NEW YORK — After failing to wipe out illegal cannabis dispensaries, New York is asking online sites to hide them.
Since the state legalized marijuana in 2021, unlicensed pot shops have spread throughout New York City, with limited pushback from authorities. On Tuesday, Gov. Kathy Hochul called on online mapping and social media companies to delist them.
“If you type ‘cannabis dispensaries’ into Google Maps or Yelp, you get a long list of illegal, unlicensed sellers,” Hochul, a Democrat, said Tuesday, speaking to reporters alongside some owners of licensed, legal pot shops. which make up a small minority of New York City’s cannabis stores.
In a statement, Yelp said the company believes “consumers have a First Amendment right to read and write about all businesses, even if they are not licensed.”
“Allowing users to contribute and view information… about unlicensed businesses serves the public interest and provides regulators with a tool to determine whether a particular business is properly licensed,” the statement said.
Legal marijuana shops in New York pay a sex tax, buy from local farms and submit to quality control tests to ensure their products are not laced with other drugs and are not stronger or weaker than stated on the label.
But fewer than 80 cannabis-licensed stores have opened in the state so far, where strict eligibility requirements and lawsuits have helped slow the rollout. Meanwhile, it is common for a single neighborhood in New York City to have a dozen illegal neighborhoods.
Hochul promised to take tough action eight months ago but has failed to make noticeable progress.
Aiming to avoid an echo of the prohibition-era criminalization of drug sales, the legalization of marijuana in New York State does not include severe criminal punishment for illegal sales and does not allow most law enforcement agencies to enforce pot laws.
Legislation Hochul signed last May gave the state powers to inspect, seize, fine up to $20,000 a day and, in some cases, close stores and go after landlords.
But the governor said Wednesday she has since learned it wasn’t enough. She said the fines are not high enough to deter people, noting that the appeals process takes many months, allowing stores to continue raking in tax-free profits on unlicensed products that are cheaper because they can be purchased out of state.
New York City itself has tried to stem the tide by going after landlords, but Mayor Eric Adams has begged Albany to give the city more power to respond.
Hochul has asked the Democratic-controlled state Legislature to pass new legislation to grant more enforcement power to city agencies, increase fines and allow law enforcement to shut down illegal stores before the appeals process ends.
In the meantime, Hochul is asking tech companies “not to post sites that are illegal and to make sure they post the legal ones.”
Local cannabis entrepreneur Osbert Orduña said Google Maps continues to remove his legal stores, one in New Jersey and another in Queens, New York. He said he has never had any problems with his listings on Yelp, although he would like the site to remove illegal operators as well.
“Four times Google has taken us off their platform for ‘violating their terms of service’. “We have done nothing other than get our store hours and our basic business information straight,” he said.
Google did not immediately respond to a question about Orduña’s specific circumstances, but noted in a statement in response to Hochul’s comments that it does remove listings for closed locations.
“If we can confirm that a business has closed for any reason – including licensing issues – we will include that in the listing. We also ban cannabis ads in New York and remove them as soon as they are spotted, often before they ever run,” the statement said.
Orduña said he also wants his illegal competitors, some of whom he knows personally, shut down. He says they tell him he’s playing a sucker’s game. But as a former Marine, he likes to do things by the book and even plans to expand and open another store in Queens next week.