 All right then. Why don't we get started here? My name is James Pepper. I'm the chair of the Vermont Cannabis Control Board. Today is Monday, May 2nd, 2022. And I call this meeting order. Just a few remarks before we get started or turn to the agenda rather. Licensing. So it is May 2nd. We have not issued any licenses. I would like to acknowledge all of the hard work that our Vermont growers have shown, not just in getting their applications together, but also just attending our meetings for all these months, providing us comments and helping us draft our rules. We recognize that this delay impacts small cultivators, particularly outdoor cultivators the most. And this is the exact kind of group or cohort that is critical to the success of this market. That being said, we can't just ignore the rules that we put into place with respect to who is a qualified applicant. We need to know at the board who we're granting licenses to and ensure that all of our licensees are complying with the regulations that are going to govern this market. This protects the board. It protects the industry. It protects consumers. You know, there's a lot of people out there that are philosophically opposed to cannabis and would like to roll this market back, and we really just can't give them a reason to do that. If that means delay now while we hire our staff in the long run, that's a trade-off that we have to make. The good news is we have an overwhelming response to our job postings, which is not the case in other state agencies. You know, they're going to be open. The jobs are going to be posted for another five days, but we already have a number of people that can literally hit the ground running both on the licensing side and on the compliance side. And I should just note also that we're not just sitting around to the board tumbling our thumbs while we wait for these folks to get hired. Everyone here is working as hard as they can to get through these applications, and I anticipate that we will have some for approval relatively soon. A quick reminder that all cultivation tiers except for Tier 6, the application window is now open, so if you've been waiting for one of those tiers to open, you can now apply for kind of tiers 2 through 5 on the cultivation side. And a reminder that we have not closed any cultivation windows or any other licensing windows, and we have no intention of doing so at this point. If we do decide to close a licensing window, we'll do so pursuant to a board vote, we'll do it in an open meeting, and we'll give everyone at least 30 days notice before that window closes. This week, we are going to be reaching out to applicants about paying their application fees. And whenever payment is involved, I think we all should be very careful. So we're going to be reaching out by email, specifically the email address ccb.applications with an S at vermont.gov. This email will have instructions on how to pay your fees. The instructions will direct you to our website, ccb.vermont.gov, where we will have a link posted for you to pay. So please be very prudent. When it comes to this process, we really do not want to have anyone get scammed. We've seen scams that have happened already with respect to the cannabis board and fee payments. So if you see anything suspicious at all, please just pick up the phone, give us a call, ask us whether or not this is a legitimate email or whatever else. So our number is 802-828-1010, and it's option zero for the adult use program. A few other updates, just banking and insurance. Again, we know that banking and insurance are not affordable in the cannabis industry. But they're also necessary to help kind of protect you, to protect the general public. So, you know, pursuing to our rules, the board requires that you make a good faith effort to get a bank account. You make a good faith effort to get commercially reasonable levels of insurance. If this isn't a possibility, you know, the board will consider waivers to those requirements. But we really need to know that you've tried. So our guidance is up to date on banking and insurance. And again, while it's not an endorsement of these companies, we know that VSECU and NFCU, NEFCU, are creating depository accounts for bank for cannabis businesses. We've heard that more are coming online and will keep our guidance document up to date, recognizing again that this is not an endorsement of these companies, these banks, but they're essentially the only game in town right now. And on the insurance side, NFP is an insurer of the kind of at least one of the dispensaries here. They are very willing to ensure cannabis businesses. They've appointed a kind of point of contact for cannabis businesses. His name is Scott Foster. He's the vice president of risk management for NFP. His email address is scott.foster at NFP.com. His phone number is 408-792-5453. That is up on our website under our FAQs. Last week, Hickok and Boardman also reached out and said that they're willing to ensure cannabis businesses. They've also assigned a point of contact for cannabis inquiries. Her name is Jessica or Jay Koons. And her email address is Jay Koons, C-O-O-N-S, at hbinsurance.com. And her phone number 802-262-1442. Again, not an endorsement, but these are two companies that have actively kind of reached out so that they're willing to ensure cannabis businesses. And it's my understanding that both of these companies can delay the effective date of your policy to the actual day that you begin operating so that you don't have to pay for a policy until you actually start using it or needing it. Fire safety, just a reminder that the Division of Fire Safety does want to talk to at least consult with every perspective licensee. If their jurisdiction is over public buildings and they can do a remote check to see whether or not they have jurisdiction over your proposed business, but they do want to talk to everyone. So again, they have two points of contact. One covers the northern part of the state, which is essentially Windsor County and the other one covers the southern part of the state. And so north is Ben Moffitt. His phone number is 802-479-7581. Email is Benjamin.Moffitt, M-O-F-F-A-T-T at Vermont.gov. The southern part of the state is Landon Wheeler, 802-216-0501. And email is Landon.Wheeler at Vermont.gov. And again, if they determine that they're not under their