For Legislators
For legislators and legislative staff
Four things
Co-sponsor the bill.
All nine sponsors of the 2025 version were Democrats. A bill that asks the legislature to set cultivation policy directly, rather than leave it to agency rulemaking, needs a messenger from both caucuses.
Ask General Law to raise it as a committee bill.
The 2025 version was filed as a proposed bill. It directed that chapter 420f be amended and set out eight specific changes, but proposed bills do not carry the section-by-section amendatory language a committee votes on. A raised bill arrives with full statutory text, a fiscal note and an OLR analysis. The fourteen-section text is written and posted below.
Tell us what would have to change.
If something in the draft would stop you supporting it, we would rather rewrite it than defend it. Every objection the Department raised in 2025 is answered in the current text, and we did that work ourselves. We will do the same with yours.
Meet with us before session.
Session convenes January 6, 2027. We would rather fix a problem you see in October than argue about it in March.
The 2025 bill
Proposed H.B. No. 5429, January Session 2025, LCO No. 2394 — An Act Concerning Caregivers, Qualifying Patients and the Palliative Use of Cannabis. Twelve numbered lines directing that chapter 420f be amended, with eight enumerated changes. Referred to the Joint Committee on General Law on January 17, 2025; reserved for a subject matter public hearing on February 3; heard February 14. No committee vote was taken.
Introduced by
Rep. Michael “MJ” Shannon, 117th District · Rep. Laurie Sweet, 91st District
Co-sponsors
Rep. Josh Elliott, 88th · Rep. Marcus Brown, 127th · Rep. Geraldo C. Reyes, 75th · Rep. Kadeem Roberts, 137th · Rep. Anne M. Hughes, 135th · Rep. Nicholas Menapace, 37th · Rep. Nick Gauthier, 38th
Questions you might otherwise have to ask
Three questions a member would otherwise have to send to the Office of Legislative Research. They are answered below, with the sources named so any answer can be checked.
Where does the indoor requirement come from?
Not from statute. Neither § 21a-278c nor § 21a-408d(b) contains the word “indoors” or any visibility requirement. The requirement appears in Department guidance, which directs readers to policies and procedures issued under § 21a-421j. That section provides such policies are issued “notwithstanding the requirements of sections 4-168 to 4-172, inclusive,” carry “the force and effect of law,” and take effect fifteen days after posting. Those sections contain the public comment period, the fiscal note, the small business analysis, Attorney General review and this legislature’s Regulation Review Committee.
How do other states structure caregiver cultivation?
States that license caregiver cultivation set the scale in statute. Two are verified below against their own primary sources; other states are being checked and are not listed until they are. In Connecticut a caregiver may already assist a patient with cultivation under § 21a-421j-39(b), but only at that patient’s own residence and, absent an enumerated family relationship, for only one patient.
| State | Patients per caregiver | Cultivation |
|---|---|---|
| Maine | 5 | 6 plants per patient; cap 30 mature / 60 immature; fees $240 per group of up to six mature plants, or up to $1,500 for 500 sq ft of mature canopy (22 M.R.S. § 2425-A(2)(B)). |
| Michigan | 5 | 12 plants per patient in an enclosed, locked facility (MCL 333.26424). |
| Connecticut | 1 | A caregiver may assist a patient with cultivation at that patient’s own residence under departmental policy § 21a-421j-39(b). No license, no separate site, no scale. |
What has happened to enrollment?
Forty of the last forty-two months recorded a decline. Patients fell from 48,896 in January 2023 to 30,505 in July 2026, a drop of 37.6%. Measured from the October 2021 peak of roughly 54,000, the decline is 43.5%. Registered caregivers fell 40.7%.
Over the same period certifying practitioners rose 22.3%, from 1,643 to 2,009. Patients per certifier halved, from 29.8 to 15.2. More clinicians are registered to certify than ever and fewer patients are enrolling, which makes a shortage of certifying clinicians an unlikely primary explanation.
Figures are from Department of Consumer Protection registrant data. The frequently quoted figure of 214 patients lost per month is the trailing twelve-month average; over the full period since January 2023 the rate is 438 a month.
Document library
- Long-form bill — raised bill formatFourteen sections in Legislative Commissioners’ Office format, 360 numbered lines, with the effective-date table.PDF
- Short-form bill — proposed bill formatThe version an individual member files through LCO in a long session.PDF
- Legislator briefThe short version, written for a member or an aide with ten minutes.PDF
- Legislative authority over agency rulemakingWhat § 21a-421j sets aside, and the two rules made under it that this bill addresses.PDF
- Draft license application and patient designation formWhat the Department would have to administer, drafted so a fiscal note has something concrete to price.PDF
- Fiscal model and Maine comparisonFee revenue, the 50/50 split, the § 12-412(120) tax offset and break-even, with Maine figures cited to the OCP 2025 report and 22 M.R.S. § 2425-A.PDF
- Participation and fee projectionEstimated licensee counts and fee revenue, every assumption labeled.PDF
- Privacy and precedent briefRavin v. State and its forty-year history, why every other state court declined to follow it, and why that makes this a legislative question.PDF
- Seeds, clones and seedlingsWhy § 21a-420p(f)(1) bars every licensed medical outlet from selling a patient a plant, and what Section 13 does about it.PDF
- Federal Schedule III updateWhat the April 2026 order covers, what it does not, and how the bill is drafted to work either way.PDF
Contact
Write to info@ctcannabisreform.org, or use the form below.