whether that had any breakdown for cash handling or new systems or anything, but it was in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. I'm not sure if this is a question from him or something of the committee would go slater. One of the things I keep coming back to is the fact that there's not going to be enough product. Is there anything in the bill, I haven't seen anything other than dispensaries, that will let small growers start early, because they're not really selling the product to anybody but dispensary. So if they're not selling the product to dispensary, yes. So if there was something in the bill that would let them start early also, would that be a problem or not? From your figures, if all of a sudden... So if something was introduced that allowed same-size supplier to supply the medical dispensaries, then I would probably revise this revenue estimate up for it because your capacity constraints would be less. And the dispensaries would not have to spend so much time raising money and building their own facilities. If small growers don't take as much time to get up and running, they don't think it's larger growers. It's true, but again, you run into the potential issues that Michelle said about small growers here being private home growers right now in Vermont and under what regulatory structure would they be? So in discussions with the Senate on this excise tax, what sort of structure was contemplated at the tax department? Because if we're looking at early sales where they're collecting from five entities that seems to be a completely different animal than what they'll be doing in 18 months or two years when the broader market goes online. Right. I think the tax department's best place to answer those questions. My guess is that you're kind of just pushing the time, the expense for the tax department a couple of years forward. So in S54 as a house, that sort of expense doesn't come until fiscal year 2021. That's when they would need the sort of up and sorry, yeah, fiscal year now. Fiscal year 22. Retail sales are in July 21. So that doesn't come until fiscal 22. And so it was kind of, I think they were maybe doing a sort of two-step approach where they first established the licensing structure, the fees and then determine what the tax department potentially other departments would need to operate the system. If the tax that they're collecting on CBD sales from hemp right now is an excise tax or is it a sales tax? It's a sales tax I believe. I believe there's a separate CBD excise tax. I think it's just they collect the sales tax on CBD. That is, they have the existing structure for the sales tax and having CBD in there is no extra cost to them if it's the sales tax. This would be a new tax with a new rate. So that's why I think they might say that there will be some start-up costs for them. We will be sure to have the tax department and to answer some questions. Committee, any other questions for Graham revenue estimates? Thank you very much. Yeah, I guess I can direct people to it. So Michelle, do you recall who the Senate heard from the tax department about this? Committee discussion? A few minutes before we start the next witness. So thoughts, questions, comments? I just wonder what a model would look like if you do it in reverse instead of picking the tax. We really come up with what are the really critical costs for bringing this new industry to a sustainable retail level. I know there's a lot of what-ifs, but it just seems backward to pick a number and then everything's got to fall under that. Because that's not how you normally construct a business. You kind of do it in reverse and then you come up with what it has to cost, what you can tax, and so forth. So it just seems trickier trying to make it work when you're working under a firm number. Other thoughts, committee? So we have some, oh, Johnson? Yeah? Go ahead and take a break. We need to let go of your morning coffee. Yeah. So I'm Lori Augustiniath. I'm the coordinator of Prevention Works Vermont, which is a network of the community coalitions in the state who work on substance use prevention issues. I'm also a member of the Opioid Coordination Council and a board member of the Vermont Public Health Association. But my interest in prevention isn't just professional. I am the mom of a teenage son, so I'm of course concerned how this legislation might affect his entree into adulthood. My husband and I own a business in the northeast kingdom, so I'm very concerned about our workforce and making sure that they are ready and able and sober to work. And recently we became the caregivers for my elderly mother-in-law. And so again, for workforce issues really concerned about having reliable and sober individuals that we can call on for assistance in her ongoing care. Those reasons I thank you very much for inviting me here this morning. So you're probably not up on all the latest trends in prevention. So in case you aren't aware, prevention has become a science. And it is rooted in a lot of evidence-based that really shows what we can do to improve conditions of substance use is less likely. It also warns us of things that we shouldn't do that will possibly increase substance disorder and certainly substance use. But while prevention has become a science, it is not a secret. And prevention is everything that we do at home and in our lives to help make our family and friends healthier and safer. And that's what the coalitions do in the state every day. There are 23 coalitions working in their communities to identify risk factors, things that might be contributing to substance use, pulling together a diverse group of partners around the table with strategies to combat those threats and in essence create a community where substance use is less likely. And I'm happy to report that there's evidence that shows it's working that the communities that have coalitions are seeing reductions in substance use greater than communities that don't have coalitions. So those 23 coalitions are all around the state, does not cover the entire state at this point, but working with those coalitions are thousands of volunteers who are really committed and want to improve conditions in their community. So those things that the volunteers and coalitions do include educating youth and adults hosting out-of-school time activities that are drug and alcohol free, creating local policies that promote health, working with retailers to prevent underage sales and alcohol tobacco, and the list goes on and on. Which is why we say an ounce of prevention is a lot of work. So there's a little addendum there. But research over the last two decades has proven that drug and alcohol addiction is preventable. And while we're glad to see so many people at the state house lately talking about prevention, let me clearly say that taxation and regulation that allows for commercialization of marijuana is not prevention. It is not good prevention. Prevention works and Vermont's prevention coalitions are opposed to the creation of a commercial system for retail sales of recreational marijuana and want to clearly refute recent statements that commercialization of marijuana is needed to provide tax dollars for prevention services. It's true that the prevention system in Vermont is underfunded and it does lack the necessary resources to implement effective strategies with enough frequency, intensity, and duration to adequately prevent substance abuse in our communities. But let me say again, taxation and regulation that allows for commercialization of marijuana is not good prevention. We believe that to support further declines in youth use rates of marijuana, the state must build a solid evidence-based infrastructure aimed at adults and youth to prevent marijuana. And again, focusing on adults as well when it comes to prevention, not just youth. And we'd like to see marijuana use rates be brought to 10% or lower before we embark on a new course for marijuana in the state. Prevention is not just about youth, but it's also about vulnerable adults, including those in recovery. Prevention is not just about providing information and enhancing skills. It's also about modifying policies like S54 so that substance use will be less likely as a result, which is why I'm here to offer my comments on this bill. I know your committee considers matters related to the organization oversight and conduct of state government and it's not a world that I'm well versed in, but I have tried to focus my comments on the topics that most concern your work and not all the concerns that we have with this legislation. So please excuse me if I mentioned something that you've already addressed in the bill or that isn't completely relevant to your work. Based on successful public health strategies like tobacco control, we need marijuana laws that not only prevent or delay first use, but also reduce consumption across the board and encourage current marijuana users to quit, just like our tobacco control program does. We should all be concerned that today, one half of Vermont young adults who report using marijuana also report that they use daily or almost daily. And that is not what most people consider responsible or recreational use. Evidence demonstrates that without a strong public health framework for this work, a wealthy and politically powerful marijuana industry will develop and use its political clout to manipulate regulatory frameworks and support public health efforts to reduce use, just like has happened with tobacco and alcohol. And I'll just put a plug in there that we have been trying for decades to increase the alcohol tax, the beer tax, and there's a strong industry fighting us on that and not allowing that to happen and that's a perfect revenue source for prevention money. It's already a substance that's available and if that were taxed to keep up with inflation, it would provide much needed funds for prevention. Can I just ask do you know if that tax had kept pace with inflation on what the tax rate would be? I have that information but I don't know if this happens in my head. But I can certainly find it. Um, liquor is taxed at 25% of the retail price and I'm trying to think beer and wine have two different uh, rates of tax um, they are both quite well and they have not I can't tell you exactly what they are but um, they have not gone up since the 1980s. Since the 1980s. I think it's 1983, does that sound right? Yes. I'm just keeping it with inflation. It wouldn't be, I don't think it's a communist jump, it's not like adding 50 cents or something like that. It's a modest amount but enough to provide additional income. Okay. I'm a little confused by this rate of inflation because this is a tax. So the product cost is going up, assuming at the rate of inflation. So the tax, even though the tax rate has not increased the tax has increased. That would be true. I think there's an affluent Orange's thing. I mean, you know, products prices are controlled by inflation. Right. So there's the excise tax. Taxes typically are not. So the excise tax is not the sales tax, right? So isn't that the difference? So I can certainly find that. I can get that information to you when I send in my comments. Thank you. So here are some recommendations from the strong public health framework in this bill. First is concerning the cannabis control board. In S54 the board includes members whose expertise is agriculture, social justice, business management or regulatory compliance who are sure to help create a competitive marketplace for businesses but not protect public health. It's important to expand the membership of the board to include a public health expert since the control board is charged with developing safety materials product labeling and employee training requirements. Utilizing a public health framework would include giving the control board power to limit strong THC potency to set specific testing guidelines for product quality and safety to set a maximum THC amount per package, not just for serving. How many servings may be? Can you just, it's very hard to take notes. Oh, I'm sorry. And I will send this to you too. So you don't have to try and get it off. I think there's a lot. But I will email it to you. A limit of how many servings may be in a single marijuana product and then also the ability to change the THC limit amounts based on the available and emerging evidence as it becomes apparent as we move through this process. We don't have to come back to the legislature for a legislative change. Could you start again, because you can email us but then we can't ask you any questions. Oh, okay. So this was the So I got the boring thing. No public health expert. Limit THC amounts. So THC potency setting specific testing guidelines for product quality and safety set a maximum THC amount per package, not just for