jurisdiction, they'll send you a form letter that says that and the board will be looking for that. Tax compliance, just really quickly. You know, every one of your principals, owners, financiers needs to be in good standing with the tax department. It's a very quick process. It can be done remotely as well. You can send a good standing request to tax.compliancesupport at Vermont.gov. In the email, in the subject line, you should just say good standing request for a cannabis license. And then within the email, you should just include your business ID or your social security or your federal employment identification number. Those are just some of the kind of reminders of the questions we've been getting this week. Again, if you have additional questions about applications or anything else, you know, we have a lot of guidance up on our website. It's kind of on the left hand side of the screen at ccb.vermont.gov. If you don't see what you're looking for there, you can email the board. It's ccb.info at Vermont.gov. And if, you know, you want to call us, you know, that number again, 802-828-1010, and it's option zero for the adult use program. And other than that, Julian Kyle, you had a chance to review the minutes from our last meeting. Yes. Yep. All right. Is there a motion to approve? All in favor? All right. Then we'll turn to the agenda. First up, review and approve social equity applicants. So we'll start with our social equity applicants. So the table at the top shows the number of applicants that have submitted a full license application that have self-identified as having social equity status. So before the board today, we have eight applicants that staff is recommending for social equity status, which means that if the board grants social equity status to these applicants, then staff will prioritize these full license applications for review. So currently, we have two in submitted status, 21 in received status, which means that we've acknowledged the receipt of their application. We have seven currently under review, and then there should be under pending board review, the number eight there. So that's missing. We'll update that before we post this to the website. So I'm going to go through these each one. I'll just go through the submission numbers. They are all before the board as recommended for social equity status based on the fact that they meet the criteria for socially disadvantaged individual as defined in board rule 113Q. So we've got submission number 74, number 45, number 30, number 11, number 187, number 71, and number 289. And we actually have seven. So, oh no, there we go. Eight. And number 148. So I didn't go through the license tiers and types, but they're all listed there. And as I said at the outset, each of these is recommended to the board for approval as social equity applicants as they meet that definition in board rule. Can we approve these as a group? Yes, you can. So I have a motion to approve. I don't remember what it says, Han, and I have far too many tabs open. I move that the board accept each one of these recommendations for social equity applicant approval as presented to us by staff at this meeting. Seconded. Any discussion? Bryn, can you talk just a little bit about what the process was to make the recommendation? Yes. So the board reviewed the application and the application has questions about the persons, the applicant, the reason why the applicant indicated they have social equity status. So for these applicants, all of them are being recommended as meeting the criteria for socially disadvantaged individual in 113Q. And the definition there, we can pull up the rule if that's helpful right here. So socially disadvantaged individual in two, individual who meets at least one of the following criteria. All of the applicants before the board today meet the criteria in subdivision one. And that, if the board recalls, is the criteria for social disadvantages set forth in the CFR. And so the applicant has indicated on their application that they meet that criteria with an attestation. And so board staff is reviewing their attestation and also reviewing their government-issued identification to confirm their status in their attestation. Further comments? Discussion? All in favor? Okay. It was kind of a big deal, actually. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I know we're just happening knowledge that we, you know, for such like big games, that's kind of a big deal. Yeah. Yeah. It took a lot of work to get us to this point. I mean, how many times we, how many hours have we been discussing? A lot. A lot. We set it as a priority from the beginning and we've done our absolute best to keep it there. Um, Brenner, are you able to walk us through the next part of our agenda, which is the recommendations as to pre-qualification applications? Yes, I am. So we'll start with the pre-qualification application table here that sets out the numbers. I'll just note that this table does not include those pre-qualified applicants that the board has already reviewed and pre-qualified. We will add that column to the table and adjust the numbers accordingly after the meeting. So this is not inclusive of those that you've already pre-qualified. But this is the, these are the updated numbers as of last Friday. And today before you, I think that we have 18 before you today for pre-qualification. So as usual, we're recommending these applicants for pre-qualification because they've demonstrated compliance with the rules 141 and 142. And they've demonstrated their suitability for pre-qualification. So we have submission number 206, which is a testing laboratory. Submission 154, which is an indoor tier three cultivator. Submission number 127, which is a mixed use tier two cultivator. Submission number 133, a mixed use tier one cultivator. Number 149 is an indoor tier three cultivator. Number 143, mixed use tier one cultivator. Number 386, mixed use tier one. Number 481, indoor tier three cultivator. Submission 106, indoor tier two cultivator. Submission 326, indoor tier three cultivator. Submission 227, mixed use tier one. Number 96, an indoor tier one cultivator. Submission 204, indoor tier two cultivator. Submission 245, mixed use tier two cultivator. Submission 485, outdoor tier two cultivator. Submission 156, indoor tier three cultivator. Submission 99, indoor tier one cultivator. And