"Medical marijuana shops could open by summer" by Kay Lazar and and Jaclyn Reiss | Globe staff, February 01, 2014
The state of Massachusetts granted the first 20 licenses to open medical marijuana dispensaries Friday, paving the way for companies to begin selling the drug to patients as soon as this summer....
That will make it, what, 18 months the state has waited to light the joint? How many needlessly suffered in the interim?
In the highly anticipated decision, state health officials surprised some by opting not to award the full 35 licenses allowed by state law. But officials promised to approve more licenses by June, as they move ahead with efforts to bring medical marijuana to Massachusetts....
Interesting description for a state that has dragged its heels on this.
Also approved Friday was the application of former US representative William D. Delahunt, who successfully won all three licenses he sought to open dispensaries in Mashpee, Taunton and Plymouth.
Delahunt, a Democrat who represented Cape Cod and much of the South Shore before becoming a lobbyist, is chief executive of Medical Marijuana of Massachusetts. His entry into the competitive process sparked concerns about the potential for preferential treatment.
In January, the state Republican Party called for the governor to appoint an independent commission to select the licenses, saying Delahunt’s friendship with state Public Health Commissioner Cheryl Bartlett, whose office awarded the licenses, “created the appearance of a rigged system designed to favor the politically connected at the expense of the critically ill.” The governor opted not to appoint an independent commission.
It's Massachusetts all right!
Representative Keiko Orrall, a Lakeville Republican whose district includes Taunton, said Friday that Delahunt’s applications might have received the highest scores but “it’s just curious out of all these licenses he won three.”
“It feels like the same old politics in play,” Orrall said.
Asked about the concerns, Delahunt said, “I’m just like anybody else,” adding that he has no influence at the department....
He dropped the joint!
Karen van Unen, director of the state’s new medical marijuana program, said at a press conference Friday that her agency expects to launch an abbreviated review process for the six companies in the next few weeks and announce the results in early June. She declined to say why the six — some of whom received higher scores from the review panel than those awarded licenses — were not selected in the first round. But she said she expected the six to fare better in the coming months because they already “have the nod” from her department....
For business owners near the sites of the proposed new dispensaries, there were fears Friday about a rise in crime....
Those are unfounded! The real crime-driving drugs are cocaine, heroin, and meth -- which just happen to be the favorites of CIA drug-runners and money-laundering banks.
The companies awarded licenses will still have to pass a final inspection by the state Health Department and ensure they are complying with any local permitting requirements before they are allowed to open.
While the launch of dispensaries has been eagerly awaited by patients, others are concerned about patient safety.
Yeah, let's keep medicine they need from them in the interests of safety. Might have to recall it like all the pharmaceuticals that killed people.
Dr. Ronald Dunlap, president of the Massachusetts Medical Society, said there is a lack of scientific information about the safety of marijuana when used for medicinal purposes, and he noted that marijuana does not undergo the rigorous testing required for prescription medications by the Food and Drug Administration.
Unreal!
The FDA is an arm of the indu$try, and as for science:
No science for Obama’s recent pot claim
What, that it is the greatest story never told, that it can cure cancer?
I can $ee why certain indu$tries would not want that.
Heidi Heilman — president of the Massachusetts Prevention Alliance, a group that opposed the legalization of medical marijuana in the state — said the law was “all about enriching the marijuana mogul.”
Related: Marijuana May Become Legal in Massachusetts
“It’s always been about big money,” Heilman said. “It’s never been about medicine. And the [Department of Public Health] did their best with a bad law that is going to wreak havoc on our poor people and vulnerable people here in Massachusetts.”
She is right on the first two points, wrong on the other two. She needs to smoke a joint and realize big money is ruling this society right now.
--more--"
Time to take another hit:
"Winning marijuana team limits its role; Delahunt, colleagues won’t run operations; little-known director brought in" by Kay Lazar and Michael Levenson | Globe staff, February 07, 2014
The credentials of the executives at Medical Marijuana of Massachusetts impressed local officials on the South Shore. A former congressman, William Delahunt, led the group as the chief executive. A former top US drug enforcement agent headed security. And the president of a well-known Cape Cod substance abuse treatment center would direct the new company’s addiction prevention services.
Why would they need that with a medical?
