Natasha Vaughn-Holdridge is reporting for Columbia-Greene Media Copake town officials have voted to allow retail cannabis dispensaries and are considering opting out of on-site consumption locations. The town board held a public forum prior to its regular monthly meeting November 11, and residents offered their opinions on the potential benefits of retail marijuana sales. “I had the sense here that clearly everybody who came to this meeting or sent us something was in favor of us proceeding,” Town Supervisor Jeanne Mettler said. “I do think when people are talking about allowing the sale of cannabis, what I believe they’re saying is that they want to allow dispensaries.” New York cannabis law allows for any village, town or city to create a local law opting out from allowing retail cannabis dispensaries and or on-site consumption sites within its jurisdiction. Any municipality that creates a local law opting out has the ability to opt back in at any time. Numerous Copake residents spoke in favor of allowing retail sales at the meeting. When it was time for the vote, the board broke the opt-out-in decision into two parts, first votng on opting out of dispensaries and then making the decision on opting out of consumption sites. The motion on the dispensaries question passed with three votes in favor, one against and one abstention. The motion on consumption sites will be decided in December. State law allows municipalities to opt-out of allowing adult-use cannabis retail dispensaries or on-site consumption licenses from locating with their boundaries, but they cannot opt-out of adult-use legalization. Read the full story at HudsonValley360 [dot] com.