By Robert Salas / New Mexico In Depth

Published on February 2, 2017

SANTA FE – New Mexico would have about 250,000 potential customers of cannabis should the state legalize adult recreational use of cannabis, an economist told the Senate Corporations and Transportation Committee on Wednesday. And those consumers would purchase roughly $412 million worth of the drug in the first year.

The data was produced by Kelly O’Donnell, an economist who served as director of state tax policy, deputy cabinet secretary for economic development, and superintendent of the New Mexico Regulation and Licensing Department during Gov. Bill Richardson’s administration. She now works as a consultant. Her report was commissioned by Ultra Health, a New Mexico provider of medical marijuana. To derive her estimates, she utilized in part survey data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, which was produced by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Of those potential customers, she estimated in the report that 138,000 live in New Mexico and 119,000 live in Texas within 200 miles of the New Mexico border.

Noting that 44 percent of Colorado’s market is from out-of-state tourists, O’Donnell emphasized the potential boost from Texas consumers should New Mexico legalize cannabis.

“Unlike Colorado, we have a big border with Texas,” she told committee members. “We have almost as many potential users of marijuana within a couple hundred miles of the New Mexico border on the Texas side as in all of New Mexico.”

Her report did not include estimates of tax revenue the state would bring in, but did include job estimates: 11,400 new manufacturing and marketing jobs, and 4,780 jobs in businesses that service the cannabis industry.

O’Donnell was joined in her presentation by Emily Kaltenbach, executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance of New Mexico. The two pointed to a range of benefits of legalization, including tax revenue, job creation, and a reduction of criminal prosecution for marijuana possession.

But not all senators on the panel were convinced of the benefits of legalization.

“You mentioned all the benefits, is there any downside to this?” Sen. William E. Sharer, R-Farmington, asked.

O’Donnell replied that in her analysis she didn’t see a potential downside because a shift from an illicit market to a regulated legal market would generate revenue, creates jobs and also undercut crime and public safety issues.

Sharer said he’d read studies that the state of Colorado has seen an increase in medical costs since legalizations, in part due to medical issues related to things such as car accidents.

“We don’t have any stoned and driving laws, so we don’t know,” he said. “We don’t know what stoned and driving is until you crash into a train a die.”

Kaltenbach replied that traffic fatalities in Colorado had not increased due to marijuana use and that public education is necessary when such a huge policy shift is considered.

“When you actually build a legal and regulated system, you need to build in prevention and education efforts for young people,” she said.

Still not convinced of the economic benefits of legalization, Sharer said that New Mexico can grow its economy in other ways, such as becoming the center for energy in the Southwest by investing in air, solar and nuclear power.

“I don’t think this is positive or negative, economically, it’s certainly not the great answer to all of our economic woes,” he said.

Sen. Clemente Sanchez, D-Grants, raised questions around the enforcement of federal law by the new administration of President Donald Trump, who has appointed Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Alabama, as his attorney general. Sessions is on the record opposing marijuana legalization.

Kaltenbach said that it’s a waiting game to see what the new attorney general will do but she’s optimistic.

“If we were to legalize here, it would be a couple of years, if that, before sales happen,” she said. “And so, I think we will have a lot to learn in those couple of years. I do think that states are a laboratory success, in that we should move forward with something like this and there are other states that are paving the way in front of us.”

O’Donnell and Kaltenbach fielded a wide range of questions from Senators, in a conversation that last more than an hour.

By Rachel Sapin / Albuquerque Business First

Published on December 22, 2016

A Democrat-controlled state legislature in 2017 has some Democratic lawmakers hopeful that recreational use of cannabis could become legal in New Mexico.

Duke Rodriguez, owner and CEO of Ultra Health LLC, one of the state’s 35 licensed nonprofit medical cannabis producers, is also optimistic about that. He said the state’s more liberal political climate along with a fast-growing consumer base could make 2017 the year the “green rush” goes all the way in New Mexico.

Rodriguez said he is confident that even if Gov. Susana Martinez vetoes any measures by the state’s lawmakers to make recreational cannabis legal, a constitutional amendment that would let voters decide has a good chance of passing this year in light of the state’s $69 million budget deficit for the current fiscal year.

“Republican and Democratic legislators have both said in the current environment, everything is on the table. That includes cannabis,” he said.

Following news that legalized marijuana accounted for nearly $1 billion in sales and $135 million in sales-tax revenue in Colorado in 2015, California, Massachusetts, Maine and Nevada passed ballot measures legalizing the recreational use of marijuana, bringing the total number of states allowing recreational use to eight.

Rodriguez said Ultra Health is expecting New Mexico’s medical marijuana industry to expand next year, thanks to new legislation. He said this year, he anticipates the state could allow medical marijuana producers to grow up to 4,500 plants. The state currently only allows producers to grow up to 450.

“That we’re fully anticipating and preparing for,” Rodriguez said.

He said if the plant count goes up for producers, he expects the state’s medical cannabis program to double in size.

According to the New Mexico Department of Health, there are 32,840 medical cannabis card holders in New Mexico. In 2013, that number was about 10,000, and the Albuquerque Journal reports that a year ago, there were 14,000 card holders.