serving. And that's also limiting how many servings can be in a packaged product. And then giving the board the ability to change the THC limit amounts in products based on emerging evidence. You're welcome. Thanks for asking me to read that again. So the second area is advertising and there's a lot here because a lot of what we do with prevention and public health is around advertising and not normalizing behaviors that we don't want to encourage. So S54 already prohibits marijuana companies from advertising or marketing their products using deceptive, false or misleading statements or illustrations. But the bill fails to include other important restrictions that would prevent marijuana companies from using marketing claims to increase the appeal and safety for their products. So I question that who is charged with judging whether advertising is deceptive, false or misleading. There's been through the course of this bill for the past 10 years who relies on public science and where is the source for making those kinds of decisions whether or not the advertising is false, deceptive or misleading. And also whether or not advertising is designed to be or has the effect of being particularly appealing to persons under the age of 21 years. And I think it would be important to stipulate who the body is that's going to make those decisions and if they're making sure they're qualified to make those decisions. So that's another reason why a public health representative has to be on the control board to assist with that. One way to keep marketing in check would be to require that all advertising and marketing statements and claims be evidence based and approved by the Department of Health. Including health related claims that would increase product appeal. We have a stellar cast of experts at the Vermont Department of Health that we need to use them with helping ferret out some of these things so that people aren't making unreasonable untrue claims on their products. Experience with tobacco and alcohol control provides a strong public health rationale for reducing the threshold for underage exposure from the 30% that's in the current bill to 15%. As the 30% threshold is an ineffective measure that will permit marijuana companies to place advertisements where youth are likely to be exposed and possibly more likely to be exposed than adults. Again, this is another lesson that we've learned from tobacco and alcohol. Additional public health strategies that address marketing include limits on sponsorship of sporting events or other entertainment venues. It could be decided that those are only venues that only 15% or more of the audience is recently expected, excuse me, or 15% or more of the audience is not under the age of 21 years. Or better yet, we could just limit it to venues that are held only if there's going to be advertising inside a entertainment venue or sporting venue. Also, limitations on third parties, for example, public relations firms or industry trade groups that write news pieces or testimonials that are actually ads and have the effect of promoting marijuana use. So there's nothing in there about who can do the advertising on behalf of the industry. Yeah. So, um... Yes, I'm sorry. I mean, I see huge percentage issues there. I mean... We put restrictions on where the third party piece. So if you know what, I'm not a legal expert. So it kind of was in the recommendations, but I'm not sure if it's been done before. I don't know how you could prohibit somebody from publishing. I think if they were connected to the industry though, I mean, I'm not sure if there's any restrictions that could be if they were a higher public relations firm for, you know, a retailer or of the trade industry being able to market on behalf of the marijuana establishments. I'm not sure, but it would be great if we could. Okay. Another recommendation is to not allow tax deductions for advertising and marketing in order to increase the costs that the marijuana establishments have for promotional activity. That would also help limit advertising if they couldn't deduct those costs. Also, a recommendation that we require marijuana companies to report to the Department of Health all paid advertising expenditures, including price discounting and incentives, promotional allowances, payments to retailers and wholesalers, and contributions to elected officials. These laws are important to promote government transparency and to discourage industry payments to professionals, much like we saw the pharmaceutical industry do with physicians. And then reports of this data could then be available or could be made publicly available as well to help with the transparency issue. Internet advertising in this bill is prohibited, but it's not clearly defined. So effective public health legislation would define digital advertising explicitly and include but not be limited to text messaging Instagram, Facebook, pop-up ads online, mobile ads or apps or other new age advertising platforms in which those under 21 might download or use. The way to protect youth most effectively and prevent advertising that encourages excessive or abusive use would be to allow retail marijuana advertising only inside licensed adult only retail outlets that sell retail marijuana and marijuana products. So that was advertising. So the next section is labeling and packaging and so I don't have a ton here but that recommendations that the package not contain any false or misleading statements which include health claims and also the term organic which in itself indicates that a product is safer or healthier than the non-organic alternative which is not necessarily true especially since you address pesticides in this bill so it could be a marketing term that's not really useful to the consumer. Also we recommend language that talks about child resistant packaging also that the label information on the packages must be unobstructed and conspicuous and then warnings about use by women who are pregnant included in the morning statements. So now on to licensing. So licensing restrictions should include limits on retailer density and require licensed facilities to be prohibited within 1,000 feet of locations that are frequented by youth, young adults and vulnerable adults and be required to be at least 1,000 feet from other retail licensed locations. If you choose to use the definition of a school in the licensing the school must include educational establishments where at least 75% of the population are younger than 21 to include colleges and universities. No one under minimum age should be allowed in any store that sells marijuana and you've already made that distinction for staff but also probably for patients that they're not bringing their kids with them. S54 has a limit on the amount of product per transaction but no mention on the number of sales per day. So we might not be able to prevent sales at multiple outlets but we can limit the number of transactions per person per outlet. S54 offers the option of a licensee conducting its own training programs on its premises using information and materials furnished by the board. I suggest we don't include that recommendation. The Department of Liquor Control that's been doing retailer trainings for alcohol and tobacco has data that shows retailer training conducted by a certified educator the compliance rate is far higher than any than the education that's done in store by store owners and there are ways to provide incentives for store owners to get their employees there for employees to take that training although you may not need one for this bill but we definitely feel that the owner trained part of that provided training should not be an option they should be required to attend a training that's offered by a trained educator and I also didn't see anywhere in their language for penalties for selling to youth and I'm not sure where that would fall into the licensing section but making it very clear that that will not be tolerated and what the penalties are if somebody is found that they are supplying to young people so the next section wasn't particularly part of the part of the bill but I'm just calling it communities and it's regarding the opt-in opt-out clause for municipalities around whether or not they allow marijuana sales and their community we recommend that the bill include an opt-in clause for municipalities not opt-out and that's for two reasons one if someone opens a business before the town can hold a meeting to consider this option their grandfather by the law which means they ultimately don't have a choice or a say in this in this policy but also by having the opt-out clause it also puts an undue burden on public health advocates to launch the community conversation instead of the commercial interest being responsible for making sure a community is going to welcome their endeavors and so we very highly very strongly that that be changed to an opt-in clause finally we request that you include a statement that nothing in the bill should be construed that the state encourages or endorses marijuana use and in fact recognizes the potential danger that marijuana use may pose to some users and also include a disclaimer that employers, landlords and licensing bodies maintain discretion to enforce their own regulations as far as the use of possession and cultivation of marijuana by employees, tenants and licensees I hope that you agree that we ultimately want fewer people using marijuana especially young people your committee can address and prevent the emerging and future public health problems associated with marijuana use by preventing the growth of another large industry similar to the tobacco and alcohol industries by letting this bill die or creating a strong public health focused regulatory on the Vermont Tobacco Control Program that would minimize social normalization and discourage the use of marijuana thank you yeah so what have been some of the most effective education and prevention strategies that you and your organization so I would say well I think one of the most effective was when alcohol use rates were sky high in the state and there were a lot of young people dying on the highways and we had a very large concerted campaign targeted to parents and stores about the risks and liabilities of supplying alcohol to youth and it really created a huge norm change in the community the ways that youth used to access alcohol change and at that point there were a lot of programs and opportunities available to people to get information and training and many of those programs that we've relied on back then in the 90s no longer exists the funding for those has been has been cut so that was one way that was very very very important for us to be able to talk to parents and other adults about why supplying to youth and to minors was was not in their best interest and that ultimately creating laws that made it not in the adults best interest to supply because there were penalties associated with that so Mary Burley who's one of my colleagues is here as well, she works with the Central Vermont New Directions Coalition is there anything that you can add to the strategy? Well there's, there was some federal policy around advertising and what you can put on television football games and that sort of thing that youth are watching with tobacco there is an option with all retail products there's the option of what we call content neutral advertising where you can't remove information for one particular substance which you can limit the amount of space on your window that is devoted to advertising and in many cases that's actually public safety asset as well because people can see inside the store if there's anything going on and people in the store can see out parking lot if there's anything going on so there's, there's various policy options what really worked with tobacco was all that money from the settlement was just for major education programs that you've probably seen a lot of those ads where the person who's lost their voice and the woman the woman that breaks my heart right now is that the English guy who says I'm going to be dead by the time you see this ad and those are very powerful and very effective so effective that the industry turned to e-cigarettes as their next market and in two years we were up to 30% use of our youth so they're, they're very powerful um they're motivated by profit and they really don't give to who it's about and I will say when Laura talked about the opt-in one of my jobs is to have all the towns of Washington County under my jurisdiction some don't even have a zoning board I mean this is just not easy for small towns to be able to compete with the money and the savvy of big marine corporations they don't know what to do we're trying to tell them as fast as we can if you don't want it here then