“They did put together a very credible team,” said Police Chief Michael E. Botieri of Plymouth, who said he met last year with Delahunt and his team.
This strong local support helped the company land three of the 20 medical marijuana dispensary licenses awarded last week by the state Department of Public Health, but Delahunt and all the other top executives are keeping their full-time jobs and will not be running the company’s cultivation and dispensing operations in Mashpee, Plymouth, and Taunton.
Medical Marijuana of Massachusetts has been much less forthcoming about the credentials of the person who will direct the daily operations: Avis Bulbulyan, described in the company’s license application as a California resident who would relocate to Massachusetts.
Must be the pot smoke.
A Boston Globe review of the winning applications shows that the firm provided the state with scant information about Bulbulyan compared to the often extensive backgrounds all the other applicants provided for these critical positions.
Delahunt would be the highest paid chief executive among the successful dispensary applicants that disclosed the pay of their chief executives, with his annual salary listed as $250,000. Many of the other firms’ chief executives would be paid about half that amount, according to the Globe’s examination of the applications.
Not openly are profit margins small, the executive pay is minuscule compared to "respectable" indu$tries. That's why the PtB hate pot. You become a pothead, not a greedhead (who like cocaine).
The combined annual salaries of Delahunt and his four other top executives is listed as $1.1 million, eclipsing by far the amounts paid to the leadership teams of the other winning applicants, many of which list wages half that of Delahunt’s company for their top five to eight executives. An official with his company said he doubts that Delahunt and the other executives would collect the salaries in the first years of operation, however.
Delahunt’s group was the only applicant granted three licenses. The success of the former congressman in the license sweepstakes has been the focus of much discussion among competitors about whether there was anything untoward in the selection process. He has long been friends with the head of the agency that awarded the licenses, state Public Health Commissioner Cheryl Bartlett.
But Delahunt and state officials insist everything was done above board, noting that an independent consultant awarded his three dispensaries the top scores among the 100 applicants, 160 out of 163 possible points.
“I would consider [Delahunt] a colleague of mine in public health,” Bartlett said in an interview this week. Bartlett is a nurse who long worked with AIDS patients and homeless people on Nantucket and Cape Cod, part of the congressional district Delahunt served, and she and Delahunt often worked together to raise funds for those causes. But she said their history did not sway the state’s decision on awarding of licenses.
At this point I don't care who the dealer is; just get it to the suffering patients!
Delahunt, who has been active in Democratic politics for four decades, was a state representative, district attorney, and congressman from 1997 until 2011. He is now a state and federal lobbyist whose clients include the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe in their bid to open a casino in Massachusetts.
I always suspected Democrats were stoned.
Related: Delahunt and the Jewish Divide
That is why he left Congre$$.
Kevin O’Reilly, the medical marijuana company’s director of community outreach, also has deep roots in local and state politics. He is a former chief of staff to Senate President Therese Murray, a Plymouth Democrat, and has served as her campaign manager since her first race in 1992. He runs a consulting firm that advises political candidates and companies seeking government approval for projects.
With so many connections, Delahunt’s team was well known to many of the officials they met with as they sought approval for their dispensary, and they won a striking level of community support. Local approval was a key component in the state’s scoring process.
Maybe there is an ember at the end of the joint.
When company officials met with Fire Chief G. Edward Bradley of Plymouth, he already knew Delahunt well. Bradley recalled that he could always reach out to Delahunt in Congress when the Fire Department needed funding or legislation.
When company officials presented their plans to Laurie Curtis, president of the Plymouth Area Chamber of Commerce, she already knew O’Reilly. He was her immediate predecessor as the chamber president. And when the company presented its plans to Timothy Grandy, vice chairman of the Plymouth Planning Board, he said he knew O’Reilly as a Plymouth precinct chairman who “works hard for the residents of the community.”
Still, all the officials insisted those connections had no bearing as they weighed applications. Curtis said Delahunt’s political experience only helped him to present a compelling case for his marijuana business.
“It’s not so much that people say: ‘Wow, he’s a former congressman. We should do it because he’s a former congressman,’ ” Curtis said. “But the fact that he’s a former congressman means he knows how to run an effective promotional campaign.”
