Interim cannabis director says permanent appointment expected 'late spring or early summer'

CATHY WURZER: Six months ago today, marijuana was legalized in Minnesota. Since then, only tribal nations have been able to sell it legally. But more and more edibles and THC drinks have started dominating the market.

Meanwhile, the Office of Cannabis Management is deep in the trenches of creating the rules and regulations so selling of cannabis flower can start as soon as possible. Joining us right now to look at the road ahead is the interim director of the Office of Cannabis Management, Charlene Briner. Welcome to the program.

CHARLENE BRINER: Thanks, Cathy for having me. And thanks for introducing me to a great new artist. That was lovely.

CATHY WURZER: I know, isn't she great? Well, thanks for your time, too, this afternoon. You have been leading the office since, what? June. And you were just officially appointed by the governor into the interim role last week. Obviously, folks know about the story. It's been kind of a rocky start with the appointment and resignation of a director, the first director. Not a whole lot of people, I think, Charlene understand what's happening with the new agency. So what's your workload like?

CHARLENE BRINER: Well, I just was telling your producer who asked me as a sound check what I had for dinner last night. And I had a bowl of cereal at 9 o'clock at the counter. So the workload is heavy. This is a novel endeavor to stand up a new office and launch a new industry in Minnesota from the ground up. So we've got a great team. And they are doing great work to get us off the ground and ready to offer applications in early 2025.

CATHY WURZER: You're one of those unicorns in state government who people look to troubleshoot and to get things done. So how do you even start the process to get a new agency up and running?

CHARLENE BRINER: Well, I think you, number one, you take a look at the law, which really gives us a roadmap or the guidelines for what the legislature expects us to do as a regulatory entity. And then you're right, my familiarity with state government really helps me understand how, typically, agencies work. We know that we need some infrastructure.

We know we need a finance department, human resources. We need communications and all of the things that you need to keep the doors open to actually do the job and meet your mission. And then you start really digging in to see how we're going to translate policy into practice. And that's really the tricky part of it.

The law is very clear in its intention to build this Minnesota craft market, to really make sure that we give smaller operators and individuals and organizations that may have been harmed by the war on drugs opportunity. But how do we do that in a way that is fair, and equitable, and easy to understand for business operators? That's where I rely on a lot of experts and a lot of folks who have far more technical knowledge and specialized expertise than I do. And you try to build a team. And that's what I'm doing and what we continue to do.

CATHY WURZER: So you're kind of going-- you're building the bridges you're going across, really, in a sense. And you have people who-- many people who want to start buying product. You have entrepreneurs who want to-- who want to start selling it. How do you try to keep that-- all those voices at bay, in a sense, while you're while you're building the infrastructure.

CHARLENE BRINER: I think that we don't want to keep them at bay. Quite honestly, we're really committed to gathering input and letting those voices who have a vested interest and a potential stake in this industry have input. We're doing-- right now, we've talked about this a little bit, Cathy, we're developing the rules or the regulations for business operators. And rather than do that in isolation, we want a large swath of input from people who know about this or who have operated either here in Minnesota other businesses, or who are interested in opening their own business.

We want to gather that input and make that part of our process. So surveys, we've done more than 60. I think it's close to 60 public meetings. We are speaking. We have a speakers bureau. We just had a meeting this morning to talk about some of the intersections with local governments with cities and counties. We want to get as much input as we can. Rather than keeping those voices at bay, we want to integrate them into our process of building and writing these regulations.

CATHY WURZER: I read the recent report from the agency. And it finds-- it found that Minnesota needs 100-- excuse me, 381 dispensaries at a minimum. That seems like a pretty big number here. What will it take to license 381 dispensaries?

CHARLENE BRINER: Well, it's going to take about 150 people to do that. And I think that we also have to do a little bit of expectations management. You've heard the governor probably say this, and I say this wherever I can, we won't be turning on a light switch and automatically there will be 381 dispensaries across the state. This is going to be an industry that takes a few years to completely stand up and mature.