here's what you have to do but three of my towns don't even have a town planned right now so this is, they're not sophisticated and it's really hard on them and we're doing the best we can but they can't compete well first of all I just want to really thank you for the time you took looking at the bill and coming up with comments about what we could propose or you would propose that we modify the bill I mean it's really good to hear a lot of ideas I just had a couple questions about some of them just to fill them out more so I better understand them you said setting testing guidelines and there is testing the bill is there something more specific that needs to be done in the bill that is not my area of expertise but I know one of the things is allowing the board the ability the flexibility to do that so they don't have to come back for legislative approval in order to you know a new test becomes available or we identify some new foreign matter in the marijuana that we need to test for fentanyl right or you know whatever else might be there that somehow is a new level of something that we need to test for that there's the flexibility that the board is able to respond okay that makes sense so I mean with respect to advertising you said who decides on what's falsely misleading I mean that's an issue with respect to I mean it's a very common term in statute with respect to all types of advertising I mean you know ultimately the cannabis control board as this bill is currently written would be responsible or whoever they decide you know is going to be their enforcement arm is going to be responsible for making those determinations I mean so do you have a specific concern there because I mean this is a very common falsely advertising is definitely illegal virtually in every industry across the United States so and there's somebody enforcement arm that's taking that up so is there something more that I guess making sure that it's really spelled out who that body is and that there's a public health person that's involved or a public health team that's involved not just industry folks or business focused people or people that are currently listed on the board but there's somebody there who understands the science understands public health not just individual you know people that may benefit individually from this law and making sure that it's spelled out and so one of the conditions was when the health impact study came out from the Department of Health but any new study comes out there's the people who are saying like this is the greatest thing you know that we've seen in years and other people say like that's all BS and so what who's going to be the person you know who's going to be the judge to say this is the evidence we're going to use this is the body of knowledge that we're going to go to to help support our decision making and that might be important for the decision making is this misleading advertising that they agree that they're going to use the CDC guidelines for what is appropriate advertising or they're going to use guidelines from the you know some other health organization or some other place but I think that might be important to spell that out before it ends up on somebody's desk and then now we're making decisions who the governing body or governing body of knowledge is going to be does the CDC have guidelines? They have guidelines around advertising for alcohol and tobacco but I don't know if it's specifically this also misleading. Sticking with advertising you said all claims need to be evidence based so I assume you're trying to get at you know looking at what medical marijuana dispensaries currently do they'll usually have you know whatever the product name is which are all weird names and then they'll say you know our patients have told us that this is good for PTSD anxiety etc. etc. Is that a concern of yours that those sort of It's a concern for me because when I go to the pharmacy it doesn't have a list that says you know it was all off my patients tell me it's good for this this and this right your physician tells you whether or not or TV advertising. Well TV advertising right exactly exactly so I think yeah I think it's somebody's if it's a medical decision solely on the evidence of you know almost once I tried it and it worked for them so you know I will try that. I think there needs to be a little bit I think this may be tightened up and there is some of that research right that's being I mean there is apparently research that's being done to prove that certain strains might be good for certain ailments right I'm assuming that's happening in the field. But you know my only just being double back for a minute is if there is no description for all these various strains you know we just you know it's just says okay this is sativa you know THC content of 22 percent CBD content of zero and people want to know whether they should have strain A or strain B or strain C there's not much guidance there except the THC level or the CBD level. So I guess my frustration is that that whole system wasn't really developed very effectively. So I've become very astute with medication stuff lately because we're watching we're taking care of my mother-in-law and all that information you get from the pharmacy says what it's indicated for you know what potential uses could be but it doesn't say my patients say you know you might want to try this because this will help. I mean there's some more science there to help make those decisions to beat the devil's advocate though all of that packaging material that you get with your pharmaceuticals is developed by the companies that are profiting off of our consumption of those pharmaceuticals. So to say that it is completely without bias I think is not quite there. I think Bob had a question so I have more so we'll come back to John in a moment. What you're just talking about now I mean I go to the Auto Master and they have a little bulletin board that has testimonials they did great great job or something like that. It's different I think between testimonials and medical fact. Is there any jurisdiction that completely outlaws advertising at this point and did I hear you say that at least one group pre-approved everything that went on to the question. So I'm not aware offhand I didn't do that research before I read these comments so I don't know but I certainly can find out from some national level who has enacted some of those restrictions. I know that there's problems about tying the hands of the industry behind their back when it comes to advertising because they've got their own level of free speech rights as a corporation which is why we need to be aware once we let it out of the gate it's going to be really hard to control it. So to really be cognizant of what those limitations can and should be and maybe being more restrictive in the beginning and giving ourselves the ability to sit up later on as opposed to trying to rail it back in later. Well you've used a cigarette alcohol comparison a lot and that's certainly something that's been limited. Right exactly it has been very limited. Certainly there are limitations I'm not sure how that works part of the tobacco limitations were because of the master settlement agreement so that was enforced on them and again I'm not an expert in corporate law so I'm not exactly sure who could come back and sue the state or sue a municipality for not allowing them to market the way they want to. I don't know the legal jargon but important for you to know as we move forward a pretty broad question but could you to give us an idea of how much it would cost to have a comprehensive public education and prevention program put together I know you are familiar with the tobacco settlement and during their heyday when they were actually getting money from the settlement to do prevention do you have any idea what they were spending? So I don't know what they were spending but I'm going to defer to Dr. Levine's comments because I'm pretty certain in his comments he identified a number I'm thinking it's 6 million but I don't know that that's the right number I can't remember what he said but I would ask you to look at his comments because he has looked at not just the prevention coalitions and the work that we're doing but the school based piece and the other services that ADAP is providing so I would want to use his number So the way that spirits are sold in Vermont basically the only advertising is once you get into the door and I think you indicated that that would be if we were going to go retail that would be a preferable type of setup I know that in the liquor stores they have descriptions of what the product is so that people can look at these signs and say this is something that meets my needs or what I'm looking for they're not particularly scientific but it's not making any claims either it just says this is where this is made this is what it's made from is that advertising that might be okay? I think so I think using that as a model makes a lot of sense that what we've done a lot of work on alcohol and tobacco control so being if there's a model like that that already exists that we can emulate I think that makes perfect sense and also I really like the idea of limiting the advertising of this bill when it all came to the forefront was we're providing a service to people who are already smoking marijuana and they don't want it to be illegal anymore we shouldn't be promoting it we shouldn't be encouraging people to use it's not good for them especially because of the way our society promotes things that it's overused it's not like I said half of the younger adults who are using regularly are using daily or nearly daily that's troublesome so and I know the folks at UVM will say the same thing for the students that are there that it's a troublesome thing and something they're worried about so if there are a way that somebody was interested in procuring in this case spirits or marijuana they would know where to go and they would go and it's not marketing to creating new audiences much like big tobacco did right it's not about encouraging people to come into the store they've already made up the decision and then they go there and then whatever advertising or marketing is there this you know to them in the door it's available to them once they walk into the door but it's not about finding new customers and building business because that's not how this conversation started up I recall correctly thank you so we are close to time so I've got Hal and then John if you had any other sure so I'm a parent with three grown children and I learned that during the work week 6 p.m. with a pretty iffy tricky time so how important is it for this education of prevention effort to provide programming during that slot and any ideas of what that might cost is that in the six million that the commissioner felt is suggesting for so I'm not I don't know where that number is included in Dr. Levene's comments or not Holly Morehouse who works with the after school folks in Vermont has a number of what robust after school programming would look like it costs for kids across the board not just younger children but even high school kids how do we provide programming that's engaging for them we do know that that's a really risky time and so being able to provide meaningful activities that keeps kids distracted but also involved in something meaningful not just you know policing them or babysitting them for those hours is vitally important and certainly part of the prevention conversation when we talk about prevention on the whole it isn't just about what happens in a school or what happens at home there's this other space that Holly talks about the third space so we need to look at what kids are learning and what they're doing during school when they're with their family and when they're at home wait at home it's cool and then outside the home everything else answer yes thank you John share this yes so this is current law that's under title 18 the dispensing of marijuana to a person under 21 is a criminal offense so it is in law it's already there does it bear repeating in this particular piece around the penalties for a licensee who's identified as supplying to you from that aspect we can bring that up with our drafts or someone to expect so thank you so much for your detailed view of the bill and your perspective on robust prevention programs thank you again for inviting me and I will send this to you how about my text thank you now we have Jessica Barnard from the Vermont Medical Society good morning thank you Jessica Barnard I'm the Executive Director of the Vermont Medical Society represent about 2000 positions across the state specialties and private practice as well as working in hospitals and I'm also speaking today on behalf of the American Academy