Plymouth’s selectmen endorsed Delahunt’s company with a letter of support, while issuing a more lukewarm “letter of nonopposition” for its competitor for a Plymouth dispensary, Mass Organic Therapy. That company earned the second-highest score among all 100 applications reviewed, but failed to win a license.
“Although [Mass Organic] did have some history of doing this in Maine, which I think was a plus, they just didn’t have the stronger credentials as we saw in [Delahunt’s] group, said Mathew Muratore, the selectmen chairman, adding that he was impressed that a former top DEA official and a former detective were heading up security for Delahunt’s company.
For its Mashpee application, Delahunt’s company says it won letters or public statements of support from District Attorney Michael O’Keefe, Barnstable County Sheriff James Cummings, Police Chief Rodney Collins, and Mashpee’s Board of Selectmen, which said Delahunt’s firm would set the “gold standard” for medical marijuana in Massachusetts.
The company intends to grow enough marijuana to serve more than 4,800 patients in its first year of business, according to its applications, but the man in charge of cultivation, and his experience, is something of an enigma.
Avis Bulbulyan has “cultivated commercial medicinal marijuana in California since 2008 for dispensaries in San Diego and Los Angeles,” according to the firm’s application, which omits names of those companies. It also says Bulbulyan was a cultivation instructor for three Los Angeles area dispensaries, but does not name them.
Delahunt’s chief financial officer, Jonathan Herlihy, said he was unable to recall the names of the companies during an interview this week and did not provide the Globe a copy of Bulbulyan’s resume, despite several requests. Attempts to reach Bulbulyan were unsuccessful.
Unlike Massachusetts, California leaves regulation and oversight to individual cities and towns, making it hard to track quality and performance, and in that void, hundreds of small dispensaries and cultivation sites have opened.
Smells good to me.
Related: $100 million agreement close in meningitis outbreak case
That's all they are getting after 70 people were killed? And no one went to jail?
Also see: Compounding Conundrum
Yeah, good thing the $tate has over$ight and not the locals. And the higher you go, the worse the over$ight. That's why the federal government is even wor$e than the state.
Earnie Blackmon — master cultivator for RiverRock, one of the largest medical marijuana dispensaries in Colorado — said it is crucial to have the right person running the marijuana-growing operation. Many of the marijuana companies that raced to open in Colorado fizzled, he said, often because of a lack of cultivation experience.
Related: Burned Lips in Colorado
Haven't smoked since.
“Without the proper cultivation, there is no medicine, and without the medicine you have an unsuccessful system,” said Blackmon.
Karen van Unen, director of the Massachusetts Medical Marijuana Program, said the state took care to insulate the licensing process from political influence. She said that the material given to the committee that recommended finalists to her did not include the names of the applicants’ top executives or board members.
As opposed to the casinos. More money to be made there.
The selection committee saw the company name, a summary of how each company was scored by an outside consulting agency that reviewed the entire applications, and a summary of the consultant’s findings for each applicant.
She said the selection process placed a heavy emphasis on companies’ ability to respond to patient needs and on access, while issues such as salaries for executives and whether their staff had cultivation experience were not as important.
“Certainly cultivation skills were a plus,” van Unen said. “But we were not just looking for cultivation experience, because that would shut out local residents from applying for these positions because marijuana hasn’t been legal in Massachusetts.”
The costs of insurance, fees, and the rest is what did it for most. Needed over a million just to bid.
John Carmichael Jr., deputy police chief in Walpole and a member of the selection committee, said that even though the panel did not receive the names of companies’ top executives, it did receive information about their professional backgrounds, so committee members knew which companies were Delahunt’s.
“That said, [Delahunt’s] was a very solid application,” said Carmichael. “Nobody cared who the face was.”
Can't see it through the haze anyway.
While many of the applicants projected a profit in the first year and some estimated a modest to moderate loss, Delahunt’s company expects to see substantial losses at each of its three dispensaries in the first year, ranging from roughly $848,000 in Taunton to more than $1.2 million in Mashpee, according to its application.
That's what happens when you deal weed, and it is why government drug runners don't bother with it.
The company’s chief operating officer, Jonathan Herlihy, said in an interview that there will probably not be enough of a profit in the first year or two to pay salaries to top executives, despite what the company listed in its applications.
For that reason, both he and Delahunt said in interviews, all the executive team, officers, and directors will be keeping their existing full-time positions in addition to working with the marijuana company.
