A Look at The California Cannabis Industry MAUCRSA Bill

As we have discussed in various other posts on this blog, California has been taking major steps to regulate the medical marijuana, and now recreational cannabis industry, at a state level.  Since medical marijuana was first legalized back in 1996, there was little regulation at the state level.  All of the major regulation was left to local governments in the various counties, towns, municipal districts, and cities across our state.

This meant that, in some cities, there would be no medical marijuana allowed and in others there would be.  It also means that there were varying levels of regulations with respect to cultivation distribution, and sale or delivery. When the state decided it wanted to change this, there were varying proposals.  In the proposal that ultimately was passed into law, a single agency was created to regulate medical marijuana.  There were competing proposals that would have given the various regulatory functions to an already existing agency, but that proposal was not successful for a variety of reasons.  The legislature dealing with medical marijuana is known as the Medical Cannabis Regulations and Safety Act (MCRSA).

However, once the enabling act for the marijuana agency was passed, there was still a lot of work to be done on drafting the actual regulations that the new agency was to be enforcing. This all changed again when Proposition 64, which is called the Adult Use of Marijuana Act (AUMA), was passed into law by the voters.  This law, as everybody knows, allowed for adults to be able to recreationally use marijuana.  However, this law came with its own set of regulations, which meant there were regulations for medical marijuana, and there would be a separate set of regulations for recreational use marijuana.

As our Riverside medical marijuana attorneys can explain, the legislature has been trying to streamline this process for both recreational and medical marijuana and, to that end, the governor has just passed a bill that is designed to combine the regulatory authority and to make a single source of laws for both medical and recreational marijuana.

This new law that was just passed is known as the Medical and Adult Use of Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act (MAUSCRSA) and is designed to combine the regulations under MCRSA and AUMA into a single set of laws that will control both sides of the marijuana industry in California.  Both MCRSA and AUMA have requirements that the state regulate the sale of marijuana by January 2018.  This new MAUCRSA Act will include the regulation of both medical and recreational use of marijuana, as discussed in a recent article East Bay Express.

There are many different laws and cannabis industry regulations in the new bill.  For example, all products that leave a dispensary must be contained in an opaque plastic bag. This change will actually shift the regulation of industrial hemp back to Department of Food and Agriculture, so it can be handled used like any other income-generating crop. When growing any marijuana, there is sure to be a need for large amounts of water, and this can be a problem as we are constantly in a state of drought.

The Los Angeles CANNABIS LAW Group represents growers, dispensaries, collectives, patients and those facing marijuana charges. Call us at 949-375-4734.

Additional Resources:

California Took a Big Step Closer to Regulating the Cannabis Industry, July 5, 2017, BY Nate Sheildlower, East Bay Express

More Blog Entries:
Report: Colorado Marijuana Laws May Not be Safe, Feb. 5, 2017, L.A. Marijuana Lawyer Blog