of Pediatrics from which represents about 225 pediatricians across the state and I think you couldn't have timed our testimony better because we didn't plan this but we have a lot of parallels with supporting Lori's comments and agree with all of her recommendations as well and I did submit this in writing I don't know if you want me to pull it up do I need to I'll send jumping in one thank you just needed it to you assuming you're the closest you might know can't refresh so this is an order of the bill I know you're close to work up and want specific language is helpful so I thought in order of where these items all in the bill I will say they are not necessarily in order of our priority because the one that comes last is actually our top priority which is sustainable comprehensive prevention programs so we'll get back to that at the end and I do have some specific dollar amounts we can talk about when I get to that point but I will absolutely reiterate what Lori said which is our support also for having a public health representative on the board I listed out the and I think this was what Lori was referencing as well the number of tasks that the board is asked to do in the areas of rule they're asked to draft public health implications so I don't need to go through all of these but around advertising and signage health and safety requirements additives to cannabis sanitary requirements testing labeling packaging length of time it takes for the product to take effect on labels create a safety information flyer and then finally basically rewriting the entire regulatory structure for the medical cannabis registry so the board has a lot under their purview that has health and safety implications and I really don't see how that work is possible without a public health expert participating in that conversation as well as a close relationship with the Department of Health and Department of Public Safety and the entities that have been doing a lot of this work already especially around the medical cannabis registry so we strongly believe a board member with expertise in public health is necessary and it's a little bit not as central to our work but I know there's been some conversation in this committee around the public safety and we have a number on the board and we support that as well we're agnostic in terms of the details of who appoints these members or how the board is structured we support a five member board we work very closely with the Green Mountain Care Board on a lot of other health regulatory issues and just see that that number of people brings a breadth and depth of experience that may not be possible on a three member board so that would also be our recommendation but again specifically really critical to have a public health input in that work so this was just our suggested language but again it was a little bit random that we put one more in the House and one more in the Senate I really support the whole conversation you had with Lori around the restrictions on advertising to you can we absolutely agree with her comment that this should not be about marketing to new users or creating more users like we've seen the tobacco and alcohol industry are experts at doing we see the again we've heard the conversation that this the legislature is looking at this as sort of a harm reduction let's make current use safer and more regulated like regulated so let's not be creating a new generation of users who are being promoted to our most specific recommendation is to remove the provision that allows mass marketing based on the percent of audience who are likely to be youth I just I think we've learned from alcohol and tobacco that is very hard to monitor and enforce and as Lori pointed out there's really no enforcement structure put in place to ensure the compliance with these requirements we have you know our experience for example right now we're working with the Attorney General's Office on an issue around stem cell clinic so totally different topic but coming under that blanket of deceptive false advertising that's really how that takes some an enforcement agency taking action takes complaints it takes then the Attorney General's Office deciding they're interested or that it violates their laws that's expensive for the state to enforce we know again with the tobacco industry it took billions of dollars of litigation to get to the regulations we have in place now and to get out of the best compliance we have with them so I agree with Lori let's keep it as narrow as possible to begin with and are really big concerns around this before we call mass marketing so billboards flyers and radio internet I actually I'm not sure I know Lori mentioned that internet advertising is not allowed my understanding is that actually internet sales that are not allowed but that the current language would allow internet advertising if based on the percent of audience but I don't know how you monitor that I mean kids have access to everything these days and so I think that and I think 30% especially given our demographics of Vermont is almost I think almost anything I don't know the details but very many things could be viewed by an audience by youth that needs that 30% threshold and just to address a couple of the questions that came up with Lori's testimony our comments at least around the advertising are specific to the commercial sales my understanding in the bill is that there's a separate section where the board would be responsible for coming up with advertising regulations for the dispensaries so I'm not sure it's necessary that they would be identical for example what could be listed in the dispensary or in a low sales location for a dispensary versus commercial sales so I think those could be distinguished based on the different markets also just to comment that those things get a little off topic with those package inserts that you get with pharmaceuticals are actually FDA approved so there is a whole regulatory structure around they've improved it for specific indications and then they actually look at that whole package insert and make sure that it's evidence based on only talking about the approved indication so there's a whole very complex regulatory structure around that and I am not a First Amendment expert but my understanding is that because marijuana at the federal level is an illegal substance the First Amendment rights conversation is different and that I would encourage you to hear from experts on advertising law but my understanding is that you don't necessarily need to give the same latitude to an illegal substance as you would other legal entities we're concerned by the potency and forms of cannabis and this is sorry this is a little bit spread between two pages here but we know from both media reports as well as published articles that a lot of the concerns in other states with emergency department visits and overdoses are from either very high potency and hailed forms of marijuana or children getting into edibles either intentionally or unintentionally and there have been a lot of news stories lately about kids bringing them to school whether they know or don't know what's in them and then whole classrooms getting sick and going to the emergency department and there was a very recent study in Colorado looking at ED visits and again they found that even though edibles were a low percent of sales total they were a high percent of what caused especially children but emergency department visits because people don't know how potent they are it's not taking effect right away so they eat more and more and also these concern about these really high potency and hailed versions so because of those concerns we actually we've seen and you may be aware of this I don't know if you've had testimony on this already but Washington state for example has reexamined all of its rules regarding edible products and they have a whole lot of detail that they're now looking at that they will actually review edibles for appearance, color, shape, packaging and other factors to ensure they're not appealing to youth it's very hard you know gummy candies you know if you look at cotton candy, lollipops I mean this is exactly what kids want to eat and so we would recommend at least a simple way to address this is that you've already asked the cannabis board to look at regulation of additives to cannabis to make sure they're not toxic more addictive or appealing to youth under the age of 21 we would encourage the board to also be allowed to do rulemaking around the potency and forms of cannabis so that they can look at should there be restrictions on potency what forms can I take, what forms can edibles take, again Washington state has said certain colors maybe it can be a neutral color, brown whatever but not yellow, orange looking really fun so we think again if you have a public health member on the board to really look at what do we allow these or not this is changing gears to the cannabis registry and the medical cannabis system and I know you've had some testimony on how the system works currently what S54 is asking for basically a complete rewrite or letting the board really look at that whole system and how it will be regulated we have some concerns with that approach we actually think our medical registry is working pretty well all things considered it's well structured it's well regulated we haven't heard concerns about this use or diversion and we feel like it is the providers know what's expected of them when filling out the paperwork the patients know what's expected of them one of our biggest concerns to sort of pick one that we would hope to be addressed in S54 is the elimination of the requirement for a certified healthcare professional patient relationship before someone can fill out the paperwork so that's found in current statute in the definitions there's a definition of a bonafide healthcare provider relationship it generally requires a three month relationship so you have to know this provider over some period of time and there are exceptions for patients who have newly moved into the state or recently changed healthcare providers or if you've just been diagnosed with something and our concern for the elimination of this is that you will see and we know this because there have been news reports of entities trying to come into Vermont except finding this a barrier that you'll just have marijuana we call them marijuana mills I've lived in California, I've lived in Maine I've seen this in both of those states where you walk in, you pay $200 to get your exam and you walk out with your card that day and you never see that provider again and the concern about that is there's no follow up there's no monitoring for system for output side effects or is this helping you is this not helping you so we do think there should be some ongoing meaningful relationships mobility to come back to see this provider if you're having bad outcomes or want more information so our suggestion would be again you've asked the cannabis board to really adopt rules about the whole administration of the chapter around medical use and we think that the rules should establish some standards for a bona fide healthcare professional patient relationship maybe the three months isn't the cleanest way to go about doing that there would be some requirement that there be a true healthcare provider patient relationship and not just somebody you're seeing to get a card I would also think that there would be some interest in that just on the concern that this would be an easy way to evade taxation if you want a lower cost product to simply go this route say you have a bad headache and you get somebody to fill out the form and then you can get it cheaper by going to the dispensary side of things rather than the commercial side of things so I just think from a regulatory perspective that's the best sense and then to our main piece and I won't reiterate all the great testimony you've heard from Lori about sustainable funding and what we know works from prevention again as Lori said it is a science now we know prevention can work we know how to do prevention our department of health and all the regional and community partners do a great job in this we've seen such huge strides in areas like tobacco so we know funding and a robust program is very important and we believe that a tax and regulate scheme for cannabis must direct dedicated sustained funding to implement comprehensive strategies throughout the state our recommendation is for $6 million and that comes from I believe you may have seen this from Dr. Levine but there was a lot of work done from the prevention subcommittee of the governor's subcommittee this summer it's actually a fairly small portion of what they're asked for overall but that funds what they call their regional prevention networks and