COMMITTEE ON COMMERCE AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPTMENT, May 21, 2026

COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF PHILADELPHIA COMMITTEE ON COMMERCE AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT Room 400, City Hall Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Thursday, May 21, 2026 12:19 p.m. PRESENT: COUNCILMAN MARK SQUILLA, CHAIR COUNCILMAN CURTIS JONES, JR., VICE-CHAIR COUNCILMAN MICHAEL DRISCOLL COUNCILWOMAN JAMIE GAUTHIER

260162, 260163, 260167, 260465 - - -

Good afternoon, everyone. Today we'll have the Committee on Commerce and Economic Development, Thursday, May 21st. Welcome to the hearing for the Committee on Commerce and Economic Development. I note that the hour has come and a quorum is present. To my left, Councilmember Driscoll, Councilmember Gilmore Richardson. To my right, Councilmember Gauthier and Councilmember Jones. This is a public hearing for the Committee on Commerce and Economic Development regarding Bill 18 Nos. 260162, 260163 and 260465. Bill No. 260167 is being held at the request of the sponsor and will not be heard at the hearing today. Mr. McMonagle, will you please read the titles of the bills.

Bill No. 2 260162, amending Chapter 9-600 of The Philadelphia Code (“Service And Other Businesses”) by adding a new Section 9-631.1 to establish requirements for commercial landlords to take certain remedial action against commercial tenants who engage in tobacco retailing without a required tobacco retailer permit and establishing penalties, all under certain terms and conditions. And Bill No. 260163, amending Title 9 of The Philadelphia Code, entitled "Regulation of Business, Trades and Professions," to establish restrictions and regulations related to the sale of certain intoxicating substances and to provide for associated penalties and enforcement, all under certain terms and conditions. And Bill No. 260465, amending Chapter 10-100 ("Animals") of The Philadelphia Code to restrict the operation of carriage horse businesses and to provide for penalties for violations, all under certain terms and conditions.

Thank you, Mr. McMonagle. Can you please call the first panel that we have to testify on Bill No. 260465.

Yes. Can we please have Sarah Barnett from ACCT and Shannon Dickerson. (Witnesses approached witness table.)

Sarah, you can state your name for the record and then proceed with your testimony.

Okay. Good morning, Chairperson, members of the committee. My name is Sarah Barnett. I'm the Executive Director of ACCT Philly. We're the animal care and control provider for Philadelphia. And I'm here today and appreciate the opportunity to testify in support of the legislation that's prohibiting horse-drawn carriage operations in Philadelphia. This bill presents a rare opportunity for the City of Philadelphia to take a proactive approach to both public safety and animal welfare. At this time, there are currently no carriages that are horse-drawn that are operating in the City of Philadelphia commercially. And because of the passage of this legislation, would not eliminate any jobs or displace any workers, which is very important. Opportunities like this are uncommon in government and public safety work. Too often we're forced to react after preventable incidents occur. And today City Council has the opportunity to prevent those incidents before they actually happen. Horse-drawn carriages can potentially be operated safely in some environments, but Philadelphia is not one of them. Introducing 1,200-pound animals into dense city traffic conditions creates significant and unnecessary risks for both the public and the horses themselves. I would respectfully encourage Council to also consider strengthening the legislation so that it prohibits animal-drawn carriages regardless of whether they are operated for rent or hire. While well-intentioned, exempting free carriage rides still creates the same public safety concerns. Just this past Sunday, free horse carriage rides were being offered on Broad Street. Of course, children and families are going to jump at that opportunity. I would have as well when I was a child. And these families are going to be drawn to something like that. But even the most experienced horse handler cannot eliminate the unpredictable nature of Philadelphia traffic. Their prey animals. They can spook suddenly and without warning, particularly in loud, crowded urban environments. And every horse and carriage is only one noisy four- wheeler away from getting spooked and causing an accident. We've repeatedly seen examples of these dangers associated with horse-drawn carriages in city settings. Last week in Kentucky, a woman riding in a carriage was killed after a pickup truck struck the carriage from behind. Earlier this week in Central Park, New York City, a carriage overturned after the horse became spooked, injuring the driver. Both the driver and the horse were experienced. Just because your dog knows how to sit at home doesn't mean they're always going to listen to you. Experience and training alone does not remove the inherent unpredictability of placing horses in these busy traffic environments. In January, a carriage horse in New York City became loose, struck multiple vehicles, tore the bumper off a taxi cab, damaged a Parks Department vehicle and collided with several unattended cars before being stopped. These incidents are not isolated. They are reminders that even under heavily regulated circumstances, accidents happen very quickly and become catastrophic. And at the same time, Philadelphia is already struggling with traffic safety. Last week, the Inquirer reported that fatal crashes involving cyclists and pedestrians are increasing across the city and rates exceed those in cities like Chicago and New York. OTIS and the Streets Department are already working very hard in making significant progress to address the ongoing challenges of balancing the safety of drivers, bicyclists, pedestrians and public transit. Adding horse-drawn carriages into that mix only introduces an avoidable risk that will create additional safety concerns that will then require more city resources to address. As someone who grew up riding horses, I do want to be very clear that I am not anti-horse.

