GOLDMAN SACKS
Patients to protest dispensary opening
BY MIKE CRAWFORD
Medical marijuana patients in Massachusetts have fought for years for more cannabis dispensaries. Though voters approved such facilities in 2012, there are still less than half-a-dozen statewide. But when the long-awaited Patriot Care opens for business in Lowell this week, the occasion will be met with protest.
For relevant intents and purposes, this leg of dispensary-related dissent in the Bay State broke out last month after Adam Vaccaro of Boston.com published an article titled, “Medical marijuana lobbyist to oppose pot legalization push.” The piece revealed that a hired gun named Daniel Delaney, who is registered with the Commonwealth to represent the interests of three Patriot Care dispensaries (one of which is in Boston), started a campaign called Safe Cannabis Massachusetts to oppose the Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol initiative that will appear on the ballot in November.
A DPH-registered nonprofit expecting to open three locations in Massachusetts, Patriot Care is owned by Columbia Care, an industry behemoth that boasts “leadership … from renowned businesses and organizations including Goldman Sachs, Staples, PepsiCo, and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institutes.” Led by former Goldman investment bankers, the company operates more than a dozen medical marijuana dispensaries in five states besides the Commonwealth.
In speaking to Boston.com, Patriot Care spokesperson Dennis Kunian praised Delaney while denying that the dispensary is involved with the anti-legalization campaign. “He’s doing this independently of us,” said Kunian of lobbying efforts. “Although, if he’s doing it, he’s pretty darn smart, and it’s something we’re going to be taking a look at.”
In any case, public records for the Safe Cannabis website show that yet another Patriot Care contractor is tied to the anti-legalization campaign as well. The domain is registered to Greg Czarnowski, whose name recently appeared in my email inbox with an invite, on behalf of Kunian, to the Patriot Care grand opening this week. Asked about this coincidence, Kunian replied in an email:
Greg is an outsourced contractor working for me on a number of events for both Columbia Care and Patriot Care among other things that he does for me … He is a terrific web designer and 3 years ago I introduced him to Dan Delaney who has been our lobbyist in Ma. since the very start. We are not involved in any of Dan’s other activities, other than his work for Patriot Care. We have not donated to Dan’s drive to oppose the Ballot issue as it is written, nor will we donate in the future. As hard as people in the recreational area have tried, they will find no link between what Dan is doing for Patriot Care other than helping us get open in Mass.
Kunian assures that his company has “no voice in the recreational issue positive or negative and will always continue to stay our own course.” Delaney claims the same, saying that Czarnowski designed the anti-legalization campaign website, but he says those jobs are independent of any work for Patriot Care.
“This CRMLA Initiative is MPP (Marijuana Policy Project), Washington, DC boilerplate that did not consult all of the stakeholders in the Commonwealth such as law enforcement, municipal groups, and property owners,” Delaney says regarding his rationale for creating the opposition campaign. Delaney says he’s seeking input from all stakeholders, including anti-marijuana Mayor Marty Walsh as well as those in the medical marijuana community, and expects that it will take $2,000,000 to defeat the current legalization initiative.
CRMLA political director Will Luzier says the Bay State initiative is an improvement over legalization in Colorado, which is being held up as a failed experiment by the likes of Delaney. Among other differences, Luzier says cannabis in Massachusetts will be taxed at lower rates in order to cut deep into the black market. On the other side of the argument, Delaney doesn’t like that the CRMLA proposal allows for adults to grow up to six plants per person or a dozen per household, with only civil penalties for anyone caught with up to double that amount. “Even for medical marijuana,” says Delaney, “I think you would be hard-pressed to find many medical patients needing to grow 24 plants.”
Many medical cannabis patients are supporting CRMLA so that they can grow their personal supply without permits or licensing. Bill Downing, a controversial caregiver who provides medical marijuana outside the dispensary system and is currently facing heat from the Suffolk County District Attorney, wrote in an email to other local activists, “Patriot Care’s support of Delaney and potential support of his effort to stop legalization could have a terrible cost. Many cannabis activists and patient advocates understand, as I do, that cannabis regulation has great advantages for patients.”
In response to news that the same people advocating for Patriot Care are pushing against legalization, CRMLA supporters are planning a protest outside Patriot Care in Lowell on Tuesday. Quite the optics there, patients picketing the same dispensary they backed through the approval process. Delaney isn’t worried, and denies that he is helping to protect regional dispensary monopolies; the lobbyist says there’s no good reason for him to oppose the CRMLA, because if passed, the initiative could potentially create even more work for consultants like him.
While Delaney will make bank either way, it’s easy to see why the Patriot Care poobahs who pay him may be concerned. In Boston, for example, the company stands to dominate virtually all of downtown — especially if zoning measures recently proposed by City Councilor-at-Large Michael Flaherty take hold. Rooted in an unsubstantiated reefer madness and irrational fear of pot shops popping up on every corner, according to what Flaherty told reporters, his arbitrary rule would “literally protect the West End, North End, Downtown, Beacon Hill and some other neighborhoods from getting another [dispensary].”
All while protecting the interests of Patriot Care and limiting future access for patients.
Mike Crawford is a medical marijuana patient, the host of “The Young Jurks” on WEMF Radio, and the author of the weekly column The Tokin’ Truth, which is produced in coordination with the Boston Institute for Nonprofit Journalism. He formerly wrote the column Blunt Truth under the name Mike Cann.
