okay uh I’m going to call uh the AL
Maryland Alcohol Tobacco and cannabis
commission meeting May 16
2024 in session uh we have
uh Alan silberstein chairman Robert P
secretary and Eric morset Commission
uh which gives us a
quorum and uh I’d like for a motion to
approve February 15
2024 minute meeting minutes so I need a
motion
please I’ll motion that I need a
second second all right motion a second
all those those in favor signify by
saying I I oppose same sign motion
carries Mr Kelly thank you Mr chairman
uh Commissioners the report I’m going to
give you regarding our activity is going
to enccompass our activity since we last
met in February the last two months we
didn’t have a quorum we did still report
out on that but just to make it official
and get it into the minutes I’m going to
give you a cumulative number of of
activities since we last met um
regarding our tobacco and cannabis
inspections and that number will remain
the same always because whenever we do a
tobacco inspection we always inspect for
cannabis whether they’re selling that
type of product to these places or not
so we conducted 400 of those inspections
we conducted
237 alcohol inspections at 43 of the can
of the Cannabis inspection places we did
identify cannabis product and we gave
them what we say is an educational
pamphlet we left them information
explaining the legality what the current
impact of the uh judicial order against
us right now or stopping us from taking
enforcement action is and Advising these
retailers to be mindful that if that
changes we’ll be back and be looking to
take some enforcement action if they
haven’t made Corrections
themselves since uh since we last met
officially we’ve seized nearly 50,000
sticks of OTP specifically
49,682
th000 we’ve SE 358 packs of unstamped
Contraband cigarettes which is a tax
loss of
$1,343 we see six bottles of distilled
Spirits six and six containers of wine
and all of these events took place in
the in just again always broadly across
the state but I’ll give you a quick
rundown of the counties alagan Anna
Rundle Baltimore City Baltimore County
Caroline Charles Dorchester Frederick
Harford Montgomery Prince George’s
Somerset tbit Washington and Worcester
counties sounds like I’m reading the
snow closings uh for each school year or
so all of those jurisdictions had some
type of violation in them we have we’ve
been able to maintain a good Staffing
level and as a result our agents are
doing an awful lot of work there’s just
a lot so it’s a lot of of these
inspections that are taking place and a
lot of seizures and where we might have
a couple of seizures a week previously
we have a couple a day now so it’s it’s
a lot of work there’s a lot of work out
there and we’re trying to meet that that
demand uh what I’d like to do regarding
a legal and legislative update is I
think Tom’s online we’re not going to
we’re not prepared to do anything today
I think perhaps next month will be a
better month for us to accumulate all of
the data and information of what just
happened in the past general assembly
session we’ll have a better idea of the
laws that the governor either signed or
have just passed into law become law by
time and so next month we’ll be prepared
to give you a more detailed rundown of
what’s happened legislatively and we can
expect to to begin say July 1 say one
thing one bill that passed this year was
one modernized not modernized but
updated the cannabis bill from last year
and it did a couple of things it one it
lets us write citations for violations
instead of having to get statements of
charges which is a technical issue but
it’s it’s just simplifies the process
for being able to get these misdemeanor
crimes into the Judiciary System so
that’s a big thing but even bigger for
us is it reduced our sta our
commissioner staff level now from F from
Seven back to five where it was and in
doing doing so made our Quorum back to
three instead of four which has been
difficult for us to meet so we are in
better shape for that that was emergency
legislation it was signed by the
governor at the end of last month so now
that that’s been signed we’re back to
three and we have a better shot of
maintaining our Quorum as
necessary uh we’ll jump into HR just
very quickly we’ve been we’ve been a
full staff for quite a while we recently
had a couple of uh openings and um we’re
working to make working to fill those
very quickly but it’s only three right
now one of them is a section manager
which is our our Trade Practices the
supervisor the manager over top of our
Trade Practices our licensing and our
reporting units that position is vacant
we will be announcing for that the
announcement is done it’ll be posted
within the next week maybe even as soon
as tomorrow but definitely within the
next week and I expect that we’re going
to have a lot of candidates for that and
two of our licensing staff elected to go
back to Annapolis to the com
controller’s office to work and I want
to assure everybody it wasn’t a hard
hard feelings kind of thing it’s
geographically closer one of them lives
a couple of minutes away the other lives
on the other side of the bridge and this
was just too much of a commute when the
opportunity was right there so in fact
they’re very very good people both of
them and they and even though they had a
job offer that would have let them go
back sooner they elected to stay
throughout August because they know it’s
I’m I’m sorry throughout April because
it’s a very busy time for us renewals
take place throughout that month of
April for for for the new licensing year
which begins May 1st and thank heavens
for them they stayed and helped us get
through that busy period of time so they
left friends nonetheless it’s a sad to
see them go in positions we need to fill
we did advertise for those positions
already we have a 126 candidates for it
so I I sure we’re going to find at least
two excellent candidates out of that
number we will be winnowing that down to
some of our best qualified candidates
and then starting our our interview so
hopefully we’ll have those positions
filled by the next time we
meet I don’t know we’ve talked much and
this this isn’t on here on our agenda
but it’s just another topic that I think
I bring up every now and again we we’ve
been trying to find a lab that is
capable of doing testing for cannabis
products for us and it’s been a real
struggle eventually the Maryland
cannabis
Administration they have a lab now it’s
in the process of being set up it’s in
its very early stages they’re not
testing and eventually they’ll do all
this testing for us but in the meantime
and we’re about a year away from that
we’ve got to find somebody to do testing
well Rec recently and and thank you to
uh Mr Hawk we’ve recently uh found some
resources that the Maryland State Police
use one lab is in Pennsylvania that can
do vegetable matter like the plant
matter for us and one of them is in
Frederick County in Maryland that can do
the edible products for us and thanks to
him pointing Us in the right direction
those contracts already exist and it
looks like we’re going to be able a
piggy back onto those contracts so
hopefully very soon we’re going to have
access to a lab which you know we we are
handcuff some and how much enforcement
we can do but we still can do some
enforcement
and we’ve mentioned before we are
especially interested in trying to begin
a program of underage sales and no
injunction is stopping us from doing
that enforcement that’s something we’re
really geared toward right now so once
we nail these Labs down we’ll begin a
pretty robust underage enforcement
program and the fiscal year is winding
down so uh we’re keeping track of our
budget to make sure that we spend what’s
been appropriated to us that we do it in
a very
uh appropriate manner that we do it in
in a very
um mature manner I guess I’m not I’m not
sure I’m using the right words but that
we want to make sure we’re spending it
wisely and properly but we’re we’re
running out as we should be toward the
end of the year so I’m glad to say that
as well Mr chair that would be my report
happy to yield back to you we’ll take
any
questions anybody have any questions
from Mr
Kelly anybody have any new business
they’d like to bring up this
time if not I’ll take a motion for
adjournment a motion for adjournment
okay second Motion in a second all those
in favor signify by saying I
I okay motion carries I look forward to
seeing everybody next month thank you
have a good month see you next month too.