that's to really do the on the ground in the community work around after school programming and use leadership so the Icelandic model that you may have heard of and that 3-6 pm time meaningful evidence based after school programming some local educational counter marketing campaigns working on local public health policies and gathering and evaluating local data it does not include the portions of what they recommended that it would actually not fund is school based prevention counselors that's an additional cost as well as some areas around research and evaluation but that's at least sort of our I would say minimal or modest piece of the request that we think is the most important to do statewide prevention campaigns and we think that should make sure that that's that's annual and that will be an ongoing source of funding for prevention work around the state and I think I actually skipped this I just wanted to mention that we also support the municipalities having an opt in rather than opt out of sales since we know that location density of retail outlets has an impact on use and it also think municipalities should be able to have the choice over their local culture of health and whether they think this contributes or doesn't contribute to it and without having that choice you risk having locations going into the most vulnerable, disadvantaged and less organized communities in the state who may not be able to voice their opinion on whether they want the sales in their location or not so I think those are all of my points thank you for your patience and hearing let me go through all this and answer any questions I appreciate you bringing us recommended language as well since you are at that point I know you're really getting down to the work here so we wanted to help it as easy as possible very helpful I was going to say the same thing about the language I appreciate that but I have a question for you as well I realize what you guys doing this is a big thing for me should this become law is the education and prevention efforts especially for our youth so are you folks both you and Laurie your organizations are you currently working to the best of your ability right now with youth organizations that are current youth organizations that are already established in this balance in my time I represent Milton so I would simply say the Milton Youth Coalition so are you guys working with youth organizations such as that currently working I think that would probably be the best question for the prevention coalitions I know marijuana our state already has some of the highest youth rates of marijuana use in the country so we know it's a problem already so I guess my high level answer to say yes I mean I know the prevention coalitions the Department of Health is well aware of the problem trying to do everything they can but I think the fun thing is the limiting factor in terms of how much can be done on sort of an organized statewide basis but yes and I think there is work happening before they answer I'd really like to hear what the Vermont Medical Society is doing we work very closely with the American Academy of Pediatrics and they are doing a lot of work statewide around sort of youth and child resilience and working with parents and communities to connect to screen youth for ACEs so any risks and vulnerability factors in their family and then refer to community resources make sure kids are connected to activities and interventions as needed so I would say that's sort of a direct piece of what especially the pediatricians are very actively working on Stephanie actually is the Executive Director of the American Academy of Pediatrics so it could probably give more detail so physicians every day are working on screening and working on prevention there was actually a bill that came out of Senate Health and Welfare around screening improving screening for ACEs they call early childhood adverse events and making sure that families who are at risk are connected to services where we work we've supported early home visiting, nurse home visits making sure there's somebody checking in on families with a new child and getting them connected to services well but medical profession doesn't have a good history in prevention given their involvement in opioid crisis which was and started with prescription drugs prescribed by medical professionals yes and I will say that one of the reasons opioid use was prescribed so highly was because it was very effective marketing and very well funded commercial entities and so that's actually a concern we see being repeated here we don't want to repeat the opioid crisis I think physicians have come a long way I would really encourage you to hear from the Department of Health about how prescribing rates have gone down there are very strict rules around prescribing and we don't want to be part of perpetuating that kind of a problem and I will say that we absolutely agree there needs to be more evidence and education for prescribers around marijuana and that evidence is limited and it's just emerging and actually there's an out of the University of Vermont Medical Center there's what's called the academic detailing program that it goes around and educates prescribers about best practices and a number of areas are called counter detailing because their job is to go around and counter the pharmaceutical detailers who are trying to convince prescribers to prescribe the highest cost brand name medication and they are developing a module or a topic right now around marijuana because regardless of what happens with F-54 patients are using marijuana for medical, non-medical, commercial reasons so it has to be something that physicians are prepared to have that conversation with their patients around regardless of what happens with this bill so we've done educational sessions for our members at our annual meeting and we've done webinars around the evidence on marijuana and what it may help, what the problems with it maybe so education and being able to do research and have evidence based data to talk about with prescribers is very important it's something that we do Post-concerned view about F-54 which is written I think our underlying concern with the whole premise is putting a financial incentive to promote more use of marijuana because you're creating an industry that their profit motive comes from more users and frequent users in other states that 80% of the sales are to 20% of users so they are getting basically people who are addicted are their biggest customer so their profit motive is to create more people who are addicted I think if we were to start if we were saying for months going this direction we know that's a given what would VMS is our organization structure it I think we look at either a co-op model a non-profit model in the Dutch coffee shop model they actually don't have legal sales they allow illegal sales if they comply with a whole bunch of regulatory requirements so that if the coffee shop violates those requirements they just pull their sort of exemption to prosecuting for illegal sales so you haven't created an industry that has a legal standing to oppose those regulations so there are ways and actually there's a good 2016 Rand report that written for Vermont on how the incentives created by all these different types of models for selling it so I think there are models again if we were to wave our magic wand and have you able to break the bill ourselves there are models that are less likely to promote high use but that said we know what you're working off of and these are our recommendations for S54 as written thank you in the context of both your conversations you talked about limiting just in the market about other non-bud or universal I think it should be universal I think the risk is lower and again I'm not an expert in kind of a science my understanding is that the risk would be lower for say the smoked bud that they don't reach the same percentages of THC potency as say the distilled kind of meat liquid or the edible and while an edible is different it may not even be the potency for serving but the fact that people don't feel it as quickly as they eat more of it so I think it should be applied to all products there should be potency limits and this goes to you as well and I apologize for not getting when you ever got a little behind in my note taken we're talking about funding again or excuse me now I'm talking about funding my first question to you folks was are you working with the local youth donations and things like that to the best of your ability and realizes it spends on funding available and things like that but right now is where are you both your organizations getting your funding and your money to do this where do you get it from we are a volunteering membership association so we get all basically almost 100% of our budget from member dues so members decide we are a valuable organization to belong to they pay us a membership fee and then we do work on a number of different activities, priorities, different advocacy in the state house and that's very prevention coalitions are more nonprofit grant driven but they can speak themselves to their funding to do the prevention work so the prevention coalitions receive some state funding federal funding often local funding prevention works receive funding from the coalitions and also from ADAP to do the work with the outreach work that we do but the coalitions on the ground it's a mixture of there you know there was tobacco money and there was special alcohol prevention money for 12 to 15 year olds and then there's the federal funding and then it does everything that gets cobbled together and there's never a reliable source to be able to say well at least we can keep a quarter time staff person you know throughout and they'll figure out how to pay for programming or other additional staff people and that's our three or five years which is awesome but it takes that long to build the relationships you need in order to create change in the community and we're talking about creating a culture that doesn't encourage substance use so it takes that long to develop relationships then a coalition loses their funding and all of that work and all of that trust that went into building that is gone so that when the next group comes back it's that much harder for them to get started because everybody's been burned once already and the Milton Youth Coalition is a member coalition of Prevention Works and I know all the coalitions work really well to outreach to youth and youth serving organizations there's always room for improvement I'm sure there's some groups that were missing but they do their best and often to oftentimes in communities the coalition is the only youth serving organization in town it's a small town or an underserved community and thank you and that is just one of my big issues it should you know in fiscal work on law is that there's adequate funding for this purpose that's one of my biggest concerns that not of course in the public safety aspect of it and we share that with you I obviously do but the thing of it is that is really important to me is that there's sufficient funding to support these efforts I agree and from our perspective at least watching the conversations happen not just this session but the past several sessions is that has seemed to be one of the whole motivations for a tax and regulate system as opposed to grow your own I mean right the home grow is that then there would be revenue to fund prevention and so if this all happens without funding for prevention it seems at least to us to kind of be the outcome for the state any other questions for Jessa can I have one comment in relation to that I didn't address funding at all in my presentation because I feel like it's the sticky wicket for prevention to be asking for money from a bill that we really have a lot of problems with but if that is going to move forward and you're working online for funding prevention I think it really needs to model the way you're providing funding for the control board that there's money added immediately to get us up to speed so that we are ahead of the industry in doing prevention and wherever we're borrowing from that money is on the table not waiting until the first tax revenues come in to fund what the work we need to do thank you so much thank you very much for your time so committee I'm going to give us a few minutes to just take a stretch break and use the facilities if you need to we are going to shift gears now for the rest of the day today to be instead of hearing from more witnesses today we really need to focus on the language of the bill in front of us I know that you all did some good solid work on going through the language on Friday afternoon but in terms of how much of the bill we've been through we've