Horses are incredible animals, but they are large, powerful animals whose instinct cannot always be controlled, particularly in chaotic city environments filled with traffic noises and construction. Add in their ATVs and crowds as well. One unexpected sound or sudden movement can turn a calm situation into a dangerous one within seconds. From ACCT Philly's perspective, as we would be the enforcement agency for this legislation, this legislation also matters because of how our resources are allocated. In just the last week alone, our officers have responded to four separate calls involving dogs behaving aggressively and injuring people, including one incident that involved two children. That call alone took our officers off duty from the other calls that they were responding to for about four hours. These are the type of urgent public safety and animal welfare calls our officers should be focused on responding to. When horse-drawn carriages previously operated in Philadelphia, ACCT Philly regularly received calls regarding horses working in extreme heat or concerning the welfare of the animals. Responding to those calls diverted already very limited animal control officers' resources away from other critical emergencies involving dangerous dogs, injured animals, cruelty investigations and public safety concerns. We would obviously go to those calls immediately. But if you're at one end of the city when you get the call because you're looking at a carriage horse who might be hot, it's going to take you longer to respond. As an organization focused on both Animal Welfare and Public Safety Act, Philly supports the legislation because it prevents avoidable risks and prevents the creation of additional public safety and animal welfare problems that currently don't exist in Philadelphia today. This is an opportunity for Philadelphia to act proactively instead of reactively, and it's an opportunity to protect residents, visitors, animals and the city resources before a preventable tragedy occurs. I appreciate your time and consideration. I'm happy to answer any questions.

Thank you so much for your testimony and thank you for all the help and guidance that you have given us along the way, and we appreciate all your efforts and responsiveness to our concerns for enforcement when needed. So much appreciated. State your name for the record and proceed.

Hello. My name is Shannon Dickerson and I'm the Director of Operations at Humane Action Pennsylvania. We are a statewide animal welfare nonprofit. I thank you for the opportunity to give comment today. I am here in support of course of the proposed ban on horse-drawn carriages in Philadelphia. No 18 matter how well-intentioned individual operators may be forcing horses to navigate congested city streets filled with traffic, construction noise, extreme weather and unpredictable conditions is inherently unsafe and outdated. These animals are not attractions or transportation tools. They are living beings with complex physical and emotional needs that cannot truly be met in an urban environment like Center City, Philadelphia. We've seen incidents across the country, many just mentioned here, involving horses collapsing, becoming injured or becoming frightened and trafficked, placing both animals and the public at risk. Cities evolve and policy should evolve with them. Many major cities have already moved away from horse-drawn carriage operations in recognition of these concerns. This preventative legislation is critical to both animal welfare and public safety. We should not wait for a serious tragedy or catastrophic incident to occur before taking action. Philadelphia has an opportunity to lead with compassion and to modernize in a way that reflects the values of a progressive, humane city. I urge Council to support this legislation and prioritize public safety, animal welfare and a more humane future for Philadelphia. Thank you so much for your time.

Thank you so much for your testimony and support. Are there any questions? Councilmember Jones.

So as someone who rides horses, I want to make certain distinctions. I'm so glad in retrospect that when we moved elephants out of the zoo, right then I did not understand how important that was. But today I've evolved in my thinking and do understand how good it is. We filled the zoo with other attractions. I want to know and make clear we're not coming against people who have individual horses that want to ride in our streets as the next step of this, right?

Is that for me?

Let me rephrase. I understand the carriage. I understand the congestion in Center City, but there are hundreds of people who own horses that actually ride through our streets on a daily basis near Cobbs Creek in Fairmount Park and in the city. Right next door there is an ordinance that way back in the day mandated that we keep the rights of equestrians safe in Philadelphia too. And I don't want this to be misconstrued as what is right for carriages and horse-drawn carriages in Center City to mean that applies to people who own and take care of their horses.