“Obviously we have to defer to the staff that will be there on a full-time basis,” Delahunt said. “This is not the gold rush. There may be some people who think it is, but it is not.”
It's a Green Ru$h!
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"Taking medical marijuana seriously, Mass. offers model for others" January 30, 2014
The Massachusetts Department of Public Health spent last year under fire for a chemist who fabricated evidence at a drug lab and a compounding pharmacy that caused a meningitis outbreak.
Also see: ACLU demands dismissal of all Dookhan-related cases
Related:
Dookhan a Democrat
Florida's Reverse Dookhan
Also see:
Florida crime lab analyst arrested on drug charges
Lab analyst held in drug thefts
Enough testing.
But the agency deserves high marks for its roll out of medical marijuana. After voters overwhelming approved medical marijuana, state health officials have taken this new responsibility seriously. They examined other programs across the country, and avoided pitfalls that befell other states.
What the hell has the Globe been smoking?
For instance, Arizona used a lottery to decide who would get marijuana dispensary licenses, and ended up with companies that didn’t have the know-how or the capital to do the job well. Massachusetts, on the other hand, has the highest-caliber applicants in the nation.
Unlike the casino crowd.
Health officials designed a rigorous process for vetting applicants, which weighs a number of factors, including local support in the town where they intend to open, plans to keep the facilities secure, and the ability to make marijuana accessible to patients who can’t afford it. (This is important because, according to state law, people who can’t afford to buy it have the right to seek permission to grow it in their homes, which would be much more difficult to regulate.)
That is why it is being legalized. Regulate and tax take! Not for health reasons!
This request for detailed plans, as well as the $30,000 application fee, have eliminated all but the most serious candidates. The teams of 100 finalists vying for 35 licenses include at least five medical doctors, one former member of the US Congress, a former state Senate minority leader, a former secretary of public safety, and a senior staff member of a respected drug treatment program. This may be a calculated show of political muscle and mainstream respectability, but it also suggests that fly-by-night operations will struggle to compete for licenses.
Building any new system from scratch is bound to face difficulties. The process has had its challenges, including some confusion on exactly who will pick the licensees. Initially, applicants were told that a panel of experts would score the applications and then pass on their findings to a second panel. But it appears now that there is only one expert panel involved. Additionally, Massachusetts Public Health Commissioner Cheryl Bartlett was expected to make the final call. But in recent weeks, it was announced that Karen van Unen, who was recently named executive director of the state’s fledgling medical marijuana program, would make the decision.
Some have sought to make political hay over the changes. The Massachusetts Republican Party issued a press release declaring the process “tainted” and demanding that an independent commission be appointed to make the decision. The party argued that because Bartlett had given $500 to Delahunt in 2007, and because Unen reports to Bartlett, the process ought to be shut down completely.
But Delahunt is hardly the only well-connected politician to file for a dispensary license. There is no guarantee that an “independent commission” would eliminate the appearance of favoritism. Politicians’ applications should be judged on their merits. They should be neither rewarded nor punished for their political contacts.
Rather than radically change the entire system this late in the process, a better solution would be to require that the reasoning behind the license decisions be made public, including the scoring sheets of the panel of experts. Other states, including Maine, have released this information to the public. Massachusetts should do the same.
The Maine model better?
UPDATE:
"3 convicted for marijuana operation
Three men charged in connection with the second-largest marijuana bust in Maine history have been found guilty by a federal jury. Jurors on Friday found Malcolm French, of Enfield, and Rodney Russell, of South Thomaston, guilty of conspiracy, manufacturing drugs and other charges. Kendall Chase, of Bradford, was convicted of conspiracy. Prosecutors said the men played key roles in the sophisticated outdoor operation in the woods of Washington County, the state’s easternmost county. State police said a raid in September 2009 yielded 3,000 plants valued at an estimated $9 million (AP)."
Maybe not.
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I hope this Massachusetts model is better than the Obummercare-based system.
The credentials till not good enough for certain folk:
"Banks shun fledgling marijuana firms in Mass.; Prospects of violating federal law deter lending" by Deirdre Fernandes | Globe Staff, January 29, 2014
Christopher Borde and his partners had $500,000 in cash, the backing of former governor and US attorney William Weld, and a landlord ready to rent them office space. But, they discovered, the trickiest part of launching their business was getting a bank account.
