It’s no secret that historically, New York City has some of the most stealthy weed delivery services in the nation.
On the legal cannabis front, the people of New York have demanded and will now receive medical marijuana home delivery. The State Health Department made drastic changes to the state's exclusory medical marijuana program making medical marijuana delivery available by the end of September.
On Tuesday, Governor Andrew Cuomo announced several key provisions including the state's first authorized delivery and allowing nurse practitioners to certify patients.
“We don’t want the federal government to come in and exercise an enormous amount of oversight and shut the entire program down,” Governor Cuomo's counsel Alphonso David told the New York Times. “We’ve always been interested in expanding the program. We just wanted to make sure we had the data to support it.”
The State Health Department made a dozen recommendations for the medical marijuana program in a report released earlier this month.
The improvements include home delivery, eased access and a provision for medical marijuana in schools. The state is expected to implement all twelve out of twelve of the department's recommendations.
Some changes will go into effect immediately, such as requiring medical marijuana companies to offer delivery by next week.
New York could learn from Los Angeles, who has fought hard to keep medical marijuana delivery running. In 2013, Los Angeles voters approved Proposition D, which was a zoning measure that was meant to whittle LA's 700+ dispensaries down to 135 dispensaries.
Over the years, LA City Attorney Mike Feuer claimed to shut down 769 “illegal” dispensaries which in turn mostly converted to delivery. Feuer succeeded in shutting down the delivery services Nestdrop and then SpeedWeed. This goes against the will of the people in Los Angeles. According to Eaze's new poll, 75 percent of Los Angeles voters say they are in favor of permitting medical marijuana delivery services in LA. Anyone who is familiar with Los Angeles knows that dispensaries have always prevailed in one form or another. An effort to reform Proposition D in Los Angeles is currently underway.
Compare that to New York's medical marijuana program. New York's illogically restrictive medical marijuana program hasn't made things easy for patients living in the state. There are currently only 17 dispensaries open in New York, which are expected to cover the state's 20 million residents. The changes are a shift in focus to the patients too ill to travel, the ones that need medical marijuana the most.
