I get asked a lot of questions about what California cannabis licensees can and cannot do under the Medicinal and Adult-Use Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act (“MAUCRSA”). California is actually business friendly once operations get going with a license– despite its many issues with the cannabis industry. For example, vertical integration is allowed. There’s no
Deceptive matter is yet another pitfall faced by canna brands as they take steps to protect their intellectual property. According to the U.S. Trademark Act (commonly known as the Lanham Act), such matter may not be registered as a trademark (15 U.S.C. § 1052(a)). While to some extent this is a commonsense rule that seeks
We recently got on our soap box about the importance of hiring a New York cannabis attorney. The catalyst for that post was the question of whether applicants for New York’s Conditional Adult-Use Retail Dispensary (CAURD) license can select their own real estate. We have an answer: no. A brief refresher of the drama. Section
We’ve been writing about eligibility criteria for licensure for the New York Conditional Adult-Use Retail Dispensary (“CAURD”) (here and here). In addition to the Office of Cannabis Management’s (the “OCM”) handy FAQ, it also recently published a scoring criterion to score eligible applicants after they have met the minimum requirements for each type of eligible
On August 4, 2022, U.S. President Joe Biden published a formal statement concerning the sentencing of U.S. basketball player Brittney Griner. Griner was just sentenced to nine years in a Russian penal colony and fined one million rubles. We’ve written about Griner’s case before (here and here), but to summarize, she could be spending the
Many folks in the cannabis industry – especially legacy operators – have little to no experience with corporate governance. I don’t mean to say that they don’t know how to run a business; they likely do. What I mean when I refer to corporate governance is the actual process of adhering to governance agreements, getting
A final judgment recently rendered in WM. Wrigley Jr. Company v. Roberto Conde, et al., is nothing short of a cautionary tale and a powerful reminder to cannabis companies: Parody is NOT a defense to trademark infringement in this type of commercial context. The parties We all know Wrigley – it’s a titan in the
Listen up friends. The Oregon Liquor and Cannabis Commission (OLCC) plans to drop the hammer on bad actors in the regulated Oregon market. Or so the Commission announced in a stern news release on Friday, July 29 (the “Release”). The Release is titled “Commissioners plan to tighten ‘change of ownership’ option.” For good effect, it
Register HERE! Join Harris Bricken attorney Hilary Bricken for a live discussion on strategies to build a scalable cannabis business, hosted by the National Association of Cannabis Accounting & Tax Professionals. Effectively serving cannabis companies as an accountant involves much more than just counting cash and paying the quarterly tax bills. There are countless state
Last week, we discovered that U.S. Senators Elizabeth Warren and Cory Booker cited our own Vince Sliwoski in a letter to Merrick Garland, the U.S. Attorney General, pressing for the end of cannabis prohibition. The Warren-Booker letter, dated October 6, 2021, advocates for DEA to remove cannabis from the federal Controlled Substances Act— which would