I can speak for Philly and I can say there's a very big difference to me and to us at ACCT Philly between the two things. So for us, it's about you've got horse carriages and the -- riding the horse, you have a little bit of a different level of control than you do if they're pulling a vehicle behind them that can spook them of everything. So we're not. You can ride a horse in the city and it can be safe in Philadelphia. And we do believe that that is possible. It's possible to treat a horse humanely in Philadelphia. We don't believe that it's possible to really operate a horse and carriage safely in Philadelphia. That's where we come from on that.

And this legislation only deals with horse carriage licenses.

Correct.

So it's not a horse rider.

Yeah. So I'm just making sure on the record that, you know, sometimes we mission creep. And I want to make sure that the intention is for the carriages as opposed to equestrians.

Thank you very much, Councilmember Jones. I have a question also. You mentioned that horses also take in other animals, the term horse you mentioned in your testimony?

Yeah. So I mean, if you look at the Philadelphia Animal Code, they define horse to include things like donkey, pony. If you ask the average person when they're looking at an animal, is that a pony or a horse, they're going to say it's a horse, but it could technically be a pony. So the code does specify that the term horse is defined as including other terms.

Other animals that would carry a carriage?

Yeah.

All right. Thank you for that. I wanted to make sure we got that on the record. Are there any other questions? (No response.)

Seeing none, thank you so much for your testimony. Is there anyone else here to testify on Bill No. 260465? (No response.)

Seeing none, thank you so much. Mr. McMonagle, next panel to testify on Bill No. 260 --

Bill No. 10 260162 and --

168 --

163.

-- and 163.

Can we please have the first panel for Bill Nos. 260162 and 260163, Dawn Kiesewetter, Keisewiter -- I always mess up, Benjamin Hartung. (Witnesses approached witness table.)

Thank you so much. Before we start and ask for testimony, I'd like to recognize Councilmember Gilmore Richardson.

Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. And thank you to our Vice-Chair Councilmember Jones and to all of my colleagues on the Commerce and Economic Development Committee. Today we will hear testimony on bills that I introduced, Nos. 260162 and 260163, both aimed at building on the body of work to clamp down on nuisance businesses, particularly the illegal smoke shops that are plaguing the City of Philadelphia and our communities. As I have stated repeatedly, these businesses fuel crime. They operate without community zoning approval, expose our young people to dangerous products and diminish the quality of life in our neighborhoods. And just this morning when I was leaving my home and I was going to get into the car -- I'm touching this with a napkin -- this was outside of my house in the grass, and this is on a constant everyday basis. Today is Thursday, so trash day was Monday. But this is what blows around in our community and what even my children are exposed to on an everyday basis. This was outside of my home in the grass. And so, this legislation marks the fifth and sixth bills I have introduced addressing nuisance businesses in our city and in addition to several resolutions calling for hearings on this issue and countless other legislative efforts that have been led by my colleagues in this body, including Councilmember Anthony Phillips and Councilmember Cindy Bass. I share this to paint a picture of just how widespread, persistent and destructive this problem has become, that despite our best efforts to rein those businesses in, many continue to exploit loopholes, disregard community concerns and operate in ways that put our neighborhoods and the well-being of our communities at stake. They are putting profits over our safety. Today I hope to take two significant steps forward in this fight. Bill No. 260162, the Illegal Smoke Shop Accountability bill would add a new section to The Philadelphia Code, authorizing enforcement action against commercial landlords who knowingly allow illegal smoke shops to operate in their properties. This legislation is modeled after similar enforcement mechanisms used in New York City, and was brought to our attention during a hearing on previous nuisance business legislation from the fall. So thank you to everyone who is here today and all of you who have joined us in the past, know that your advocacy and your attention to these issues have been making a difference. And today's hearing I'm sure is certainly evidence of just that. The second bill we will discuss today is Bill No. 260163 or the Intoxicating Substances bill, and that would address the sale of unsafe and unregulated products such as delta-8 and kratom by updating The Philadelphia Code. It would define intoxicating substances, hemp-derived products and kratom. It would align the city's current rules on intoxicating substances with FDA guidelines, so only products approved by the FDA can be sold in the City of Philadelphia. We would create an intoxicating substance retailer permit limiting where the FDA-approved products can be sold, and allowing for City of Philadelphia oversight and establish a minimum sales age of 21, with the prevalence of these substances exploding across our communities and instances of children being poisoned by these products skyrocketing. These guardrails will be critical to ensuring the health and safety of all Philadelphians, which is our primary responsibility as legislators. And while I recognize and I certainly appreciate those who are here today who are sharing their lived experience with these substances, the reality is that without meaningful oversight and regulation, these products can and do continue to pose a risk to our residents. And just imagine children playing outside and picking up these products off the ground. This was outside of my house, and I'm holding it with a napkin because I don't know what else was on it or inside of it.