got a bit more work we need to do so if you want to take a few minutes now to make note to yourself of some of the issues that you've heard raised in previous testimony or this morning that you want to flag when we get to that section of the bill please do that we are at the point now where it is critically important for us to start engaging with the language of the bill and so we are going to begin that work momentarily I think legislative council will be back in just a few moments so go ahead and take a quick break so thank you for being with us so our goal here for the rest of the day is to stay pretty singularly focused on the the bill language in S-54 I know that you discussed some changes that committee has already even used some direction on from Friday so I think I'd like to pick up where where it's logical from what we did not get to on Friday so that we can discuss the other areas of the bill that we may might want to see some changes to great so for the record Michelle Childs legislative council and we're still walking through S-54 just kind of a once through and we discussed a few, several issues on Friday and I've already started to draft for those and then I think once we get through it we can get through the bill today and then I can work on a draft tonight and then I can start to have some language for you to figure out tomorrow morning so I think where we generally left off was on page 11 and we hit a couple issues over past that but I think one of the things that we had left was the last thing that we had discussed was kind of I'm going to restructure just reminding you a little bit this section around the coming back in January and the board reporting on the second and third fiscal years on the build out positions, appropriations that are needed and the fees and having those kind of come in in January and bumping a couple of the other things that aren't quite as timely a little bit later trying to create some space in there and then I know that we talked about the timeline a little bit and folks weren't necessarily looking to extend the timeline and look at the different dates but I've talked with Michael O'Grady so he's our deputy for the legal team and he has a lot of regulatory experience and I was just checking with him around what he thinks around the timeline and he kind of confirmed what my concerns were as he said there's no way I think it was what he told me it was not going to happen and so I would just encourage you as your attorney to really do take a look at the timeline and something that I talked to Mike about maybe that he thought would be willing to do is if you guys maybe schedule Mike or Mike and Betsy Ann even just for a short time to just do a broad overview of what rulemaking entails and the process and the timeline for how that kind of typically happens because I know you have an interest that if you're going to move forward with this you want to make sure that it's workable that it's really actually doable and I know a lot of people are talking about the policy up here and I sometimes get stuck too much down in here trying to be like yeah but this piece doesn't fit here but I think that's also my role is to make sure that you can accomplish your policy goals on the ground with this and so I would just say it just makes me think of the timeline in talking about how we're going to restructure the report back in January and how we can try to create some more space to make sure that everything can get done So I was assuming when I saw that timeline I mean it looked pretty aggressive to me and I was assuming that it maybe came from a perspective of wanting to not necessarily recognizing how much time it's going to take the board to do the things they need to do but from the standpoint of wanting to make sure that the legislature has a chance to see it and react to it I think the initial I think what's happened is certainly from the senate standpoint I think they because they've been putting forth proposals for a number of years they're looking to get to the point of retail sales as quickly as possible but then what had happened also was that as the bill progressed more things started getting added to the board's responsibility so it might have been much more narrow at the beginning but then you know the timeline was excited to recognize the broad so they're just being asked to do more and more things but yet the timeline has stayed the same and so I would just say suggested at some point you know maybe you hear from Mike and Betsy Ann just about you know what rulemaking and then we just really examine the timeline and I can build out what I had originally done for a timeline and make that more specific with all the new little stuff or the tasks that have to be done and you can think about that because even just you know one of the things you're discussing clearly is about whether whether to do the early sales and then the way the proposal that we've discussed is having the early sales still be regulated under the Department of Public Safety while the board is getting up and running and there's been discussion about what would there be right now the medical program isn't slated to shift over until January 1st, 2021 we're looking at whether or not that could shift over earlier but again all these different things create more of an administrative burden and to potentially slow things down and so I just want us to be cognizant of all that with all of these policy choices so I think so that was the last section that we really had talked about I think on the section 6 you know I'll amend that because you're expanding the board from 3 members to 5 members the section 6a 6b and 6c I don't know if you want to get into those provisions or not around talking about the money obviously with the expansion to the 5 members obviously there's going to need to be a different appropriation but I don't know if you guys talk about that here or just leave it the way that it is and then let approach handle that well let's go have a clarifying question did we land on the purpose of those two additional commissioners what the committee decided was that there will be the one appointment by the treasurer and the one appointment by the attorney general there will not be specifics about any of those 5 board members but that the board shall create an advisory committee that's right now they're just authorized to create an advisory committee so one of the things that you guys can come back to where you can discuss about what I was going to do is incorporate some of the specific issues that were previously in about requiring this board to have a background in this but incorporating that into the advisory board language and some of the things that y'all have been talking about so the board shall create an advisory commission and that advisory commission shall have members representing social equity issues you know background in business or finance and management or regulatory experience or plants having that kind of a thing and then I believe the decision by the committee is to have those specifics be in the advisory commission rather than being tagged specifically to the board members so 6D auditor of accounts that's something we just flagged just that April is a perhaps not the best date for that so assuming that you would maybe see depending on the time that you may see the first retail sales in July of 2021 how long do you want the regulated market up and running before you want the auditor of accounts to be looking about whether or not that structure still makes sense once you've started to build out the board and the staffing I don't know how long the auditor would need to kind of to do a review so you want some time period for there for him to take a look at it and say here's how it's operating now we're right this would be I would say maybe it would be operating for 18 months before he starts to take a look at it and but does that make sense do you want a couple of years you know what's considered I think you've heard from the money people that it takes a while for you to start to see what they would consider to be a mature market and be able to assess that and my only thought on this is to keep this as short if we're going to go and discuss with the timeline of technical grade perhaps just flagging then we want to change this date and not decide on a date today until we've heard from them okay so moving on to section 7 in the cannabis establishment something that I'll tell you that I just want to do from a technical perspective is I just want to go back and compare the definitions I have in here for the different types of licensees with what their authority is under their specific definition that I'm just going to do a little tweaking and clean up not substantive but just so you know because that'll be something that will be reflected in the next one is that I think as amendments were made or certain changes sometimes I just want to make sure the language is consistent but I would just consider that to be technical so I will let you know as I did a walk well as you know I did a walkthrough for commerce yesterday and so one of the things that that they are working on in that committee are is corporate structure and so there's a lot of definitions in here having to do with who is an applicant who is considered to be a principal who controls you know things like that and those are things that they're working on so they may be looking at tweaking those definitions so that's in play over in commerce but I don't know that there was anything that came up for anyone in your discussions around any of the other definitions I don't have anything but let me know if I'm incorrect this is Jim one of Jim's things he just posed a question do we need a wholesale or a license in general just because you know in the liquor world and Marsha's probably a better one to talk about this is you know they're game product from all over the world I mean here it's going to be limited to Verlap and that was Jim's comment and how did he feel about that you just posed a question do we even need a wholesaler's license I'm not taking a position of just well talking with people that are probably more knowledgeable of this industry than I am one thing that was brought up was sometimes it would be easier for the grower to just deliver to a wholesaler and then let that wholesaler go about delivering to the individual retail locations especially when you have a number of retail locations but also for in-state wineries they can get a permit that allows them to do a direct shipment to a retailer also so give people the option they can either work with a wholesaler who will deliver to a number of different locations for them or if they want to do business with their local retailer they could be allowed to do direct deliveries currently has that built-in flexibility right if you look at page 31 on the cultivator license so about talking about what they can do so they can sell to a wholesaler product manufacturer or retailer or dispensary so they would have that option and I think that a wholesaler the purpose of that is exactly what you said Marcia which is to provide additional options for cultivators who perhaps are just like I just I don't want to manage all that you know that aspect of it and some kind of other legal entity there's nothing in the table there's nothing in here about that no no no oh I you know I don't know much about cooperatives so I would not be the person to talk about that Massachusetts cannabis bill has a co-op model in it for marijuana or cannabis cultivator in order to encourage small growers to be able to work together and then go up to a certain production yeah it'd be a certain production level I forget what it is in the mass law but it is something their co-op is pretty big I mean what there's they're small is our big but it's you know it's something to consider in encouraging small growers potentially legal market anything else on definitions you brought up the host other question so I just have one question about cannabis testing laboratory it's very unclear throughout the statute whether that testing lab needs to be independent independent from cannabis establishments okay it would be a license cannabis establishment one of the licensees no I understand that but independent from so if it's testing it needs to be independent from other cannabis establishments so that you don't have you're not doing yourself you're not self testing yes there is if you look at and I can put in a cross reference there but if you look at the testing lab license I think that there is language in that so if you look at page 36 subsection F a cannabis establishment that is subject to testing requirements shall have its cannabis or products tested by an independent licensed testing laboratory and not a licensed testing laboratory