Denver’s social cannabis consumption pilot program was set to expire in 2020, but Denver City Council voted 10-1 to remove the sunset date, making the program permanent.

In 2016, Denverites approved Initiative 300, which was designed to allow businesses to establish indoor cannabis consumption areas. Private, invitation-only consumption events were already legal, but I-300 made it possible for businesses like yoga studios, art galleries, hotels, concert venues, and coffee shops to wade into the cannabis industry.

Since I-300 was enacted in 2017, the program has been plagued with problems. The sunset provision made it difficult for cannabis entrepreneurs to secure loans and investors, as well as physical space for their businesses. Leases for commercial buildings are typically three to five years, so before the sunset provision was eliminated, social use businesses would have to commit to a lease that would outlast the regulations.

Additional difficulties include restrictions on where social consumption lounges can set up shop, limiting the number of potential properties available. Marijuana businesses hoping to be licensed for social use must gain approval from nearby neighborhood or business groups, be located 1,000 feet away from schools, daycare facilities, drug treatment centers, city pools, and recreation centers.

Moreover, because of state restrictions, licensed consumption businesses are prohibited from allowing indoor smoking, cannabis sales, or alcohol consumption. Proposed legislation could ease some of these restrictions, making cannabis lounges more viable.

Denver City Council has been looking at ways to improve Denver’s social use program, and removing the sunset provision was the first step.

The only opposition to removing the sunset provision came from Denver City Councilman Kevin Flynn. “I don’t believe that simply repealing the sunset, which voters had approved and authors of the initiative included, is going to make any difference in the context of all the other changes that would have to be looked at before this program would take off,” Flynn said. “I don’t see that removing the sunset would result in any new businesses suddenly coming forward, with all the other restrictions that I believe are truly the reason that more of these licenses have not been sought by other business.”

Since I-300 was enacted in 2017, the city has received just five applications. One of those applications was rejected, one was rescinded, one is still under review, and two were approved. The Coffee Joint in west Denver was the first business granted a social use license and is currently the only social pot business in operation. A second marijuana consumption lounge, Vape and Play, closed just a month after opening.

Ten years ago, Smiths Falls in Ontario was a small town in trouble. In the midst of a recession, the main employers in the area, including Canada’s largest Hershey’s chocolate factory, pulled up stakes, taking more than 1,500 jobs with them.

In a community of fewer than 9,000 people, the loss of so many jobs was devastating. Along with their income, people lost their homes and cars, grocery stores closed, and many of the town’s residents chose to move away.

Smiths Falls’ mayor, Shawn Pankow, said, “It was a five-year period there where it was hard to find any good news.”

That all changed in 2013, when Tweed Inc. and its parent company, Canopy Growth Corp. moved into Hershey’s old factory. Initially, the medical marijuana company promised the town about 150 jobs.

“And then Justin Trudeau comes along and says, ‘You know, we should think about recreational cannabis.’ And there was a lot of smiles in this building,” said Jordan Sinclair, vice president of communication for Canopy Grown Corp.

When Canada legalized recreational marijuana in October 2018, the company shipped more than a million cannabis orders in four weeks.

Five years after setting up shop, Canopy is the largest pot company in the world and employees more than 3,000 people globally. And Smiths Falls has gone from a virtual ghost town to the unofficial weed capital of Canada.

Carol Lawrence, who was once a tour guide at the Hershey factory, is now a tour guide for the Tweed visitor center.

“If someone had told me five years ago that I’d be standing working at a cannabis factory, I would look at them and say they’re crazy,” said Lawrence, “And look at me now.”

Smiths Falls isn’t the only small town revitalized by marijuana. Trinidad, Durango, and Cortez are three small communities in southern Colorado near the New Mexico border. Like Smiths Falls, the area was experiencing an economic depression, few jobs, and a falling population.

Nick Cordova, a local restaurant and hotel owner in Trinidad, said, “Before marijuana came here, the town was dead. Half the population was gone. Half the town was abandoned. Half the downtown buildings were abandoned and run down. Without weed, half this town wouldn’t be here. Literally.”

Since recreational marijuana sales began in Colorado in 2014, the population of Trinidad has nearly doubled, and these three small towns bring in the most cannabis sales per capita in the state. Last year, Cortez added $250,000 of marijuana taxes to their city budget, while Durango added around $400,000. Trinidad brought in the most tax revenue by far at an estimated $3 million.

Location is a big reason why these towns have thrived from cannabis dollars–a majority of marijuana purchases are made by people who travel from nearby New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas.

Cannabis is bringing new opportunities and revenue to towns that were in desperate need of hope.

Canada finalizing rules for marijuana edibles

Canadians have until Feb. 20 to submit feedback to Health Canada before final marijuana edible regulations are released this summer. Canada legalized adult-use cannabis sales in Oct. 2018, but restricted the sale of marijuana edibles, infused beverages, concentrates, and topicals until Oct. 17, 2019.

Unlike regulations in the U.S., the proposed Canadian regulations will limit marijuana edibles and infused beverages to 10 milligrams of THC, regardless of whether it’s sold for medical or recreational use. Some experts in the marijuana industry worry that the low-THC limit will encourage black market sales.

