The California state auditor released a report on the Department of Cannabis Control (DCC) with the major takeaway being that not enough is being done to prevent cannabis packaging that attracts children.
State Auditor Grant Parks' report found that packaging for many cannabis products contain colorful fonts, strain names, cartoon images or animals — all things that attract kids.
“This is big tobacco all over again," said Luke Niforatos, executive vice president of Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM). "The tobacco industry had candy cigarettes and Joe Camel, the marijuana industry has vaping devices, gummy bears and cartoon characters that they have conjured up to market and make their products appealing to kids.
"Research shows that having flavors that are appealing to youth on vapes or other smoke products are especially appealing to younger demographics.”
The report also claims that between 2016 — when cannabis was legalized in California — and 2023, there was a 469% increase in the number of calls to California Poison Control concerning children under 5 years of age ingesting cannabis: 148 calls in 2016 to 842 calls in 2023.
The state auditor's report made some recommendations for regulations. Among those is an effort to prevent repeat marijuana licensees' offenses by having the DCC specify guidelines regarding escalation of compliance actions. The report also recommends DCC inspections and complaints have a review of previous actions issues in an effort to crack down on repeat offenders.
The report also recommends having lawmakers regulate products' names that are attractive to children and increase design elements that are not allowed on packages. To ensure that cannabis packaging does not have strain names that are attractive to children, it recommended the legislature to consider prohibiting advertising of strain names that could be attractive to children. The report also urges lawmakers to ban certain flavors of cannabis that attract kids.
Renee Meyer with the compliance division of the DCC told NBC 7, “the auditors got it right when they noted that our regulations are very subjective, so it is difficult for us at times to come up with consistent regulatory measures against certain cannabis packaging and labeling.”
Meyer says regulations on cannabis packaging need to updated and refined. While, Meyer agrees with many parts of the audit, she also notes there are problems with a lack of resources to monitor California’s huge legal cannabis market and to remember the DCC has no control over the unlicensed market.
"It is doable to improve around cannabis packaging and labeling. We can do this and make changes. Both the department and the legislature have an opportunity to work together to make the regulations stricter," Meyer said.
Niforatos is also encouraged by the recommendations but says big picture, California has failed at one key part of the legalization effort.
"Marijuana legalization passed through in California based on the premise that we could legalize, regulate and tax marijuana," Niforatos said. "This audit report is showing us that regulation is still not working out. Regulation is not what it was promised, and we need to hold policymakers and the industry to a higher standard going forward.”