owned or controlled by the licensed holder of the cannabis establishment is that enough good enough definition to get at the issue of whether or not it's truly independent because it says owned or controlled by the licensed holder what about if it's owned or controlled by the investors what if it's owned and controlled by the employee okay I think we need to define that that's why I was focusing on definition section of so to give a little direction to how we would like to see this operate functionally you're looking for um you're looking for independent testing that is free from any sort of financial relationship with right the licensee the principal they own any owner an employee so that there's true independent that there's no connection between the testing laboratory and any other cannabis establishment I can look at that's getting into the financial structure because that's going to be where you're going to find a lack of independence is that there's an investment in a cannabis establishment retailer wholesale or whatever it is and that same investor is making an investment in the testing lab that's what I want to prevent okay so I will um I understand conceptually what you're talking about I'll loop in David Hall who's working with commerce on these definitions and this aspect as with regard to applicants and then I'll CCU and then maybe we can just have an offline discussion and then we can bring back a proposal based on if you want for the committee does that make sense? and then I have a question if the board wanted to have the agency of agriculture doing the testing is there anything in this language that would preclude them from doing that? No no this is strictly so the testing labs is um and one of the things it's for the license and one of the things I wanted to ask you about is about is that right now that this is you know that it can be that they're test they're getting things from other licensees to do for themselves which is separate from what the board is going to be doing for testing for compliance alright and so again you have the ag lab that can do hemp S117 and human services extends it to cannabis it also allows the ag lab to license independent labs to also that meet certain standards to be doing that work as well and so the compliance stuff is you know so this is envisioned to be these independent one of the things when we get to this is to talk about whether or not you want to allow these testing labs to also be testing for an individual who's not licensed maybe they want to test their you know if people are allowed to grow their own which they are currently if they wanted to utilize the service of a testing lab um would you want to allow the testing lab to service the public generally and also would you want them to be able to to test for a dispensary I mean dispensaries you know do so is that an option too so right now it's just under the licensees but that's something to consider you want to be sure that you're encouraging that there are testing labs out there so people have the resources to test well one of the benefits of tax and regulate is that we know that there's unadulterated product so I mean independent testing for both adult use and medical marijuana in my perspective is important so that you know the product is verified that you know it doesn't have pesticides you know it doesn't have mold or other substances that could harm people because that's one of the true benefits of a tax and regulate system is that people know when they purchase a product whether it's medical or non-medical they're getting an unadulterated product so you would so you're proposing that you would they would be able to test for the public and also for dispensaries right and we'd have to tweak the language the medical dispensary thing because it says the cannabis board cannot make rules that would restrict medical dispensaries and more than they're currently restricted I believe somewhere it does in adopting the new rules right so I just want to make just flag that because this would be a restriction because now as we've heard from earlier testimony there is no independent testing required for medical dispensaries it's permissible it's permitted but it's not required that is that I think right I think okay so I'm going to go back up so regulation by local government you're going to talk about that this afternoon so I'm going to skip over it for now advertising we did talk about this on Friday and I'll just recap a little bit based on my my recollection and then discussions with the with the vice chairs that there are is that is that he proposed and I'm working on language of looking at requiring the board to review all advertisements and he said meet a few other states to look at what they do with respect to that for medical programs the language in the other states has it more so that it's either submitted either at the time of publication or either prior to publication or at the time of publication you know so one of the questions is is would you want to require that the ads cannot be published until they've been approved by the board and then just think through a little bit about how that may play out logistically and from a capacity standpoint of being able to do that I don't know I just pose I just pose the questions at times well here's the you know there's a specific capacity issue but one of the ways around that is to charge a fee for advertising review so that you're paying for the administration of the advertising review program if you know cannabis establishments want to advertise and I think there should we should review what's going out there because I do have concerns about potentially misleading advertisements Nelson, Bob, Marcia how one of the things that we're talking about advertising I think of all the medicine I'm on and the one thing I always get is the little package that says this medicine could be harmful in these ways and it lists all the things that could occur when you take is there anything in this bill that says when somebody buys a package to this this could be harmful in these ways that comes with the package there are some provisions in here that specify that warn in certain warnings that have to go on anything that is sold by a retailer there are also provisions in here about around rules around educational materials that would be provided at the point of sale as well and I can highlight when we go through the specific language so just Nelson to all those indications come from drug trials because marijuana is a schedule one for a good drug there aren't drug trials after this morning's conversation and leaning more towards point of sale advertising I'm still reviewed all the components that we've talked about but it's important let's flag that we'll flag that so looking at doing some language on prior review and allowing the board or putting maybe adding to the list of things that they recommend to you in January in all the fees is a fee for advertising review for that there was also something in looking at the other states mostly they are very similar to what you have in subsection A here but one of the things that wasn't in here was a prohibition on prizes awards or other incentives for purchases that you might want to consider so kind of like usually right now what we're saying is more that people are trying to sell something with cannabis as the price which is not allowed but they make a section and say you can do things like that but you can't be like be a regular customer on a monthly basis for a year and you're entered into or something like that so would you like to see some language on that ready yes we'll see a couple more people who have questions as well Marcia and then how in agreement with Bob that I would rather see more of a structure like the way we sell spirits in the state once you're in the door there's advertising, there are displays but there is no other type of advertising that's allowed other than for the store to say that they are a liquor store or liquor agency for the state now beer and wine is different but advertising for spirits is really restricted basically to the price guide that the liquor department issues so there's no there's no radio there's no television well for in-state liquor ads on manufacturers will have magazine ads right yes they can and it was always a gentleman's agreement that liquor companies would not advertise on national TV but that has changed over time but you won't see liquor ads on for a liquor store for on channel 3 but once you're in the store then advertising is allowed people can put up displays they can promote their product so it seems to me like these this is a decision point because I don't imagine that we need to have a fee for the board to review advertising that is only going to be displayed inside the dispensaries and so before we go down the avenue of creating this new structure for reviewing of advertising I think we need to dispense with this question how was that on this topic or was that it's about maybe leading the advertising this suggests something so I think it's important to communicate why taxed and regulated marijuana is good for the customer it's free of impurities and I think if it's done in the right way it could help divert people from the illicit market to this market so almost like a good housekeeping stamp of approval or whatever on products that this is so it educates people about why this is being taxed and regulated and why it's better for you than any other product I think maybe we're talking about promotion as opposed to advertising education as opposed to advertising but I fully believe that we should be putting money in making sure that people are aware that the regulated market is you don't go blind when you drink it but come to Joe's because we have a sale on ounces it's not this kind of thing that I would not see along the interstate why don't you see anything on the interstate it's a non permanent sign awesome I just went on and did a thing that's sort of for Vermont for stores and you get there's tons of them coming up telling me what town and where would this be the same type of advertisement so out for these types establishments so people know where they are because that's an advertisement you go to that web page which is one of those stores you want to look at and it's clear there's wine and wood spirits and all the others Yankee wines and spirits right here in Mount Period so just telling the location yeah, is that okay people are going to come to your state and fly, are they going to drive around the blocks until they find one I would see that my experience in other states is you can fire up Google maps and type in marijuana dispensary right, but a lot of those it's not the dispensaries themselves that are doing the advertising it's other sites that like if you look at one of the witnesses mentioned leadmaps.com that's not the I don't know maybe the dispensaries probably advertise on that site but what they do is they aggregate information and do that which is very well like a Yelp or something like that it's a little different I would see that it's more information rather than advertising unless we had the caveat that basically said you can't anybody that's licensed by the state cannot participate in so you wouldn't be buying an advertisement if it's completely independent if it's somebody in Monswana making the website of information that they compile which is uncontrollable by us but trying to say that a licensee can't knowingly buy space there then that becomes advertisement and I wouldn't think forever I don't know I don't really have any background on issue around advertising or businesses obviously some kind of complete ban you have first amendment concerns here how those are affected by the fact that it's federally illegal I don't know when you talk about advertising for alcoholic beverages I just sent an email to Damien to see if he's got any background or references with regard to how that is regulated I know that in coming up with what is here is that I had originally looked at some of the tobacco rules around some other states so I don't know right now dispensaries are not prohibited under state law from advertising but I would call that ban suspect I think that was when you talk about a gentleman's agreement I think there's more it has not been challenged but so committee I would tend more towards pursuing the fee for review of ads by the board as opposed to trying to trying to do a restriction of them you know I think the board I think it's reasonable for the board to look at the content of the advertising and also to look at the location of the advertising to make sure that it complies with not being targeted towards underage consumption but I would prefer to kind of leave this more or less intact and pursue the fee just as a reminder there