Borde’s company, MA Care Connect, is a medical marijuana dispensary, and like many others coming into the new market, it is finding that banks want little to do with a business that is still illegal under federal law.
Uh-huh.
See: Money Laundering and The Drug Trade: The Role of the Banks
But they don't want to $tink of pot!
Related: HSBC Still Laundering Money for Terrorists, Drug Cartels
Yeah, but that any weed money.
Borde estimated that he tried five banks, including one with which he had a long relationship, but most wanted nothing to do with his money.
I suppose it is nice to know that the money-junkies have their limits.
Finally, he succeeded at a large national bank, but only after he decided not to mention marijuana unless asked. He was not.
“We’re not the Colombian cartel,” said Borde, who helped launch a children’s television station and worked as an investment banker. “It’s a proper business.”
Oh, the banks will launder for them.
The conflict between federal and state marijuana laws has become a bigger issue as more states legalize the drug for medical and, more recently, recreational, uses. Dispensaries in the other 19 states that have legalized medicinal cannabis have run into similar banking problems, requiring entrepreneurs to hide the nature of their business, establish separate holding companies, or just haul around bags of cash.
A target for robbery!
Last week, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said that legal marijuana businesses should have access to the banking system and that the Obama administration would provide rules aimed at easing banks’ concerns, mainly by making these activities low priorities for federal prosecutors.
Bank officials in Massachusetts, however, are far from assured, worried what might happen under different administrations. Their preferred solution: changing federal law.
Among the wary bankers is Michael Tucker, chief executive of Greenfield Co-operative Bank in Western Massachusetts. He said he turned away several companies that inquired about setting up accounts tied to the medical marijuana businesses. It is not only dispensaries that worry Tucker, but landlords who want to lease offices to dispensaries or warehouses to growers.
No weed coming to my town.
If those property owners have mortgages with his bank, their monthly payments could be viewed as illegal drug money, he said. “You have relationships with people who are honest and good people,” Tucker said. “[But] we’re going to say, ‘We’re sorry, we’re not going to do business with you.’ ”
Massachusetts is expected to distribute the first medical marijuana licenses by the end of this week. Eighty nonprofit firms have submitted plans for 35 licenses in the hopes of being first to set up shop in Massachusetts in what is expected to become a lucrative business.
Nationwide, legal marijuana was a $1.5 billion industry in 2013 and is expected to nearly double to $2.7 billion this year, according to the National Cannabis Industry Association, a lobbying group.
In most circumstances, banks would welcome a booming new industry. But Massachusetts banks fear that doing business with growers, dispensaries, and even landlords that lease space to these businesses, would trigger additional layers of paperwork, more government oversight, and potential charges of money laundering.
That's in$ulting! They think you are stooped if you shmoke!
Under federal law, marijuana is considered a controlled substance and banks are required to report any incidents of suspicious or illegal activity to federal regulators.
That made me laugh, and it wasn't the marijuana!
That could mean filing a four-page report every time a dispensary or grower deposits money into the bank — potentially daily, local bankers said.
“There’s not enough value to us relative to the risk to dealing with medical marijuana dispensaries,” said Richard E. Holbrook, the chairman and chief executive of Eastern Bank, the state’s largest community bank. “There are too many downsides.”
Is he trying to say the $lap-on-the-wrist, chump-change fines would be more?
Elsewhere in the country, legal marijuana businesses have run into the same problems....
That means they have a lot of cash lying around. They pay employees with stacks of bills and buy money orders to send to utilities to keep the lights on.
Under the table?
They also must increase security and vary hours of operation so they do not become easy targets for burglars. “The fact that these companies are forced to operate in an insecure way is unsustainable,” said Taylor West, the deputy director of the National Cannabis Industry Association.
Some marijuana businesses have found ways to get a bank account by, for example, setting up separate holding companies that avoid any reference in their names to marijuana. Even then, once banks get a whiff of where the money comes from, they close the accounts.
As opposed to a sniff, 'eh?
