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By Theresa Yarbrough, Founder & Director, GA Cannabis Industry Alliance

In a moment that should have been marked by clarity and accountability, the Georgia General Assembly chose silence.

On October 7, 2025, the GA Cannabis Industry Alliance submitted a formal Open Records Request seeking documentation from the House Blue-Ribbon Study Committee on Georgia’s Medical Marijuana and Hemp Policies. We asked for conflict-of-interest disclosures, meeting minutes, and recusal records—especially regarding Dr. Robin Fowler, a licensed medical marijuana operator who also sits on the Committee.

The response? A legal shield.

“The Georgia General Assembly and its members, officers, staff, committees, commissions, and offices are not subject to Georgia's open records laws.” — Office of General Counsel, Georgia General Assembly

They cited Institute for Justice v. Reilly (2019) to justify their exemption. The Georgia Supreme Court declined to hear the appeal, locking in a precedent that exempts the very body crafting marijuana policy from public scrutiny.

The Myth of Haleigh’s Hope

Let’s correct the record: The Blue-Ribbon Committee was not established under Haleigh’s Hope Act. That act was an intended compassionate medical framework—not a legislative exemption clause. To invoke it as justification for withholding records is both misleading and deeply troubling.

This committee was formed independently by House leadership. It includes members with direct financial interests in Georgia’s marijuana licensing system. The lack of transparency around its deliberations, recusals, and ethical safeguards undermines public trust and raises serious questions about monopoly influence in state policy.

The Power We Hold—Even Without Funding

Organizations like the GA Cannabis Industry Alliance don’t have the millions it takes to lobby lawmakers or wine-and-dine committee members into doing the right thing. We don’t have corporate war chests. We don’t have paid influence. But we dohave you - the community power.

We have truth. We have memory. And we have the cannabis-using public, who can send these MSOs packing with every dollar they redirect, every Pop-Up they host, every survivor shop they support.

This movement isn’t funded—it’s fueled. By culture. By conviction. By the real business of marijuana in Georgia: healing, trust, and legacy.

The Complicity Clause

Let’s name it plainly: Every Georgian who purchases a medical marijuana card and buys products from corporate-funded dispensaries is complicit.

And it doesn’t stop there.

• Every advocate who sets up a table to push medical marijuana cards on behalf of MSOs—complicit.

• Every advocate who steps to the microphone in legislative hearings to support bills that empower monopoly operators- complicit.

• Every advocate who stands beside those who empower MSOs, offering silent endorsement or shared platform- complicit.

Not necessarily malicious. Not necessarily informed. But complicit, nonetheless.

Because every act of endorsement, every dollar spent, every silence held:

• Strengthens the system that erased Georgia’s small hemp retailers

• Funds the lobbyists who demanded THCa bans

• Undermines legacy community growers who offered healing without gatekeeping

• Conceals the truth from patients behind polished branding and policy spin

• Shields monopoly interests beneath legislative exemptions and ethical fog

This is not a condemnation—it’s a naming. A ritual act of clarity. An invitation to shift, to reckon, to return to the real business of marijuana in Georgia— for the people of Georgia: healing, trust, and legacy, not million-dollar backing. Let’s get back to real ownership of marijuana in Georgia—by and for real Georgians.

A Call to Consciousness

This refusal becomes a teaching artifact—a scroll that reveals the architecture of legislative evasion. It reminds us that the fight for marijuana freedom is not just about access to the plant—it’s about access to truth.

We call on our community to:

• Amplify this refusal—share it, repost it, ritualize it

• Demand ethical reform—push for transparency laws that include legislative committees

• Protect our memory—document every moment of resistance, every act of evasion, every signal of monopoly control

Final Word

If your committee is crafting marijuana policy, and your members profit from marijuana licenses, the public deserves to know. If your decisions impact our healing, our businesses, and our futures, then your silence is not protection—it’s complicity.

We will not be erased. We will not be silenced. We will not let the lights go out.

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