A pot-friendly, no-alcohol comedy and music club got licensing approval on Tuesday to open in Somerville’s Union Square. Now everyone will have to hold their breath and see how this works in a city that hasn’t adopted cannabis “social consumption” regulations.
The “420 friendly” King’s Court Comedy plans to open at 71 Union Square directly over a Cookies cannabis shop, which was also before the commission Tuesday – for a change of address to 72 Union Square so King’s Court can have its old address, said the applicant for Cookies, Binoj Pradhan. A partition and second door will be installed in the lobby to separate the weed shoppers from the clubgoers. Physically, anyway.
The club space, on the building’s second story, was once to be used for cannabis education. “This project took over five years to build from the date it was approved,” Pradhan said of his store. “In five years, the landscape has changed. It did not make sense for us to take more space and lose money.”
Instead, King’s Court has signed a letter of intent for a seven-day club in Somerville; in the past year, it ran weekend pop-ups with Diaspora, a cannabis club operating on Church Street in Cambridge’s Harvard Square.
Neither Somerville nor Cambridge has adopted cannabis social consumption laws promulgated by the state Jan. 2, spokespeople for each city said.
“The city is awaiting additional guidance from the Massachusetts Cannabis Control Commission regarding the licensing process at the state level. No decisions have been made and there is no corresponding timeline,” said Victoria MacGregor for Somerville, where the Board of Health hosts a representative from the Massachusetts Association of Health Boards on Thursday to get grounded on the topic.
“Although the regulations went into effect immediately, social consumption licenses are not yet available and businesses will not be authorized to sell regulated cannabis to consumers for on-site consumption until receiving a state license,” Cambridge’s Jeremy Warnick added.
Legal, police and fire issues
So Somerville’s licensing commissioners – who first heard from King’s Court in November and continued the case – proceeded through their questioning like people probing the ground for land mines. They tripped them repeatedly. It’s just that no explosions came.
“The product that you’re proposing to allow your customers to use is highly regulated, you know that. It’s highly controlled. We can’t [approve licensing] with the implication that you’re going to say to your customers ‘Go downstairs to Cookies and buy, come upstairs to us and consume,’” chair Joe Lynch told Kings Court manager Owen Skye Nelson.
But Nelson pointed out that King’s Court is technically a members-only, private club where its customers “are eligible and legally allowed to … consume things that are legal in the state of Massachusetts.” Members sign up online and must be 21 and older and follow club bylaws about behavior.
Cannabis consumption would include through “combustion,” Nelson said, meaning there would be smoking in a public – er, private – space. Fire department lieutenant Francis Otting acknowledged that the fire department “simply responds to incidents where there’s report of smoking in buildings, and we would manage the fire risk.”
Police lieutenant Diogo de Oliveira explained another fine line King’s Court managers and customers would walk: “We are only concerned with public consumption of marijuana, which is illegal in the City of Somerville and can result in fines up to $300.”
“No express prohibition”
After chair Joe Lynch noted that private clubs were “banned” in Somerville from letting customers bring their own alcoholic beverages, yet another distinction was introduced by assistant city clerk Michael Potere: “There is no prohibition against bring-your-own marijuana, either in the city ordinances or, most importantly, in the CCC regulations,” Potere said, citing his research and discussion with city lawyers. “No express prohibition.”
King’s Court has consulted with lawyers too, Nelson said, and believes it is moving forward with something that “is legal in private settings” and will soon be embraced by Somerville under social consumption rules. Though he could have continued the hearing again to a future month, he opted to go ahead for a club as Lynch described it: minus a terrace where smoke or noise could antagonize neighbors and with licensing “that does not give permission to serve alcohol, neither does it give permission to serve cooked food other than packaged food, neither does it imply that you can allow your patrons to consume cannabis in any form in that club.”
“Fair warning that whatever you choose to do down there, you’re going to be operating at risk,” Lynch said.
The licensing was approved unanimously despite commissioner Christopher Allen worrying over the “fig leaf” that King’s Court was a private club. In Allen’s view, the assigning of license was for the club to consume pot in a future in which the city has a regulated social consumption program.
Plenty of process ahead
Municipalities must opt in to allow social consumption locally by a referendum, ordinance or bylaw, Warnick said. The state is working on an implementation plan for social consumption establishment license applications in the CCC’s online portal, as well as guidance and staff procedures, responsible vendor training for social consumption agents and a public education campaign, “among other deliverables.”
The recently approved state regulations for social consumption “are very thorough and, in some cases, strict,” Warnick said. “For many existing cannabis businesses, the potential construction costs, staffing costs and mechanical equipment costs” have been discouraging.
Local adoption of social consumption regulations and practices can also take months, including changes to ordinances and zoning codes.
King’s Court goes next to Inspectional Services, where conflicting answers from the applicant and landlord about seating will be settled. It then goes to the clerk’s office for the final issuing of a license.
Maybe the most potent question Tuesday was addressed to Somerville clerk Potere after he explained the position of city lawyers that there is no express prohibition against bring-your-own cannabis.
“If you’ve had that conversation, sorry, but why are we even exploring social consumption sites?” Lynch asked.
“That’s a very good academic question,” Potere replied.