House bill would not solve cannabis commission’s structural flaws
June 15, 2025
Re “After years of turmoil, a new structure for cannabis commission is worth a shot” (Editorial, June 2): The bill passed by the Massachusetts House that would change the governance structure of the Cannabis Control Commission includes a provision that the chair would hire an executive director, who would serve at the pleasure of the chair, rather than the current structure in which the full commission hires the executive director.
As the public policy mediator for the deliberations that resulted in the Massachusetts Cannabis Control Commission’s new charter, I can attest that this change will continue the central problem of the original legislation and result in ongoing conflict regarding the commission’s administrative functions.
As Inspector General Jeffrey Shapiro has argued, the current statute provides no clear guidance on who is responsible for leading the agency, especially because it assigns similar powers to both the commission’s chair and its executive director.
Yet the proposed change in the legislation would make the executive director beholden to the chair for his or her job at every turn. It would strip away any independent authority of the executive director to manage commission staff to implement commissioners’ policies and decisions.
At a minimum, the executive director should be hired — and, if necessary, fired — by a majority of the full commission. This would create a necessary check on the powers of the chair, in that, for example, a decision to remove an executive director could be overridden by the other commissioners. As a result, the executive director would have the authority to make implementation and management decisions that may align with the commissioners but not always with the chair.
Let’s be sure the legislative fix addresses the source of the problem and enables the commission to do the job the Commonwealth needs.
Susan Podziba
Brookline
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