is a provision in here that the board is to adopt rules for advertising as well that are going to be geared towards policy goals that are set forth in subsection A that seems reasonable to me but thanks for the discussion so do we want to pursue the avenue of having the board in addition to writing the rules around what's allowed in advertising to set up a fee structure so that they can review the advertising before it goes up or do we want to pursue the avenue of point of sale only and therefore we need to do a little work on understanding what banning advertising might look like when we suspect there are speech issues there Bob? I think it's easier to loosen the news than it is to tighten it once I think it's gotten out of control that we're going to lean towards so do you want to head up subsection A to consult with a few folks from Ledge Council and others about what point of sale only restriction would look like how big is the committee? how big is the committee? you? I guess I would rather not get in a week to let the board figure this out actually I would go with that if we were sending that as maybe not the mandate but a strong suggestion in terms of preference I need you to say a little more what you mean by that formulating something now timeline being so tight so I think one way to tackle that is the rule making and advertising right now is slightly vague so we could work on that language to achieve some of the concerns that have been discussed today to ask the cannabis board to look at rule making with respect to specific issues such as point of sale advertising just throwing that out there as a proposal as a way to get to this because I do share house concerns a bit about trying to tackle creating a advertising regulatory scheme today I do too that's what I was going to say but pointing them in a direction I think is a strong direction so let's flag that when we get to the rule making section we can see if we want to give any more focused direction to the board in terms of rule making so I will just mention the subsection B language which I think may have the effect of accomplishing a lot of what Marsha is going for around point of sale in terms of the restriction unless you can show that that advertising reaches no more than 30% of folks who are under 21 and so it may not just be point of sale but maybe they could have advertisements in a 21 and over music venue or a club or something like that where they would say well you have to get carted at the door to even come into this particular venue so those little ads that you see in the restrooms or whatever that kind of stuff and maybe those would be permitted there in addition to point of sale or whatever but that you're unlikely to be able to meet that criteria if you're if you just got a a sign on the side of the road or wherever it is or you're putting it in seven days or something like that I don't need to be this positive I just wanted to remind people that that's fair so education and there's other provisions within the rule making around the build up for education for licensees and for employees just the section that requires that every three years the licensee has to complete an enforcement seminar and that licensees has to ensure that each employee involved in the sale of cannabis need to add cannabis products to that can you repeat that in the show? I'm sorry can you repeat that in the section about education oh yep so this is on the bottom of page 19 top of page 20 so that every so licensee has to complete an enforcement seminar every three years conducted by the board and they can't have their license renewed unless they've complied with the terms of the program there's also something in rule making that we'll see in a few minutes around that they have to do this and so they'll build this section kind of out more of their rules subsection B licensee has to ensure that every employee involved in sale of cannabis and I'm going to add cannabis products on there has to complete a training program approved by the board prior to selling and at least once every 24 months thereafter so this is another Jim comment Jim likes the DLC training model can you interpret that for a market? okay I believe it's all owners and managers must attempt perhaps I think he wants to have DLC training a seminar in person and then that manager or owner can train their staff with a DLC approved program and they have packages or you can go online and take it but the people who are in charge of the establishment must do the face to face training periodically and then all of their staff need to be trained I think that's what this is modeled after if you look at A the licensee has to complete because some of them are periodically and then B is that the licensee has to ensure that each employee so whether it's a manager or whatever completes the training program so I don't know if this exactly matches that but I think conceptually it's envisioned to be very similar and then again the board is required to work on rules that's kind of further refine the requirements for those two things so what they found and I think it was mentioned earlier this morning that face to face classes have a much higher rate of compliance than apply more other types of education that's provided so those seem to be very and we'll see more on that in rulemaking yes so moving on to rulemaking so subdivision 1A is relating to how it applies to all licensee so all type of licensee so we can just go through the list so the applications A qualifications and B I will just note that that one, subdivision 1B is something that commerce is looking at as well oversight inspection record keeping after employment and training requirements security restrictions on advertising marketing and signage so we can talk a little bit more about building that out I mean it wouldn't necessarily maybe structurally fit right there but I can put something back in the advertising section around the rules this list before we dive into the advertising if this says that the rules shall include and I'm looking at G physical security video and alarm requirements does that mean that every licensee every license type has to include video and alarm requirements so the reason I'm getting at this is because I could imagine outdoor growers particularly the ones who are small scale growers using a different type of security than some sort of alarm a wired alarm out in the back field I mean you can say security requirements including any appropriate lighting physical security video and alarm requirements and that would be permissive of the different tiers and they're going to make a distinction and say is it appropriate in this kind of context or not in the other maybe it's easier to alarm a field than it is I will just on that I will just mention back in the definition section so one of the things that is well we'll get to that alright so so for I health and safety requirements does that encompass education and prevention and the health no I would think about that in terms of OSHA things having to do with employees having to deal with if you're a product manufacturer or you're whatever you're doing there to make sure that you're like the respirator so regulation of additives procedures proceed to sale traceability of cannabis including any requirements for tracking software storage and transportation sanitary requirements procedures for renewal procedures for suspension and revocation requirements for banking and financial transactions given something that commerce is looking to look at and then top of page 22 policies and procedures for conducting outreach and participating participation in the regulated market by diverse groups of individuals who have been disproportionately impacted by cannabis prohibition so for cultivators no I just want to go through this list before we just so we're going to get back to advertising is this the only reference to advertising in the world because it would apply to any of them because in what we're thinking typically of retailers advertising but if you're a small grower how are you getting the word out to the product manufacturers and the retailers and the dispensaries that you're a small grower who's growing these five different types of strains you know how is it and how are they able to know that unless you're doing some type of advertising okay well let's talk about advertising let's sketch right now I do agree with Michelle it's probably better to go back up and if we're going to refine advertising above this because it's just it's going to be hard to do it here so I have the other things on advertising that I'll work on the language, John if you want to work with me on anything else that you want to kind of maybe put in the other specific statutory section on on advertising that might further dust up I'm happy to work with you on that or go back to court and then we can come up with a proposal that you can make to the community this is this is probably covered in procedures suspension and revocation of licenses but I really want to make it clear procedures for the sale of product to were the use of the product by anyone 21 years younger I mean specific looking at what that means right your interest is in saying that your license may be revoked yeah but I want to spell as a consequence of selling to them steps and it's not just suspension steps to prevent this is related to advertising not really making period rulemaking around the prevention of the use of cannabis by people 21 years under the age of 21 including enforcement which is like what liquor control does now that they have undercover people going in to make sure there aren't sales to people under the age of 21 that's not really spelled out anywhere in this bill right you might want to do that more in the suspension and revocation section okay sorry I don't know how to really pop around on this look I had really fast some lake without everybody's eyes bug out when I spin through but I will take note of that around the suspension and revocation action on youth right and you can have this is the thing it's something that is not in here that you may want to duplicate and is that you know there's the provisions in Title 7 the criminal provisions for a licensee who sells under age or and also you don't have in the corollary to that is then for there's penalties for youth who try to buy under age I'm not just concerned about criminal penalties the criminal conviction is much more difficult to get than a civil penalty of some form so I mean there needs to be both criminal and civil right okay so you want to beef up the language on suspension revocation I'm just saying one way to do that is the way it was done in S41 they had a separate section 241 separate section on youth yes and if there's a specific section that you're thinking of where you want to send to me I'll send it to you and I wrote that one too but it's okay you don't have it I've written so many of those bills over the year they're starting to blend together no I just you know because you know okay criminal penalty you know if an employee of a cannabis establishment sells to an underage person I doubt we're bringing a criminal case against the establishment so if I had I thought that with regard to suspension and revocation that I picked up the language in 241 but if there's something that's in 241 that I address suspension and revocation as it applies to underage sale I can go back and take a look at that or if you have certain provisions well there's other provisions too like you know a marijuana establishment should not permit a person under the age of 21 to enter a building or a closure on the premises where marijuana is located this you know that's in 241 it's nowhere in this bill so you're talking about I'm trying to uphold the list of use provisions in the use section I mean that was said you right is that what I'm recalling okay I will go back and take a look at that I just want to make sure that I think it's important to spell that out somewhere in the bill that we are trying to make an attempt to protect children from the use of marijuana I mean if for no other reasons so the people understand that we're trying to do that I mean people outside of this room you know what I can actually do you want would it be helpful if at this point we just I can just pull up 241 in that section on you do you want to do that now and see what provisions you want me to include let's be aware that we're now into the lunch hour and we all might benefit from an opportunity to eat lunch and go get some fresh air for a few minutes so can we pick back up with the 241 language after lunch and then if there were any other areas of rulemaking that you had thoughts on think banking and all of that so let's pick this up at 115 have an hour get some fresh air we're gonna work hard this afternoon so