“We’ve been doing a lot of work, as last year demonstrated, breathing life through the Rhode Island Cannabis Act…and now we’re hyperfocused on getting these regulations done.”
By Christopher Shea, Rhode Island Current
The Rhode Island Cannabis Control Commission met Thursday afternoon for the first time in over two months, spending most of its first meeting of 2025 behind closed doors.
Absent from the agenda was a staple item for most meetings: public comment.
The hiring of a chief public affairs officer, however, dominated the meeting. The commission’s three members spent 15 minutes in executive session where they voted to extend a job offer to a candidate.
The announcement was made upon the commission’s return to open session. Then the commission adjourned. The meeting—the first since October 15, 2024—lasted 23 minutes.
Chairperson Kimberly Ahern would not disclose the name of the candidate the commission selected to the crowd of seven members of the public who attended the meeting.
“There are layers of things to do before we can share anything,” Ahern told Rhode Island Current.
A total of 76 people applied for the chief public affairs officer job by the October 12, 2024, application deadline. The job was posted October 3 with a 10-day application period. The position is tasked with handling media inquiries and coordinating with the General Assembly about cannabis-related legislation.
“It was a very robust applicant pool,” Ahern said. “People are very excited about the commission’s work, I think.”
The annual salary for the position is $110,585, said Matthew Touchette, a spokesperson for the Rhode Island Commerce Corp. and Department of Business Regulation, which has overseen the state’s cannabis rules as the commission sets up the governing rules for Rhode Island’s recreational cannabis market.
“I’m going to be bummed that I’m not going to be working with Kim as much anymore,” Touchette said. “I am the only person who’s been with her since day one—she’s just been awesome to work with.”
The commission will next meet on Wednesday, January 8, when it is scheduled to vote to post its inaugural draft regulations for the state’s budding cannabis industry for public comment, as is required under the state’s Administrative Procedures Act.
Over the summer, draft regulations for labeling requirements and how licenses will be awarded were conditionally approved. Commissioners wanted to get all regulations for the state’s recreational cannabis market finalized by the end of 2024 but fell short of that goal.
“We’ve been doing a lot of work, as last year demonstrated, breathing life through the Rhode Island Cannabis Act,” Ahern said. “That means following a number of statutory mandates, working across different agencies and the Cannabis Advisory Board.”
“And so we worked through all those and now we’re hyperfocused on getting these regulations done,” she added.
This story was first published by Rhode Island Current.
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Photo courtesy of Chris Wallis // Side Pocket Images.
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