Today, the Massachusetts Cannabis Control Commission (CCC) voted 3-0 to allow applicants whose provisional licenses have expired due to non-payment of the required fee under 935 CMR 500.103(1)(e) to submit payment by December 3, 2024 to extend their provisional approval. After an hour-long discussion, the Commission voted to approve the following motion:
Move to direct the Licensing staff to assign expedited review, prioritizing Social Equity Program Participants and Economic Empowerment Applications, for previously approved provisional license applicants that responded to the Commission’s September 23, 2024 email, who submit their provisional license payment and resubmit their application by December 3, 2024. If the license applicant complies with all the requirements of 935 CMR 500.000 or 935 CMR 501.000, the Chief of Investigation and Enforcement shall issue a provisional license. The applicant shall not be responsible for another application fee. Commission staff shall provide notice to the Executive Office of Economic Development of the applicants who have responded to the Sept. 23, 2024 Commission email.
As discussed in our previous post, 120 applicants were notified that their provisional licenses had expired due to non-payment of the fee. The Commission reported that as of October 1, 2024, they received 20 responses to their September 23rd email regarding interest in making payment to extend provisional approval.
Please note that you may still respond via email to [email protected] by 5 p.m. tomorrow, October 3, 2024. All you need to include in your email is: (1) The entity name associated with your previous provisional approval and (2) The corresponding license application number(s).
Among the 20 responses received, 10 are Social Equity Program Participants (SEP) and two are Economic Empowerment Applicants (EEA), highlighting the language of the motion to prioritize these applicants. Licensing staff noted that they would ensure that SEPs and EEAs already in the queue for provisional license review and approval are not affected by today’s vote. This is of additional significance as the deadline for applying to grants from FY25 Cannabis Social Equity Trust Fund is October 17, 2024. The Commission discussed a strategy for this cohort of SEPs and EEAs with expired provisional licenses to feasibly meet the deadline, given that some grants are only available to provisional license holders. Ultimately, they decided that the goal of today’s vote was to facilitate provisional approvals and concluded with the last sentence of the motion to keep the EOED informed of these potential Social Equity Trust Fund applicants.
As always, if Prince Lobel can assist your business, or if you’d like to learn more about the services we offer, please reach out to Michael Ross or anyone in Prince Lobel’s Cannabis Group.