What Will the California Cannabis Industry Look Like in a Few Years (From the Legal Perspective)?

05 Dec What Will the California Cannabis Industry Look Like in a Few Years (From the Legal Perspective)?

We see litigation in the California industry’s future.

Because California’s cannabis regulatory scheme is still in relative infancy, 2018 has looked the same for most operators: applying for annual licenses and waiting (and then continuing to wait) for them to issue or fighting to get temporary license applications submitted before they can no longer be issued. But what happens in two or three years after hundreds or thousands of commercial cannabis licenses have been issued? A host of administrative and civil litigation, probably.

California’s cannabis regulators have immense power that’s not just going to disappear after they issue licenses. The Bureau of Cannabis Control, which regulates a number of different license types, arguably has more police power than the actual police. Section 5800 of the BCC’s readopted emergency regulations, for example, gives the BCC “full and immediate access”, without prior notice, to enter premises, inspect cannabis or vehicles, and copy books and records, and failure of a party to comply with a BCC investigation can be subject to discipline.

Not only do the agencies have broad investigative power, but the subject matter of what they can investigate—all the various regulations that companies have to comply with—is immense. The regulators are not going to sit around and assume that licensees are following the law, the regulations, or even their own operational plans submitted with their applications—they are almost certainly going to use their investigative power to root out non-compliant operators. This should come as no surprise as the BCC, for example, has already taken some action against allegedly unlicensed cannabis operators. Our cannabis lawyers in other states with older licensing schemes have already seen targeted agency investigations and enforcement actions.

There are really endless ways that the agencies may choose to investigate or enforce their regulations, but it’s safe to say that they will prioritize enforcement against unlicensed operators. They may also go after some other easy targets—selling to underage persons, violations of advertising or delivery regulations, track-and-trace non-compliance, and so on. Rest assured, too, that administrative rules will continue to evolve, and licensed businesses that do not keep up on compliance will also be vulnerable.

Not only are the next few years likely to see an increase in administrative actions, but they are also likely to see a swath of civil litigation between licensees and internally. With the development of so much new technology and other intellectual property, we expect to see a good deal of trade secret and other IP litigation. Prop 65 and other forms of false advertising litigation are likely to continue as well. And internally, members of cannabis companies may start to bring lawsuits against each other or their companies for a number of reasons—from simple things like alleged mismanagement of company assets to fraud in soliciting investors.

The future of the California cannabis industry isn’t entirely certain, but it’s likely going to involve a lot of time before arbitrators, judges and other dispute resolution officiants.