NCIA Director of Communications Bethany Moore checks in with what’s going on across the country with the National Cannabis Industry Association’s membership, board, allies, and staff. This week Bethany is joined by NCIA CEO Aaron Smith and Deputy Director of Government Relations Michelle Rutter Friberg. Join us every other Thursday on Facebook for NCIA Today Live.
by Aaron Smith, NCIA’s CEO and Co-founder
History was made today as Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) along with Senators Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Cory Booker (D-NJ) introduced the Cannabis Administration and Opportunity Act which would finally remove cannabis from the federal Controlled Substances Act and begin the process of federal regulation.
For the last year, NCIA has been working behind the scenes to ensure this landmark legislation not only ends prohibition but also creates an environment where small and medium-sized businesses can thrive under national legalization. These businesses – who we now call “Main Street Cannabis” – are the heart of our industry and we’re proud to have been giving them a seat at the table in our nation’s halls of power for over 12 years.
We will continue working with our allies in the Senate to advance this bill and advocate for some necessary amendments to better ensure that small, equity, and women-owned businesses (in particular) are well-positioned to thrive after the end of federal prohibition.
We would not be where we are today if not for your support which has allowed us to effectively represent the interests of small businesses like yours in the halls of Congress and in the court of national public opinion.
I hope you’ll join us in making national legalization a reality by making your voice heard at our upcoming 10th Annual Cannabis Industry Lobby Days in Washington, D.C. September 13 & 14!
Thanks to your membership, NCIA’s government relations staff represents Main Street Cannabis in D.C. every day but Lobby Days is your chance to show up and tell your unique story to our nation’s lawmakers, firsthand.
Lobby Days is also the best opportunity to connect with your fellow industry leaders who are truly invested in the future of cannabis and sensible national policy. Please register today so you don’t miss out on making history with us! Reach out to my colleague Madeline Grant to learn more about how you can be as impactful as possible at this year’s Lobby Days.
Thanks, as always, to all NCIA members for their support of the cannabis industry. If your company is not yet a member of NCIA, now’s the time to join and have your voice heard in the halls of Congress.
Watch this video update with Aaron Smith and Michelle Rutter Friberg:
By Michelle Rutter Friberg, NCIA’s Deputy Director of Government Relations
Hopefully you’ve had a chance to recover after 4/20, but here in Washington, D.C. the work never ends!
Over the last few weeks, there have been developments on the timeline for the Cannabis Administration and Opportunity Act (CAOA), updates on the path forward for SAFE Banking, and a slew of pro-legalization events took place in the D.C. Keep reading for the latest:
In February 2021, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) along with Sen. Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) announced that they would be introducing a comprehensive cannabis bill to deschedule cannabis, enact a regulatory framework for this new industry, and seek to repair some of the harms that the war on drugs has created. In July of that year, the trio released the long-awaited, detailed discussion draft of the Cannabis Administration and Opportunity Act (CAOA) and asked for comments and feedback from stakeholders (you can read NCIA’s here) to be submitted by September 1, 2021. Since then, the Senators have been diligently reviewing and working on the legislation.
The sponsoring offices had hoped to introduce the CAOA in the beginning part of the year, and more specifically April 2022, however, they recently announced that they are continuing their diligent work and will introduce the bill before August recess.
While this announcement can be frustrating at face value, I’m happy that the Senators are being thoughtful, careful, and considerate about crafting this legislation. Precedent matters a lot on Capitol Hill, so getting it right on the first try (or attempting to!) matters.
The House of Representatives has passed the SAFE Banking Act three times this Congress; first in April 2021 as a standalone bill by vote of 321-101 and most recently as an amendment to the House’s version of the America COMPETES Act, which is now being negotiated by a bicameral, bipartisan conference committee.
