[PRESS RELEASE] – WORCESTER, Mass., Oct. 23, 2026 – This week, Worcester Mayor Joseph Petty successfully filed and passed a resolution during a Worcester City Council Meeting encouraging constituents to vote No on Question 8. Petty joins other elected officials, regional leaders, public health officials, law enforcement, small business owners and advocates fighting to protect the commonwealth’s legal cannabis law.
Massachusetts voters overwhelmingly approved legal adult-use cannabis in 2016, creating a regulated marketplace that has generated nearly $2 billion in state and local revenue, supported thousands of jobs and established strong consumer protections, including product testing, age verification and labeling requirements. The Stop the Repeal Campaign aims to educate voters about the ballot question that would repeal legalization in the commonwealth.
“Repealing recreational cannabis laws in Massachusetts will not only take us backwards – it will negatively impact our communities that are already struggling with budget shortfalls and locally owned small businesses that have invested their life savings into building their legal businesses that create jobs and support local economies,” Campaign Chair Ryan Dominguez said. “We are grateful to have the support of Mayor Joseph Petty and the constituents of Worcester in defeating this damaging ballot question, helping to support local Worcester businesses, jobs, and public health and safety programs.”
Supporters of the campaign say repealing legalization would reverse a decade of progress, undermine public health and safety, and deprive communities of critical revenue used to support schools, housing, transportation, health care and other essential services.
Since legalization, Worcester has benefited from $8.54 million in cannabis excise revenue, with $1.89 million added to the city’s budget last year alone. Across Worcester County, since 2019, municipalities across the county have received $22.59 million in cannabis excise, including $1.6 million for Leicester and $904,000 for Shrewsbury.
“Voting No on Question 8 is about accountability, public safety and protecting our neighborhoods. Over the past decade, Massachusetts made the deliberate decision to replace an unregulated illicit market with a strictly enforced, transparent system that checks IDs twice, tests every product and keeps cannabis out of the hands of young people – contributing to a 57 percent drop in youth use across our commonwealth,” Petty said. “Repealing this framework will not eliminate cannabis; it will simply eliminate our ability to regulate it, handing market control and billions of dollars straight back to unlicensed street dealers.
“Keeping cannabis legal and strictly regulated protects thousands of local jobs, preserves tens of millions of dollars in vital municipal and addiction recovery funding, and ensures our police officers remain focused on violent crime and the fentanyl crisis. We cannot afford to turn back the clock.”
Since 2019, the state’s Social Equity Program has certified more than 1,100 participants. Licensees must maintain public Positive Impact Plans and Diversity Plans to advance equity in their operations and harmed communities.
In addition to the Social Equity Trust Fund, from fiscal years 2021 through 2025, Massachusetts invested approximately $27.9 million in two reentry-related programs for emerging-adult recidivism-reduction programs and for community reentry, transitional housing, workforce development and case management.
“Massachusetts was the first state in the country to actually build equity into cannabis legalization, and that matters,” Major Bloom founder and President Ulysses Youngblood said. “Nearly 1,300 people have come through the Social Equity Program, and the state created the Cannabis Social Equity Trust Fund to help people from communities that were hit hardest by prohibition actually get a real shot at ownership and opportunity
“As an Economic Empowerment operator, I can tell you firsthand that the system is far from perfect. Equity businesses still deal with major barriers, especially access to capital and the cost of operating in this industry. But to me, the answer is not to tear the whole thing down. The answer is to fix what is broken and keep building on what we started.”
Bud’s Goods President and CEO Alex Mazin said, “The approval of tonight's resolution is a major milestone which showcases the importance of the cannabis industry for the city of Worcester. I am very proud of the city council and Mayor Petty for putting this resolution forward. Voting No on Question 8 is crucially important both socially and economically for the commonwealth.”
The Stop the Repeal Campaign will engage voters across the commonwealth through grassroots organizing, public education and coalition-building efforts to ensure Massachusetts continues to move forward rather than returning to failed policies of the past.