But we're going to need a team of licensing specialists, of inspectors, of technical support folks, people who can really help walk people through this process, sort of navigate it, and so we're continuing to build that team. I would also say we've got close to 60 people working on this right now between an implementation team, the permanent staff that I'm hiring, and then also the folks over at the Department of Health and the Office of Medical Cannabis who will eventually be part of our team and are doing the enforcement right now for the hemp products that you see on shelves all over the state.

CATHY WURZER: So we're talking about the dispensaries coming online. Half of the licenses will go to BIPOC entrepreneurs in an effort to achieve social equity. Now as you know, other states, Illinois comes to mind, have social equity provisions in their cannabis laws. But the Illinois market has been dominated by a number of large companies, many of which are publicly traded, not necessarily people of color who have been harmed by past marijuana laws. So how is your office going to make sure the Illinois experience does not happen in Minnesota?

CHARLENE BRINER: Well, a couple of ways that we're approaching that. And the first is which looking-- is we're looking really closely at the very clear intention of the law itself. So the legislature, the governor, and the advocates who had a voice in actually writing this new law were very clear about putting some guardrails in and developing this Minnesota driven craft market.

So we're really trying to put some guardrails in. There is space for all types of operators. But we don't want it dominated. We don't-- we don't want a bunch of multistate operators cornering the market. We really want to build this craft industry of small and medium-sized businesses. So looking at the clear intention around that, and then embedding some equitable practices from the very beginning of the licensing process.

You may have read in our reports to the legislature last week, both the demand study and the annual report we're required to submit, we previewed some legislative recommendations that we believe will even further strengthen those social equity goals and make it more likely that we are opening opportunities for social equity applicants.

CATHY WURZER: Will there be more assistance for social equity applicants to make sure that you do have the number of individuals you need?

CHARLENE BRINER: I think that this combination will offer technical assistance and assistance to navigate some of those processes for applying for a license. We're also looking at changing the order of operations. One of the things that we've learned from other states is that one of the requirements in the law is that if I want to operate a business, I have to secure my facility. I have to get a mortgage. Or I have to rent a building before I even come to OCM to get a license.

That is particularly burdensome in an industry where it's really hard to get capital. It's still federally scheduled as a controlled substance, cannabis is. And so it's not easy to go to traditional banking or other lending sources. So requiring folks to get a mortgage or to secure a lease before they have any sort of expectation or assurance that they'll get a license is especially burdensome for those smaller operators or social equity applicants.

We propose sort of changing the order of operations that people interact with OCM. So that we're minimizing that financial hardship on the front end. We've seen that requirement to secure a building before you even get a license, particularly in California, has resulted in delays that have really bankrupted folks.

They've had to spend hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars, on a facility before they even can get a license. So we want to avoid that from the front end. So that's just one example of trying to really think about how do we mitigate some of the challenges in an industry that's complicated, that's highly regulated, and that takes some multiple steps to actually stand up and be successful.

CATHY WURZER: Say, before you go, where are we in the search for a permanent director? And have you-- have you applied yet?

CHARLENE BRINER: No, Cathy, I have made it clear. And as you-- as you mentioned when you introduced me, I still have interim in front of my name. This is a temporary role for me. It is incredibly exciting. I'm thrilled to be working with a really talented team of folks. But we are conducting a national search. Last week, the process opened again. And the governor has opened applications. MMB is helping us recruit. Applications are open until February 26th. Folks can go to the OCM website and get information about that. And we hope that by late spring or early summer, the governor will have named a permanent replacement.

CATHY WURZER: All right. I appreciate your time. Thank you so much. Best of luck.

CHARLENE BRINER: Lovely to chat with you. Thanks, Cathy.

CATHY WURZER: We've been talking to the interim director of the Office of Cannabis Management in Minnesota, Charlene Briner.