Other players in the field are expanding too. This year the Verdes Foundation, which employs roughly 40 people, opened its second location in Rio Rancho. With over $1 million in total receipts as of July, The Verdes Foundation averages 250 clients per day.

HIGH TIMES

Published on November 22, 2016

Just days after Nevada voted to legalize marijuana for all adults 21 and over, HIGH TIMES announced plans for the first-ever Las Vegas Cannabis Cup. The iconic magazine’s premiere event and competition will serve as the official kick-off to the 2017 HIGH TIMES Live & Legal Cannabis Experience Tour.

Presented in partnership with Ultra Health, this pioneering celebration of the new and evolving world of legal cannabis will take place March 4 and 5 at the Moapa River Indian Reservation, just a short ride away from the famous Las Vegas Strip.

“We’re so proud of Nevada for continuing our national march towards legalization and showing that this community should be celebrated, not denigrated,” said Mary McEvoy, HIGH TIMES’ Chief Events Officer. “So naturally, we’re planning one of our biggest and best Cannabis Cups ever to usher in this new era in a style befitting of Las Vegas’s reputation.”

By approving Question 2, Nevada voters legalized the creation of a regulated commercial cannabis industry, while allowing all adults 21 and over to legally possess up to one ounce of cannabis or 1/8 of an ounce of concentrated cannabis, effective Jan. 1, 2017.

“HIGH TIMES has always been synonymous with cannabis, and Las Vegas with entertainment,” said Duke Rodriguez, CEO and President of Ultra Health. “We are pleased to partner with HIGH TIMES in the ultimate celebration of social and medical cannabis use and setting the standard for future landmark events.”

Since 1987, HIGH TIMES has hosted Cannabis Cups around the world to celebrate cannabis with music, speakers, vendors and interactive cannabis experiences, where attendees can learn hands-on about cultivation, legalization and connoisseurship, while coming together as a community to take part in the world’s premiere cannabis competition.

The HIGH TIMES Las Vegas Cannabis Cup will feature a live cannabis grow room, live trimming, a cannabis chef cooking competition, edibles seminars, product launches and more—like a World’s Fair of Weed. Musical acts and speakers will be announced in the coming weeks.

And of course, HIGH TIMES will crown the top three winners in each of the 13 Cannabis Cup competition categories. The Cannabis Cup is the original and highest honor of independently lab tested and judged cannabis products, and winners represent the best in Nevada and the United States.

Tickets go on sale for the 2017 U.S. Cannabis Cup in Las Vegas beginning Thursday, November 24th, 2016 on CannabisCup.com. Single Day, Weekend and VIP ticket options, complete with transportation to and from the Cup, will be made available.

By Coleen Heild / Albuquerque Journal

Published on November 5, 2016

When a three-week-old medical marijuana seedling named Dorothy made her public debut at the New Mexico State Fair in September, state officials scrambled to pull the plug on her appearance.

Now the New Mexico medical cannabis company that sponsored Dorothy’s field trip is facing state sanctions that could cost the company more than $100,000, said Duke Rodriguez, owner and CEO of Ultra Health LLC, one of the state’s 35 licensed medical cannabis producers.

“With this kind of damage to our reputation, to our patients, and to our ongoing business, we certainly are going to defend this,” Rodriguez told the Journal on Friday. A hearing on the appeal on the matter is set for Nov. 30 in Santa Fe.

The seedling was slated for a 10-day stint at a booth Ultra Health rented at the fair, but the plant was ejected on opening day, Sept. 8, after New Mexico State Police and fair officials were notified.

Rodriguez told the Journal the seedling was “displayed wholly for educational purposes.”

But health department officials informed Ultra Health that removing the medical marijuana plant from the company’s Bernalillo production facility to the State Fair violated state law that requires cannabis production facilities “be housed on secured grounds.”

“The removal of a cannabis plant to an off-site location constituted both a change of location for the nonprofit producer’s production and a substantial change to the entity’s production plan,” states a Sept. 16 letter to Ultra Health from state medical cannabis program director Kenny Vigil.

The penalty imposed is suspension of “all sales and distribution” by the company for five days, and a $100 fine, according to the letter.

Rodriguez told the Journal the sanction is an overreaction.

“Never did we say we were intending to produce, cultivate or distribute cannabis for the state fairgrounds,” he said.

As for the security concerns, Rodriguez told the Journal, “The plant was under the control and administration of our licensed personnel the entire time and the maximum amount of time that the plant stayed on that campus was less than nine hours,” Rodriguez said. He said the seedling wasn’t flowering and had only trace levels of THC, a mind-altering ingredient in marijuana.

“If they would simply have left it at a $100 fine we might be open to a settlement of such a minor fine, but what they have proposed is a sanction greater in value than $100,000,” Rodriguez said. “The $100,000 is just the immediate cash impact. The long-term damage to the program and the patients is even greater.”

New Mexico has authorized more than 30,000 cardholders to legally use pot for any one of more than 20 medical conditions.

“For example, in Hobbs, we are 95 percent of the market,” Rodriguez said. “Those patients will have no alternative other than going back to the black market to secure their medicine, which is the absolute wrong message to patients or for the program.”