While many in D.C. had hoped that negotiations would conclude by Memorial Day, lead sponsor Sen. Todd Young (R-IN) recently said that a more realistic timeline for the bill would be the end of summer. This week, the Senate will vote on 28 motions to instruct- these are procedural, non-binding resolutions that guide the conference committee through the negotiation process. After that, the conference committee can begin meeting
Founded in 2016, the National Cannabis Festival is an annual event held in Washington, D.C. with a focus on cannabis and music, advocacy, education, and activism. Now boasting well over 20,000 attendees, NCIA is proud to have been involved with the event since its inaugural year, and I even sit as an advocacy committee chair!
This year, the festival was back and better than ever with an entire week of events celebrating cannabis advocacy in the nation’s capital, including an incredible Policy Summit featuring members of Congress, advocates, journalists, and more.
Like I said – the work never ends in D.C., and the NCIA team is gearing up for another busy month filled with Evergreen virtual lobby days, Hill meetings, coalition building, and more! Want to get involved? Consider becoming a member today!
by Michelle Rutter Friberg, NCIA’s Deputy Director of Government Relations
It may only be February, but the NCIA government relations team has been busy at work this year advocating for you and your business! Just over the last month, the SAFE Banking Act passed the House for the sixth time, we held our first mini-virtual lobby days, and Majority Leader Schumer provided an updated timeline for the Cannabis Administration and Opportunity Act (CAOA). Keep reading to learn the latest:
Last week, Congressman Perlmutter (D-CO) followed through on his promise to attach SAFE Banking to any viable legislative package when he filed it as an amendment to the America COMPETES Act, which is a large manufacturing bill. Now, the bill is headed to a “conference committee” – a term for when House and Senate leadership, as well as committee chairs and other members of Congress get together to negotiate differences in the two chambers’ bills.
Congressman Perlmutter and the other lead offices of SAFE Banking are currently talking with leadership about the importance of enacting the provision, however, Leader Schumer and Senator Booker have been clear about their opposition to passing SAFE without broader equity provisions. During early February, keep your eyes on the news to see if SAFE Banking makes it into the final, enacted language!
Due to NCIA’s Evergreen members’ investment in shaping policy for the cannabis industry, we have been able to take our Government Relations work virtual by hosting our first ever Mini-Lobby Days! As we continue to represent a value-driven, responsible industry, our main goal is to educate congressional offices on all aspects of cannabis policy reform, including social equity, banking, 280E, scientific data, and much more.
During the first week of February, NCIA’s Evergreen Roundtable members participated in more than 30 virtual congressional meetings, including time with Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ), Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR), and Rep. Dave Joyce (R-OH). Members also met with relevant committee staff and communicated the importance of holding hearings and markups on cannabis policy issues, as well as enacting reform while Democrats hold the majority in both chambers.
Sound interesting? Get in touch with Maddy Grant (Madeline@TheCannabisIndustry.org) to learn more about becoming an Evergreen member today!
Back in September, NCIA and other stakeholders submitted responses to the Cannabis Administration and Opportunity Act (CAOA) discussion draft, led by Leader Schumer (D-NY, and Sens. Booker (D-NJ) and Wyden (D-OR). Since then, the Senate’s focus has been primarily on passing President Biden’s Build Back Better Act, which has significantly slowed progress on the CAOA. While the bill hasn’t been formally introduced yet, the sponsoring offices have slowly continued to have conversations with committees of jurisdiction to tee things up behind the scenes.
In a recent press conference in New York, Leader Schumer announced plans to introduce the CAOA in April. Can anyone say 4/20?
This update just represents a small snapshot of all that NCIA’s government relations team has been working on in D.C. – make sure to keep an eye on the blog, find us on NCIA Connect, and follow us on our social media channels to learn the latest!
Deputy Director of Communications Bethany Moore checks in with what’s going on across the country with the National Cannabis Industry Association’s membership, board, allies, and staff. Join us every Friday on Facebook for NCIA Today Live.
by Madeline Grant, NCIA’s Government Relations Manager
Over the last year, NCIA’s Membership Department has dedicated a lot of time to revamp our membership tiers and benefits to ensure the best value for our members. We gathered feedback from members, conducted market research, and learned what value cannabis businesses sought in this fast-growing industry. I want to spend a little time today going through your benefits to be sure you are utilizing them to the fullest. As we represent the cannabis industry as a whole, we made sure there was a tier that could represent every cannabis company, small or big. Our three tiers are Seedling, Blooming, and Evergreen. To offer an array of benefits for your business, NCIA has three main buckets of benefits; networking & education, marketing & business resources, and policy & advocacy. Let’s take some time to go over all three.
