Commissioners and staff acknowledged applicants’ and cultivators’ frustration over the abrupt halt to the process that would award 20 new retail licenses as early as May. Commissioner Robert Jacquard said regulators had already begun coordinating with the Rhode Island Lottery on equipment and a location for the selection process.
“Now we are stopped from continuing that process,” he said. “But that does not mean we are stopped from figuring out the best path forward to reach our top priority, which is issuing retail licenses.”
Any details on the commission’s legal strategy will remain hush as it appeals the April 8 order by the U.S. District Court Judge Melissa DuBose temporarily stopping the licensing process.
“Anything used in this public forum can be used against us in the court case,” Mariana Ormonde, chief legal counsel, said at the start of her overview.
The commission is the defendant in three federal lawsuits filed by out-of-state entrepreneurs over the state’s requirement that all cannabis license holders must be majority owned by Rhode Island residents. Plaintiffs in each case argued the residency requirement violated the Dormant Commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution, which prohibits states from engaging in protectionist practices against other states.
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