Andrew DeAngelo, who operates marijuana dispensaries in California, is part of Green Heart Holistic Health & Pharmaceuticals, which is seeking a license for a Boston operation. In California, he said, his company had to move its account to at least six banks since launching operations there in 2006. Bankers would start feeling pressure from regulators asking questions about the business relationship and origins of the money, and close the accounts.
“You don’t want an all-cash business,” he said. “It’s not safe.”
The state’s banks and credit unions have asked Senator Elizabeth Warren, a member of the Senate Banking Committee, to help in reconciling state and federal marijuana laws.
I suppose we will find out if Liz Warren $mokes.
Meanwhile, the Department of Public Health, which oversees the licensing of medical marijuana, has recognized the banking difficulties. Initially, it required applicants to have at least $500,000 in startup funds in corporate bank accounts. In November, the agency eased the rules to allow the money to be held in personal accounts....
I'm nowhere near starting a bu$ine$$.
--more--"
Related: Sturbridge traffic stop yields 36 pounds of marijuana, troopers say
Of course, beer and bars and whiskey always get big play in my Bo$ton Globe:
"Red Sox win approval to expand liquor sales" by Brian MacQuarrie | Globe Staff, December 13, 2013
Fenway Park bills itself as a fan-friendly venue, and next season promises to be a little friendlier for customers who enjoy a beer or a little hard alcohol with their peanuts and Cracker Jacks.
The Boston Licensing Board on Thursday approved requests from the Red Sox to expand sales of liquor to three more stations inside the 101-year-old ballpark and to allow sales of all alcohol until the end of the seventh inning. Through last season, the cutoff had been 2½ hours from the first pitch or the end of the seventh inning, whichever came first.
With many games lasting more than three hours, a leisurely pace that suits the Red Sox more than most Major League teams, the elimination of a time limit could result in an increase in alcohol sales.
More drunks filing out of the park, great.
Any worry about increased crime here?
A wide range of mixed drinks will be sold at eight stations in the ballpark now, said Jonathan Gilula, the Red Sox executive vice president of business affairs....
The plan has the endorsement of Mayor Thomas M. Menino’s office, which had raised concerns before the 2011 season when the team initially broached selling mixed drinks throughout the 37,000-seat ballpark. Those concerns were subsequently addressed to the satisfaction of city officials, and mixed drinks were sold that season outside the premium, upper-deck areas where they had previously been allowed....
Will Walsh?
The board also approved the sale of beer in light aluminum and plastic wide-mouth bottles, in addition to the plastic cups that have been a staple for years. The reason is to curb the long lines that often form at concession stands, where each beer is poured into a cup, Red Sox executives said.
Next season, customers can opt for a bottle instead of a draft beer and walk away with an opened container.
Licensing Board chairwoman Nicole Murati Ferrer said the panel did not consider bottles to be a safety issue.
“With this particular ballpark and the fans that we’ve had, there’s no history of projectiles being used” outside long past, isolated incidents, Murati Ferrer said.
Red Sox officials said that the change to bottles is following an industry trend and that wide-mouth openings will lessen their danger as a potential missile.
“When thrown and not covered, they empty at pretty much the same rate as a plastic cup, and it’s about the same weight, so we don’t have much fear,” said Larry Cancro, the team’s senior vice president for Fenway affairs. “We find that when people buy their beer, they really don’t want to throw it.”
The team also received approval to sell mixed drinks and alcohol on Yawkey Way when the ballpark is hosting other events, such as soccer games or concerts. The club, which closes the street to traffic before games, previously had sought permission to sell alcohol there on a case-by-case basis for other events, Cancro said....
--more--"
What kind of beer will they be selling?
"Top House lawmaker from Revere to resign; Reinstein to take a position with Boston Beer Co." by Jim O’Sullivan | Globe staff, January 03, 2014
A top lieutenant to Speaker Robert A. DeLeo will resign her Revere-based seat to take a government relations post this month, she said Thursday, removing from House leadership a chief advocate of a casino in her hometown.
Representative Kathi-Anne Reinstein, first elected to the House in 1998, said she will step down to become government affairs manager for the Boston Beer Co.
The Globe fills my Monday Mead, right down to the bottom of the beer stein!
The company, which brews Samuel Adams beer, has been shopping for a government affairs executive for months, eliciting interest from several big names in local politics.
So she is going to be a lobbyist?