NCIA offers the opportunity to network and meet other cannabis professionals in the industry. It’s our job to provide events and tangible platforms so our members can grow their networks and businesses. Through our networking platform, NCIA Connect, we offer an exclusive online community to chat daily with other cannabis professionals. Here you can post questions, provide resources, share articles and utilize the platform to build relationships across the country. As an NCIA member, you are eligible to apply to speak at any NCIA virtual or in-person event. Depending on what tier you join you receive a certain amount of complimentary admissions to our trade shows and regional events, which you can check out here. As you move up to our Evergreen tier, there is the opportunity to attend exclusive VIP networking events, private meet-and-greets with celebrity keynote speakers, and a guaranteed seat on one of NCIA’s committees.
As a cannabis business, it is important to have access to resources, especially as the industry is rapidly growing. Through membership, we offer discounts for Simplifya SmartCabinet compliance software, discounts on NCIA’s digital marketing and event sponsorship, a listing with a link to your company’s website in the online member directory, and access to BDSA Greenedge market intelligence platform. Through our digital platforms, we offer the ability to submit educational content to NCIA’s Industry Insights blog or post news about your business on our website and the eligibility to apply to be a guest on NCIA’s top-rated Cannabis Industry Voice and Cannabis Minority Report podcast. As we move into the Blooming and Evergreen membership levels, we offer company logo impressions and links posted to all NCIA social media platforms with over 200K total followers and featured in our newsletter sent to 40K e-mail subscribers annually. Our benefits offer great marketing opportunities to network and grow your business.
With momentum building across the country as more and more states are legalizing every year, we are simultaneously seeing more policy movement in Washington, D.C. It is more important now than ever to support cannabis policy on Capitol Hill. As a member of NCIA, your dues are directly supporting our ability to lobby and advocate for an industry we can be proud of while investing in the cannabis industry’s national policy agenda. All NCIA members have the opportunity to come out to our Annual Cannabis Industry Lobby Days (which is the best event to attend in my opinion). In D.C., you’ll meet with congressional offices and discuss the challenges you face as a business owner and meet other NCIA members from around the country. As a member at our highest tier, Evergreen, companies have private monthly updates with our Government Relations team, private briefings with key congressional offices, the opportunity to provide input on NCIA’s policy white papers, and direct access to NCIA’s registered lobbyist in D.C. Our support from the Evergreen tier allows us to allocate more resources to meet our goals on Capitol Hill, therefore, allowing us to continue to be as influential as possible.
Speaking of policy on Capitol Hill…
Just last month, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), along with Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden (D-OR), unveiled long-awaited draft legislation that would remove cannabis from the schedule of controlled substances while allowing states to determine their own cannabis policies.
This legislation called the Cannabis Administration and Opportunity Act (CAOA), is actually a discussion draft and has not been formally introduced (yet). If you’re interested in learning more about the bill and seeing the text, check this blog out.
But now, we need your help! As a discussion draft, we have the ability to weigh in on the CAOA’s proposed language and provide our feedback as an association. As members of NCIA, your input and expertise are essential and critical to us as we prepare our submission. Your submissions will be reviewed by NCIA and incorporated into the feedback our team is simultaneously compiling.
Use this form to send our government relations team your thoughts! I can’t wait to hear from you.
It’s important to understand and utilize all of your benefits as an NCIA member. If you ever want a quick refresh on your benefits please check out the membership matrix found here. Of course, if you have any questions please feel free to email me at Madeline@TheCannabisIndustry.org. I’d love the opportunity to hear from you!
