New Virginia Cannabis Commission Meeting Next Week Will Help Shape Recreational Marijuana Sales Rules Under The Next Governor

A newly reformed government cannabis commission in Virginia will meet next
week to discuss the future of marijuana law in the commonwealth—a process
widely expected to result in a revised proposal to legalize retail sales of
the drug.

Convened as part of a House joint resolution passed by lawmakers earlier
this year, the group is set to spend the coming months gathering public
input and making recommendations on an array of policy matters around
Virginia’s would-be transition into a full-fledged adult-use commercial
cannabis market. Those include fundamentals like licensing and tax details
along with related issues such as paraphernalia, employment protections and
labor union agreements.

Use and possession of marijuana has been legal in Virginia since 2022, but
retail sales remain forbidden—a situation that’s helped fuel a
multibillion-dollar illicit market. Despite efforts by Democrats in past
years to legalize and regulate the retail system, Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R)
has stood in the way of the reform, twice vetoing proposals passed by
lawmakers.

“There’s kind of a good-news, bad-news with retail cannabis legalization in
Virginia,” Del. Paul Krizek (D), who sponsored the resolution creating the
new body—formally called the Joint Commission to Oversee the Transition of
the Commonwealth into a Retail Cannabis Market—told Marijuana Moment in a
recent interview.

The bad news, he said, is that lawmaker infighting over whether and how to
regulate marijuana has meant “we’re unable to provide Virginians with a
tested, well regulated retail market” even years after possession became
legal.

“The good news is it’s given us a little bit of time to work on perfecting
this legislation that we’re going to bring back next session,” he
continued. “It’s also given us the time to…get more input from the public
and from the stakeholders, and to really move cannabis from the street
corner to behind an age-verified retail counter.”

In the short-term, Krizek and others say the commission’s conversation will
inform an updated bill to introduce in the coming year. With Youngkin
term-limited and unable to run for re-election in November, his replacement
is likely to decide whether regulated products will become available in the
commonwealth in the next few years.

Whatever happens, the body is scheduled to remain in place until mid-2028,
which the lawmaker said will allow members to keep at the work—whether that
means continuing to explore the possibility of retail sales or monitoring a
fledgling commercial system as gets off the ground.

The commission created by Krizek’s bill, HJ 497, consists of six lawmakers
from the House and four from the Senate. A similar commission previously
existed in the commonwealth, but the law creating that body sunsetted last
year and the group disbanded.

Most business at the commission’s first meeting, on July 9, will be
housekeeping: things like setting agendas and ground rules for meetings,
electing officers—Krizek said he hopes to be selected as chair, with Sen.
Adam Ebbin (D) as vice chair—and laying out expectations for process ahead.

From there, he emphasized, the bulk of the commission’s work will involve
hearing from stakeholders and the public.

“This is all about a public process with public input, not just
stakeholders, but the public in general,” Krizek told Marijuana Moment.
“One of the goals, I’m certain, will be to get as much public information
[as possible], especially from our stakeholders.”

He said he intends to use the recent legal sales bill that was vetoed by
Youngkin as a starting point “with a few small tweaks” but also pointed to
other issues he hoped the commission would take up, such as expanding
cannabis-related employment protections to include non-medical marijuana
use by adults, evaluating proposed tax rates on paraphernalia and adding
provisions around labor union organizing.

Asked whether the matters would be part of a comprehensive sales bill or
dealt with on a more piecemeal basis, the lawmaker emphasized that the
committee’s focus for now is on understanding policy issues rather than
strategizing how to pass legislation.

“You have to tackle it policy first, and you worry about the tactics as you
go,” he said.

Among the organizations expected to participate in the commission process
are Marijuana Justice and NORML, which both appeared before the previous
iteration of the body.

Chelsea Higgs Wise, executive director of Marijuana Justice, said she’s
“excited about the opportunity for public comment and expert testimony,”
calling the commission “an opportunity for a melding of the minds.”

“These legislators, many of them are new to the cannabis industry, and so
this is an opportunity for them to learn best practices, hear from trusted
advocates and organizers and invite in the experts…to make smart
decisions,” she said.

“The majority of them have a history of standing on justice, equity and
being open to learning how cannabis can really benefit Virginia,” she added
of the commission’s members. “I am very excited for this commission to hear
and craft the future of Virginia cannabis.”

Among the priorities Marijuana Justice has for the conversation is a review
of micro business eligibility provisions, which Higgs Wise said could be
too wide in scope, as well as how adult-use cannabis operators could
effectively compete with large, existing medical marijuana companies.

“Centering corporations, centering big cannabis, is not necessarily what’s
best for a Virginia-based industry,” she said. “We really want to have
in-depth conversations about the start date of sales and what that will
mean for people that are just getting started, versus those that are
already operational either with hemp or with medical cannabis.”

JM Pedini, development director for the advocacy group NORML and executive
director for Virginia NORML, told Marijuana Moment that the commission “has
consistently provided an excellent opportunity for both lawmakers and
members of the public to participate in cannabis policy discussions before
the legislative session begins” and encouraged interested members of the
public to attend the panel’s meetings.

But Pedini also stressed the importance of getting out the vote later this
year, especially in the governor’s race.

