State official won’t say how many illegal pot shops there are as NYC begins crackdown: ‘Larger than we’d like it to be’
NY Post
A state cannabis regulator refused to give an estimate of how many illegal pot shops there are in New York while Mayor Adams announced a five-borough “Padlock to Protect” program Tuesday to close down the illicit weed stores.
“It’s much larger than we’d like it to be,” Pascale Bernard, the state Office Cannabis Management’s deputy director of intergovernmental affairs, said during a Tuesday meeting at Queens Borough Hall.
Borough President Donovan Richards then asked for a “guesstimate” on the number of illicit shops that have been the scourge of neighborhoods across the Big Apple and a thorn in the side of the budding legal cannabis market.
“I wouldn’t want to put out a number that is either inflated or deflated,” Bernard said.
“We recognize this is an issue,” she added.
She said a new state law recently approved by Gov. Kathy Hochul and the legislature will make it easier and “turn the tide” against the illegal shops.