NCIA Deputy Director of Communications Bethany Moore checks in with what’s going on across the country with the National Cannabis Industry Association’s membership, board, allies, and staff. Join us every Friday on Facebook for NCIA Today Live.
by Rachel Kurtz-McAlaine, NCIA’s Deputy Director of Public Policy
STOP what you’re doing and ask yourself 2 questions:
If you answered yes to one or both of these questions, please take a quick moment to let us know! Click on the unique link next to the relevant question. If you want to learn more about either issue, keep reading.
Hopefully, by now you’ve had a chance to read the discussion draft of the Senate bill released a few weeks ago, detailed in Michelle’s last blog post, Crazy for Cannabis Administration and Opportunity Act (CAOA). If not, at least read the summary so you understand what is happening with this potentially historic legislation.
We are at the precipice of federal legalization, but as you know, in such a highly regulated industry, how legalization gets implemented can have a significant impact on your business. So it’s important that your voice is heard when these laws and regulations are being discussed. We’ve created this simple form for NCIA members to easily give us feedback on the CAOA. If you’re a committee member, you can provide feedback through your committee as well.
You may remember reading my article, Text Messaging (SMS) Crackdown Impacting the Cannabis Industry, published back in May, written when we were first learning the scope of the issue. Although many companies seemed to be able to move on with workarounds, we’re hearing even workarounds are disappearing. And even when businesses are still able to operate, they get charged high fees or are severely hampered in what they can do with the messages.
Because this issue has been affecting so many of our members in one way or another, we want to help, but we need to hear from you. This isn’t a law that we can lobby to change, it is a convoluted policy that telecommunications giants are enforcing on their customers, ostensibly to cut down on customers complaining about spam, but in some cases, they are applying blanket bans on cannabis companies.
As an industry, we can fight back. We are organizing a working group to take on the telecommunications giants, including a potential class-action lawsuit. If you want to be part of this or learn more, please email me.
Those workarounds going away, or extremely expensive and cumbersome. It can seem overwhelming to fight back.
At this point, time to organize and use strength in numbers against giant telecommunications companies.
NCIA Deputy Director of Communications Bethany Moore checks in with what’s going on across the country with the National Cannabis Industry Association’s membership, board, allies, and staff. Join us every Friday here on Facebook for NCIA Today Live.
By Michelle Rutter Friberg, NCIA’s Deputy Director of Government Relations
Last week was undoubtedly one of the most exciting weeks in federal cannabis policy ever! On July 14, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), along with Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden (D-OR), unveiled long-awaited draft legislation that would remove cannabis from the schedule of controlled substances while allowing states to determine their own cannabis policies. Let’s take a look at what we know:
You’ll recall that back in February, the trio of Senators announced that they were working on a comprehensive cannabis bill. Since then, NCIA and other advocates have (im)patiently been waiting to see what shape that would take – I was calling it the best-kept secret in Washington! However, at long last, the discussion draft of the Cannabis Administration and Opportunity Act (CAOA) was released.
A discussion draft is exactly what it sounds like – prior to introducing this language as formal legislation, the Senators have shared it in this form, allowing stakeholders, the public, and others the opportunity to weigh in and provide their expertise and feedback.
As I mentioned above, the CAOA removes cannabis from the list of controlled substances, effectively legalizing it at the federal level while still allowing states to set their own policies. According to the bill’s detailed summary, it has a few goals:
“… [it will] Ensure that Americans – especially Black and Brown Americans – no longer have to fear arrest or be barred from public housing or federal financial aid for higher education for using cannabis in states where it’s legal. State-compliant cannabis businesses will finally be treated like other businesses and allowed access to essential financial services, like bank accounts and loans. Medical research will no longer be stifled.”
The bill also includes:
The discussion draft comment and feedback process will be ongoing until September 1. Until then, NCIA will be working with our board, Policy Council, committees, and our members (particularly our Evergreen members!) to solicit their expert input on some of the areas the Senators have expressed interest in. After that deadline, the Senators will take their time to review submissions and subsequently formally introduce the revised language later this year. Stay tuned via our newsletter, blog, and upcoming events to learn the latest on this and how you can actually submit your thoughts to us!
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