Related:
"Kathi-Anne Reinstein, former state representative and a Revere Democrat and the fifth-highest ranking member of leadership, left Friday to take a job as a lobbyist for the Boston Beer Co."
Also see: Boston Globe Back at the Bar Again
Reinstein’s decision comes at a pivotal time in the ongoing debate about where to site a Massachusetts casino, with a vote on the proposed facility scheduled for next month.
The Democrat has been a vocal proponent of the Suffolk Downs and Mohegan Sun facility in Revere, after East Boston residents last year voted down such a venue in their neighborhood.
She joins a growing parade of lawmakers, particularly in the House, who have left the Legislature in recent years to accept government affairs and lobbying jobs.
Both Westfield and Dorchester have special House elections slated for April, as does the north-of-Boston state Senate seat vacated when Katherine Clark won a congressional seat.
In a note to supporters on Thursday, Reinstein described the “emotional beginning” of her political career. In 1998, she won the seat long held by her father, who had died of cancer earlier that year.
Reinstein wrote that she would be “unable to actively participate” in the Feb. 25 city referendum on a host community agreement with Mohegan Sun. But she urged residents to “join me in voting” in favor of the pact.
A longtime DeLeo friend, Reinstein played a prominent role in helping him cobble together the necessary votes to win the speakership in 2009.
Since then, she has been a close deputy, serving as second assistant majority leader and frequently voicing the leadership line on issues.
Reinstein’s resignation takes effect Jan. 17.
She declined to be interviewed, referring instead to her note to supporters.
--more--"
I suppose alcohol is better than some other things:
"Spike in heroin overdoses across Mass. stirs fears" by Evan Allen | Globe Staff, February 06, 2014
In Taunton three people have died, apparently of heroin overdoses, in less than a month. In Attleboro a 28-year-old woman died, apparently the same way, on Friday. In Salisbury police are warning residents about a possible bad batch of the drug after two people overdosed Wednesday morning....
The danger of heroin was thrust into the spotlight this week after Oscar-winning actor Philip Seymour Hoffman was found dead with a needle in his arm in his New York City apartment Sunday....
It took an "important" person to die to get the spotlight on it?
Related: Rancher Rodeo
Was It Afghan Heroin?
Globe isn't asking where it came from.
"4 arrests related to Philip Seymour Hoffman’s death
Four people were arrested in Lower Manhattan on Tuesday evening with more than 350 bags of heroin as part of the investigation into the death of actor Philip Seymour Hoffman, authorities said. Investigators executed search warrants in three apartments in a building in Manhattan. Three men and a woman were arrested, and the investigators recovered the bags of heroin inside the apartments. None of the people arrested have been charged with the sale of drugs, and a firm connection to Hoffman has not been established, officials said. Hoffman died Sunday in an apparent heroin overdose. An initial exam of Hoffman was completed Wednesday, the office of the chief medical examiner said, but a determination as to the cause of death had yet to be made pending toxicology tests (New York Times News Service)."
Related: Public sightings of Hoffman suggest complicated final days
Also see: Two people die in Carver heroin overdoses
I don't even get names?
In Massachusetts hard numbers of recent overdoses were not available, officials said, as analysts are still compiling statistics. State Police are coordinating with their drug lab to see whether testing has revealed any pattern of additives or very pure heroin. They will review the findings and ask analysts if they are seeing anything new, said State Police spokesman David Procopio said....
I don't know how reliable the drug lab is!
Police used to get one or two overdose calls a month, Heagney said, but for the past two weeks, they have been getting at least one a day. On Monday Attleboro issued an alert, warning residents to be aware of the high number of overdoses and urging users to seek treatment and avoid using heroin....
Good idea.
Authorities believe there are three possible explanations for the spike in overdoses, Procopio said. One is that a very potent strain of heroin has entered the state. Another is that a cutting agent, such as the synthetic narcotic Fentanyl, is being added, increasing toxicity. And the third is that people are using multiple drugs simultaneously. It could also be a combination of all three, Procopio said....
The only way to find out is to try some, I guess.
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As for me, I am not interested even though the stuff is everywhere, although I do care where it is coming from.
Related: Meth House Cleanup Makes Me Mad
I suppose we can wash this all down with invisible ink.
Haven't seen a drop in my Globe since.