“By limiting the entire packages to 10 milligrams of THC, the regulators will increase the amount of packaging waste associated with edible cannabis products and make legal businesses less competitive against the black-market operators that aren’t restrained on edible potency,” said Jordan Wellington, chief compliance officer at Denver-based Simplifya.

Unlike edibles, the limit for marijuana concentrates and topicals will be significantly higher, allowing up to 1000 milligrams of THC for both medical and recreational use.

Legal marijuana sales reach $6 billion in Colorado

Since legal adult-use sales began in 2014, Colorado has sold $6 billion in medical and recreational marijuana. Recreational cannabis sales in the state have continued to increase, while medical marijuana sales have fallen. According to Marijuana Business Daily, there was a 20% decrease in MMJ sales between 2017-2018, from $416 million to $332 million. Medical marijuana sales reached a market high in 2016, at $445 million.

Recreational sales in Colorado have grown steadily since 2014. Adult-use cannabis sales in 2017 reached $1 billion, while sales in 2018 reached $1.2 billion, an 11% increase. There was a huge leap in cannabis sales between 2016 and 2017 when sales increased by 49%. In 2014, the state sold just $303 million in adult-use cannabis.

European Parliament votes to increase access to medical marijuana

The European Parliament voted in favor of a resolution that would incentivize cannabis research, clinical studies, and access to medical marijuana among European Union countries. The vote follows a recommendation from the World Health Organization (WHO) that cannabis should be rescheduled under international drug treaties.

The resolution is non-binding, meaning that it doesn’t actually change any marijuana laws in EU countries, but it does show increased support for ending cannabis prohibition. In addition, the resolution calls for a commission to “define the conditions required to enable creditable, independent scientific research based on a wide range of material to be conducted into the use of cannabis for medicinal purposes” and to “address the regulatory, financial and cultural barriers” that have prevented cannabis research.

Congress holds cannabis banking hearing

Access to banking has long been an issue in the cannabis industry, with marijuana businesses having little-to-no-access to banking services. For the past six years, Reps. Ed Perlmutter (D-Colorado) and Danny Heck (D-Washington) have filed the “Secure and Fair Enforcement Banking Act” (SAFE) that would eliminate restrictions that prevent insurance and federal financial institutions from working with marijuana businesses. On Wednesday, the SAFE Banking Act received its first hearing in the House Financial Services Committee.

For cannabis companies, lack of access to banking creates challenges that companies in other sectors don’t have to tackle. Cannabis businesses are often forced to run cash-only operations, increasing the risk of crime, and regular business transactions like getting a loan, or paying employees and taxes are much more difficult.

Some credit unions have taken on banking for cannabis companies, but the American Bankers Association told the House Financial Services Committee that, “the majority of financial institutions will not take the legal, regulatory or reputational risk associated with banking cannabis-related businesses without congressional action,” and that access to banking services would make cannabis businesses “safer and better regulated.”

The World Health Organization (WHO) issued new recommendations to reschedule cannabis and its chemical components under international drug treaties. WHO also clarified its position on CBD, recommending that cannabidiol containing less than 0.2% of THC “should not be under international control.”

The report, which hasn’t yet been formally released, recommends that whole plant cannabis and cannabis resin should be removed from Schedule IV and be downgraded to a Schedule I substance.

Currently, THC in all forms is included under both the 1971 and 1961 treaties, creating confusion. The new recommendations would remove THC from the 1971 Convention and place it in Schedule I of the 1961 Convention.

Pharmaceutical preparations of THC, including medications like Sativex, would be categorized as Schedule III under the 1961 Convention.

Under international drug treaties, Schedule IV is the most-restrictive category, whereas in the U.S. the most-restrictive category is Schedule I. Drugs in the most-restrictive category are considered to have no medicinal value and a high potential for abuse.

Michael Krawitz, a legalization advocate and U.S. Air Force veteran, told Forbes, “the placement of cannabis in the 1961 treaty, in the absence of scientific evidence, was a terrible injustice. Today the World Health Organization has gone a long way towards setting the record straight. It is time for us all to support the World Health Organization’s recommendations and ensure politics don’t trump science.”

Despite acknowledging the therapeutic benefits of cannabis, the WHO recommendations won’t throw open the door to international legalization. As Tom Angell explains, “the practical effects of the changes would be somewhat limited, in that they wouldn’t allow countries to legalize marijuana and still be in strict compliance with international treaties, but their political implications are hard to overstate.”

The biggest implications for WHO’s recommendations are for CBD. Last year, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) released a memo recommending removing CBD from the Controlled Substances Act. However, international drug treaties that require the regulation of cannabis, including CBD, prevented the change.

However, in the memo, the FDA noted that “if treaty obligations do not require control of CBD, or if the international controls on CBD change in the future, this recommendation will need to be promptly revisited.”

WHO’s recommendations were expected in December, but its release was delayed. Members of the United Nations could vote on the recommendations in March, but the delay in the release of the report could mean that the vote is pushed back until 2020.