lastly, submission 105, an indoor tier three cultivator. So all 18 of these applicants have demonstrated compliance with the rule. And suitability for pre-qualification. So staff is recommending these submission numbers for pre-qualification. Is there a motion to approve these? This is our first testing limb. I move that the board accept each of the recommendations for pre-qualification approval as presented to us by staff at this meeting. For a second? Second. Any discussion? I can see a testing lab. Yeah. All in favor? Hi. Hi. Okay. A little ahead of schedule. But that is kind of the rest of the business of the board today. So we'll move into public comment. We'll handle that the same way we always have. If I'm joined via the link, please raise your virtual hand. We'll kind of call on you in the order that you raise your hand and then we'll move to the folks that joined via phone. Nellie, could you just help us with the order? Yes. Yes, I can. Dave is up first. All right. Good morning, everyone. I did not. I think we didn't get a licensing update at this meeting that we've had at the last few meetings. I've always found those very helpful to know how many applications of each type have been started and completed, completely submitted. It would be great to get that. But also a clarifying question. James, you mentioned on tax compliance that you said every owner and financier needs tax compliance. And that's not how I was reading rule 1.4.5D. So maybe next week's meeting, we can get just a clarification if that's really the reading, because 1.4.5 talks about every applicant submitting a tax compliance. But it doesn't specifically say for every single owner and financier. And while I certainly could send more emails to the tax department, I guess I just, for complex entities with a dozen shareholders, I'd like to avoid it, if not something you guys actually need. So thank you very much. Thanks, Dave. Austin is next. Hi, yeah. I wanted to ask a clarifying question about the fire management and contacting them. And from last week, I thought that was something that would happen after submission or after approval for license. But is that something you're looking for everybody and for application? And if we've submitted application, if we can contact and send that along? That's my question. Thanks. Thanks, Austin. Anyone else with a comment? Feel free to raise your virtual hands. And if you join via phone and have a comment, you can hit star six to unmute yourself. So the phone ending in 0959 has unmuted themselves. I have a question. Okay. My name is Bobby. Thank you for all the work you all are doing. I know it's a lot. Thank you. How do we find out? Because I haven't received a letter, but I know that my pre-qualification has been under review. Would I be receiving a letter so I can use it for the banking insurance that I need? I know you're calling out the numbers. How do I find out about the application number that I have? Okay. Thanks, Bobby. Anyone else with a comment? We'll close the public comment window just to address some of those issues. Fire safety, yes. It is a prerequisite of us issuing a license that you've at least spoken to fire safety. They've either decided that you're not within their jurisdiction or you've come into compliance with their kind of building codes. And if you've started your application and you don't have that, the board will be in touch about the parts of your application that are incomplete. So you should reach out to fire safety. And the two numbers and email addresses that I mentioned are up on our website. And then, Bryn, do you want to just address the pre-qualification question from Bobby? Sure. So if you are pre-qualified at the board meeting, then you will receive an email and you will also separately receive a hard copy letter in the mail. So you'll receive an email that includes your submission number and the link to the board meeting at which your application was approved. And then your hard copy letter will come in the mail and it will include the names of all the principles and controlling individuals for your business. And that's the letter you can use to approach the bank for a bank account, for example. Or use it as you see fit. So you should receive both an email and a letter. Helpful. All right. That is everything on our agenda. Does anyone have anything that they want to bring up while we're in the meeting? Thanks for everyone for bearing with us and our staff. Pardon me. I missed an opportunity to ask a question previously. Okay. Go ahead. On the fire safety. Does the fire safety clearance apply to tier one outdoor as well? So I will answer your question, but we can't really get into a back and forth in this context. Feel free to kind of submit your question to the board. But I will say that fire safety would like to talk to even tier one outdoor cultivators because they want to know things along the lines of where are you going to store your cannabis once it's harvested? Do you have any buildings that you are using related to your business? They can do a lot of that work through a phone interview and through just looking up your exact location where you plan to do business remotely. They don't have to do necessarily a site inspection. But they've told us, they've been in touch with us. They said they want to hear from every perspective licensee. And first for this threshold question is, is your business within their jurisdiction? Is it not? And if it's not, they can send you a very quick form letter. And I imagine that they will be sending a very quick form letter to most tier one outdoor cultivators. But if you are within their jurisdiction, then there's a little bit more of a process. So I think our guidance on our website should be up to date on that and certainly the phone numbers and email addresses of the two points of contact from fire safety should be on there. Any other comments, Julie or Kyle? I was just going to say thanks everybody for bearing with us. So we're certainly working hard. And we have 11 guidance documents up in various parts of our program on our website right now. And I would expect a handful more to be up this week as well. So we're turning it out along with prequel and full applications at this point. So more next week. All right. Well, I will adjourn the meeting. And thank you all for joining us. Thanks to our staff.