“Ultimately, it is the outcome of this November’s election that will
determine the fate of cannabis retail in Virginia,” they said. “There are
only two choices. Voters can either elect a governor who will sign a retail
sales measure, or one who will double down on prohibitionists’ attempts to
roll back cannabis freedoms in the commonwealth.”

One advocacy group not planning to engage with the new commission is the
Virginia Cannabis Association (VCA).

“To be quite frank, we’re not going to participate in any of these
meetings,” said Jason Blanchette, the organization’s president. “I don’t
really know what’s going to come out of it.”

“I’m not really looking to get involved in that at all,” he continued of
the commission’s work, explaining that VCA is focused on reintroducing the
same bill that lawmakers sent to Youngkin in the past two years.

“We are going to push like heck the bill that we have already spent an
enormous amount of time getting it to the finish line,” Blanchette said.
“The hope is to pass this thing in January so they don’t have to keep
monkeying around here.”

He also doubted the makeup of the panel, saying that “six delegates and
four senators is not the way to do it.” He’d rather see members of the
cannabis industry represented on the body itself.

“I think it’s going to be mandatory for them to have a medical operator
representative. It’s going to be mandatory to have a grower-farmer
representative. It’s going to be mandatory to have a retail
representative,” he said. “Public input…versus having a seat at the table
are two totally different things.”

Blanchette said he’s nevertheless bullish on the chances for reform,
predicting that after November’s election, Democrats will control not only
the governor’s office but also both the Senate and the House of Delegates.

“They more than likely are going to have a trifecta,” Blanchette said of
the party. “And that’s what makes 2026 the year this has to pass.”


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Advocates like Pedini have pointed out that if the next governor isn’t open
to legalizing retail sales, that could set back the effort until 2030 or
later.

It could also affect more incremental reforms. For example, in May Youngkin
vetoed a bill that would have allowed deliveries of medical marijuana
directly to patients at locations other than their own homes. It would have
also updated product labeling requirements so packaging would more clearly
indicate THC and CBD levels.

In March, after the legislature passed the legislation, Youngkin
recommended an amendment that would remove language to allow marijuana to
be delivered to places other than a patient’s private residence. Lawmakers
later declined to make that change, however, and sent the unamended bill
back to the governor.

The proposal had strong support in both chambers, passing the Senate on a
30–10 vote and winning final approval in the House on an 84–14 margin. But
Youngkin nevertheless rejected it.

“While accurate labeling is essential to ensure patients receive consistent
and safe medical cannabis,” he wrote in a veto message, “this bill would
codify the ability to deliver medical cannabis to commercial businesses and
temporary residences, raising public safety and regulatory concerns.
Permitting deliveries to businesses—including locations where substance
abuse, gambling, or other high-risk activities may occur—creates
unnecessary risks for diversion, theft, and unintended access by minors.”

Pedini at NORML described the veto at the time as “yet another example of
the attacks on legal cannabis and responsible consumers that are underway
across the nation.”

Youngkin in March also vetoed a host of other drug reform proposals passed
by lawmakers, including the legal sales bill and another to authorize the
prescription of a synthetic form of psilocybin as soon as the federal
government authorizes its use.

Beyond the legal sales and psilocybin bills, the governor also rejected a
number of other cannabis-related reforms this session, including efforts to
resentence people serving time for cannabis offenses and protect the
parental rights of those who legally use the drug.

Youngkin agued in a veto statement that legalizing sales of adult-use
marijuana “endangers Virginians’ health and safety.”

“States following this path have seen adverse effects on children’s and
adolescents’ health and safety, increased gang activity and violent crime,
significant deterioration in mental health, decreased road safety, and
significant costs associated with retail marijuana that far exceed tax
revenue,” the governor claimed. “It also does not eliminate the illegal
black-market sale of cannabis, nor guarantee product safety.”

Even before the start of the current legislative session, Youngkin’s office
had signaled it had no interest in the reform.

Asked by Virginia Public Media (VPM) late last year about the likelihood of
a veto, Christian Martinez, a spokesperson for the Youngkin, told the
outlet: “I think you can cite the fact that time and time again he has been
very clear on that.”

Reform advocates are already watching to see where his possible
replacements stand on legalization and other cannabis policy changes.

Two frontrunners for the position—Republican Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears
and Democratic former U.S. Rep. Abigail Spanberger—have starkly different
views on the reform.

Earle-Sears recently echoed Youngkin’s views, saying of legalization:
“There’s no hope in that.”

She’s also said marijuana is a gateway drug and that she fired a previous
employee for using it.

Spanberger, meanwhile, voiced support for a regulated retail market.

“We need a formalized, legal, emerging cannabis market,” she said. “We also
need to make sure that [tax] revenues flow into Virginia and are used to
strengthen our communities and public schools.”

Ebbin, the senator who is expected to become vice chair of the new
commission, suggested that the outcome of the election will determine the
future of cannabis policy in Virginia.

“I think we will finally see regulated sales after the 2026 legislative
session,” he told Marijuana Moment, “assuming a pro-regulated market
candidate, like Abigail Spanberger, is elected governor.”

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*Photo courtesy of Mike Latimer.*

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