The Week Ahead
(August 10, 2020)

During a quiet week for cannabis-related policymaking in Washington state, we began to glimpse the outlines of the frequent WSLCB COVID-19 Legal/Policy/Rules meetings.

Here’s a look at cannabis-related policymaking events on Cannabis Observer’s calendars in the week ahead.

Monday August 10th

On Monday, the Washington State Liquor and Cannabis Board (WSLCB) COVID Legal/Policy/Rules Meeting was scheduled to recur.

  • [ Event Details ]
  • Agency staff leadership, Board Chair Jane Rushford, and Assistant Attorney General Bruce Turcott convene multiple times per week via webinar to discuss policy-related questions raised in the context of the pandemic. Originally having met daily every work day, the schedule of meetings was shifted to 3x per week (M, W, F) on June 10th.
  • At publication time and In response to public records requests filed by Cannabis Observer, we had begun to receive public information from the WSLCB regarding the agency’s frequent COVID Legal/Policy/Rules meetings.
    • Thus far, that information has almost entirely consisted of a date-specific snapshot of a “COVID-19 Policy Tracking Spreadsheet” used by meeting participants to provide abbreviated notes on specific policy discussions.
    • At the Friday July 17th meeting, the corresponding spreadsheet snapshot documents the introduction of an item by Director of Legislative Relations Chris Thompson regarding a draft COVID Policy Allowance Matrix participants had begun working on.
      • Initially envisioned by Public Health Education Liaison Sara Cooley Broschart, the document was “put together to capture our thinking, perspectives and information we’re aware of regarding the allowances we have temporarily extended to industry during the pandemic.”
      • Enforcement Chief Justin Nordhorn was credited as suggesting “Could send to [the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs (WASPC)] and prevention to add any issues or concerns.” A question was raised about how to better include the “Public health/prevention perspective with Trecia [Ehrlich] and Sara gone,” the former departed for WSDA and the latter later noted in the spreadsheet as on “maternity leave.” The task was delegated to Nordhorn’s Executive Assistant Judy Edwards utilizing Ehrlich’s list of prevention community contacts.
      • Listed on the “Alcohol” tab of the spreadsheet, it was unclear if the COVID Policy Allowance Matrix was also intended to document policy allowances for cannabis, vapor, and tobacco licensees. Public records staff helpfully conveyed the document “is still in draft, and not finalized, at this time. Therefore, it is exempt from disclosure per the citation below.”
        • In our experience, the WSLCB does not consistently utilize that particular public records exemption to obscure preliminary draft documents, and the agency releases draft documents at its discretion.
    • The COVID-19 Policy Tracking Spreadsheet has thus far generally been the only responsive record returned from these meetings. While we have only begun to glimpse the outlines of these internal cannabis policy-related meetings, at publication time we had not received any recordings, presentations, handouts, or participant notes in response to our requests. We will be receiving many more responses from WSLCB public records staff in the weeks to come - including all of the responsive records from the early days of the pandemic when the majority of policy allowances were implemented by the agency.

Tuesday August 11th

On Tuesday at 10am PT, the weekly WSLCB Board Caucus was scheduled to recur.

Wednesday August 12th

On Wednesday at 9am PT, the somewhat bi-monthly Washington State Board of Health (SBOH) Board Meeting was scheduled to recur, but did not include any cannabis-related items on the agenda.

On Wednesday at 10am PT, the WSLCB COVID Legal/Policy/Rules Meeting was scheduled to recur.

The weekly WSLCB Executive Management Team (EMT) meeting was cancelled.

  • [ Event Details ]
  • The last 26 regularly scheduled EMT meetings have been cancelled. The EMT last convened on Wednesday February 12th.
  • During the July 16th caucus, Board Chair Jane Rushford said “I feel it's important that we bring [EMTs] back.” She and Executive Assistant Dustin Dickson were “looking ahead to September” to refresh the EMT format, though she expected “we probably won’t do once a week, we don’t need to do that.” Nonetheless, Rushford expressed a need for “meaningful” meetings of WSLCB leadership (audio - 2m).
  • The Board calendar was subsequently updated to reflect Chair Rushford’s commitment, and all EMT meetings through August were cancelled.

Friday August 14th

On Friday at 10am PT, the WSLCB COVID Legal/Policy/Rules Meeting was scheduled to recur.