Cannabis opt-out case appeal filed

By THANE GRAUEL

Local attorney John Nathan has filed an appeal in his case that alleges Pound Ridge decided not to opt out of the state’s cannabis dispensary law outside of public view and in violation of open meeting laws.

His suit, originally filed Aug. 26, 2024, in state Supreme Court in White Plains, was dismissed by a judge on June 30. On July 22, Nathan filed an appeal with the Appellate Division, 2nd Department, in Brooklyn. It names the town of Pound Ridge, the Town Board, SMBB, which does business as Purple Plains, the town’s only recreational cannabis dispensary, and the state Office of Cannabis Management as defendants.

The state Supreme Court judge had ruled in favor of motions to dismiss the case, agreeing with the defendants that the clock on the statute of limitations had starting running long before Nathan argued, and that the public did indeed have notice of the decision to not opt-out of the state’s incoming recreational cannabis law because it was mentioned during a Town Board meeting.

“I have identified 13 material areas of fact and law, which I intend to raise on the appeal,” Nathan told The Recorder on Wednesday. 

Among his points, Nathan challenges the judge’s thinking on the statute of limitations; whether Nathan had standing in the case; and whether a statement by Town Supervisor Kevin Hansan at a 2021 Town Board meeting, which Nathan said was one-minute long, provided adequate public notice of the town’s thinking on the opt-out provision.

 “It is highly disappointing that he intends to appeal the court’s ruling,” Hansan told The Recorder on Wednesday, “especially considering it has already cost the town’s taxpayers $49,075.”

Nathan, meanwhile, said that the time he has personally spent on the case would amount to $216,562. 

He said he is pursuing the case not only because the people of Pound Ridge were not given a voice in the opt-out decision. “I’m doing it for the residents of the state,” he said.“What we have now is what I call ‘the Pound Ridge rule,’” Nathan said. “What’s going to happen is that when the next law like this gets passed, let’s say some upstate county, the town board up there say, ‘Well, we don’t have anything more than what the Pound Ridge people did’ because it’s now established that Pound Ridge, they got away with it.” 

The Supreme Court judge in White Plains wrote in his ruling: “The Town Board announced to the public at a noticed Pound Ridge Town Board meeting on April 6, 2021, that the Cannabis Law passed and that the legislation included a limited opt-out provision. This announcement put plaintiff and every resident on notice.”

Nathan appears particularly rankled by an affidavit of Hansan’s in the case.

“From April through December of 2021, no resident of Pound Ridge, either in writing or in person, requested a public hearing on the cannabis opt out issue,” the affidavit reads. “Similarly, no member of the Town Board asked for the matter to be discussed at a public meeting, in a public bearing or otherwise added to any meeting agenda. No Town Board member asked that the Town vote to opt out. No member of the public requested the Town Board discuss the opt out issue, let alone pass an opt out resolution. As such, I did not place the matter on any agenda.”

“We have the representative blaming the represented, which is absolutely upside down,” Nathan said. 

He again said he’s challenging the way it was handled by town officials on principle, not because he cares one way or the other on the cannabis issue. He said he is not a part of any local political movements or running for local office.

Nathan said the appeal will likely have a phase in which both sides file briefs and replies, and then eventually there should be a hearing before a panel of judges. It all could take a year or more, Nathan said.