Kingston marijuana panel, officials mull county seal of approval for cannabis products

Aug 22, 2023

KINGSTON, N.Y.—The city’s Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Act Task Force met for the final time on Thursday with Mayor Steven Noble and Ulster County Executive in attendance to talk about the possibility, assuming Ulster County or Kingston lands a recreational marijuana dispensary, of developing a county seal of approval for cannabis products.

The task force wanted to meet with Metzger after developing recommendations over several months around how the legal cannabis industry would function in Kingston. Noble said the city had come a long way in terms of readiness.

“I think we just weren’t quite prepared, I think Kingston is really prepared now for what’s to come,” said Noble.

Metzger said she had a vision for the industry in the county and cautioned against large companies polluting the process.

“The cannabis industry can go in two different directions,” she said. “It can be this large corporate-dominated, unsustainable, inequitable economic force, or it can be a real model of socially just, equitable and sustainable and small scale (industry).”

Metzger said dispensaries might need training in operating a small business and help to navigate the different licenses, and added “That to me is what makes sense for Ulster County.”

She said the county’s old economic development director put out a request for proposals for a consultant to come in and make recommendations for how to best support the nascent industry, but that it didn’t align with her hopes for the industry.

Metzger said the new director, Kevin Lynch, is revising the proposal to better align with those hopes. Part of the new path forward for the legal cannabis industry could be a county seal of approval that would signify to consumers that the cannabis they purchase is both equitable and sustainable, she said.

She said an agricultural director working under Lynch would help farmers to achieve those goals and develop products up to the correct standard. The cannabis showcases that would start this month would help those same farmers unload products they aren’t able to sell.

Metzger also said she liked the idea of taskforce member Jeremy Cherson to use Ulster County buses to transport cannabis consumers around the county so they could safely enjoy local weed.

Noble said that while he was happy with the task force’s progress and findings, it was a shame that there were no dispensaries in Kingston yet. “We’re this gap in the whole state,” he said, adding that he thought the county and city had been stepped over.

Corporation Counsel Barbara Graves-Poller said she was proud of the board as well, telling members that their work had provided a model for future task forces in Kingston and that they could be called upon in the future for their insights.

“This group has done what other municipalities have not,” she said.

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