One of the first disabled military veterans to run a legal pot shop is accusing state cannabis regulators of threatening his business by not renewing his license, which is set to expire on February 12.
Marine Corps combat vet Osbert Orduna told a Cannabis Control Board meeting Thursday that the jobs 30 employees are at risk if his license is pulled — as his supporters claim that the reason he’s not being renewed is because he signed a labor contract with a new union.
“By failing to execute your basic administrative functions, you are recreating that exact environment of hopelessness,” said Orduna, whose shop, The Cannabis Place, is located in Middle Village.
J.C. Rice
“For me as a combat veteran with PTSD this is a triggering event. You are betraying the very people this law was promised to elevate. This is not a clerical error. This is a systemic failure of leadership.”
According to Orduna, the only change in the Cannabis Place’s 2-year renewal license application is that he signed a labor agreement with a different union, Local 420 of the International Union of Journeymen and Allied Trades, instead of Local 338 of RWDSU/UFCW — the affiliated Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union/United Food and Commercial Workers International Union.
Local 420 UJAT secretary-treasurer Guy James said “if it smells, it smells” when asked if cannabis regulators put a hold on Orduna’s application because he dumped a rival union for his.
Orduna has been an advocate of New York’s cannabis industry, even appearing at press conferences with Gov. Kathy Hochul.
But he has also been a critic of the Office of Cannabis Management, joining a lawsuit against state cannabis regulators over an alleged misreading of buffer zone rules separating marijuana dispensaries from schools.
Orduna said the Office of Cannabis Management is at risk of being viewed negatively like the US Department of Veterans Affairs, for leaving vets in the lurch.
“We know the stories of veterans pushed so far past the breaking point by a broken, indifferent bureaucracy that they felt their only option was a final, desperate act in a parking lot just to be heard,” he said.
“Do you need to see and smell brain matter splatter before you actually take responsibility for your actions?”
Disabled vets are one of the groups that get preference for weed business opportunities under the law that legalized marijuana
But in a letter to Orduna, OCM said if its review of the license renewal is not completed by Feb. 12, “you may continue to operate under your expired license until Cannabis Control Board has made a determination on your renewal application.”
The OCM, in its response to the Post, said it will contact the licensee if there are any issues that need to be addressed as part of its review before making a recommendation to the Cannabis Control Board.
The agency said under the State Administrative Procedure Act (SAPA), a licensee that submits a timely and complete renewal application may continue operating under its “existing” or lapsed license even while the application remains under review.
“This provision protects licensees who have complied with renewal requirements from being penalized due to the timing of Board action and ensures continuity for businesses operating in good standing. The Office has communicated this framework directly to licensees, including through written correspondence issued today,” OCM said in the statement.
Osbert claimed the law does’t prevent his bank from freezing assets or landlords from padlocking the premises if his license lapses. OCM said it would send an email to any party to prevent that from happening.
There are 582-licensed cannabis dispensaries, more than doubling from 2024 despite complaints of bureaucratic bungling and management shake-ups.