Let me be perfectly clear, we are not here today to make determinations on the efficacy of these products. We are here today to ensure that we are doing everything, and I mean everything, within our power to protect public health and safety, because we cannot adequately safeguard residents from products that are being sold with very little oversight, inconsistent standards, and limited accountability. This legislation will provide the city with stronger tools to protect consumers, address dangerous practices and better ensure that these products do not continue to cause harm across our communities. And although we have not yet seen comprehensive regulation at the state or federal level, we know that jurisdictions across this country have already taken action to restrict or ban the sale of these substances. We know that our young people are accessing these products. We know that some products may be poorly manufactured or contaminated with harmful toxins. And we know that reputable health organizations such as the Mayo Clinic and the FDA have raised serious concerns about their potential risk. We cannot afford to wait for action from the state or federal government while these risks continue to impact our communities. We are seeing the consequences in realtime and that is why we are here today, to make meaningful and to take meaningful action to protect the health and safety of our residents. And with that, I want to thank everyone for being here today and for participating in this important conversation. I am looking forward to today's hearing and the work we will continue to do together. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. )

Thank you. Thank you, Madam Leader. We'll begin with the testimony now on Bill No. 260163. If you'd like to state your name for the record and proceed with your testimony.

Is it 162 or 163?

Both. If you're giving testimony, you can give it on both.

Right, for the first, 162?

162, yes.

Good afternoon, Chair Squilla, Vice- Chair Jones and members of the Commerce and Economic Development Committee. My name is Dawn Kiesewetter and I am Deputy Commissioner for the Philadelphia Department of Public Health. And joining me is Ben Hartung. He is our Public Policy Administrator for the Health Department. On behalf of Commissioner Raval-Nelson and the Health Department, thank you for the opportunity to testify for this bill introduced by Councilmember Gilmore Richardson. Bill No. 260162 amends Section 9-631 of The Philadelphia Code, which requires retailers to have a Philadelphia tobacco retailer permit to sell tobacco products. The bill adds a violation for commercial landlords who knowingly lease commercial premises to a retailer that engages in unpermitted tobacco retailing. The bill provides that when the Health Department issues a retailer a violation for the unpermitted tobacco retailing, the commercial landlord would also receive written notice from the city about their lessee's violations. After receiving this notice, the commercial landlord can then receive a fine if their lessee receives additional violations for selling tobacco products without a permit. The bill provides an affirmative defense for commercial landlords that commence a proceeding to evict the violating retailer or take other lawful action that has the effect of ceasing unpermitted tobacco retailing. The Health Department supports this bill as it would provide an additional tool to address unpermitted tobacco sales. Thank you for the opportunity to testify today and we're happy to respond to any questions.

If you can before we ask questions, we're going to do both bills together. So if you want to testify on 163 too.

Absolutely.

And then we'll ask questions. Thank you.

Okay. So good afternoon, everyone. We are still the same. So Bill No. 4 260163 prohibits the sale of certain hemp products, including certain hemp-derived cannabinoid products and certain kratom products. It sets the legal age for purchase at years of age for 10 hemp and kratom products. It also 11 creates an intoxicating substance 12 retailer permit, which would be 13 required to sell any hemp product 14 or kratom product. 15 The Health Department 16 would promulgate regulations to 17 create this permit. Both marijuana 18 and hemp are varieties of the 19 cannabis plant. Hemp was 20 historically considered marijuana 21 by the federal government and its production was prohibited. In 2018, Congress passed a farm bill 24 that amended the Controlled Substances Act to differentiate between marijuana and hemp based on their concentration of the psychoactive compound Delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol THC. This amendment led to an interpretation of the new definition that hemp containing less than 0.3% THC but also containing other psychoactive compounds was permitted to be sold. This has been called the Farm Bill 13 loophole and has led to a proliferation of unregulated hemp- derived cannabinoid products that include psychoactive cannabinoids other than THC, for example, Delta-8 or THCa. Congress recently passed a bill that closes the Farm Bill 21 loophole, which goes into effect on November 12, 2026. In addition, because THC and CBD are active ingredients in FDA-approved drugs, they are excluded from the FDA's dietary supplement definition. THC and CBD cannot be sold as supplements or added to food products. The Health Department does not currently regulate supplements, but does require retailers to remove from sale any food products that contain THC or CBD. Kratom refers to a tree native to Southeast Asia and to products derived from its leaves that are marketed as herbal supplements such as mitragynine and 7-hydroxymitragynine, 7-OH. Consumption of kratom products can produce both stimulant and sedative effects and can lead to psychotic symptoms as well as psychological and physiological dependence. However, people who use kratom report doing so to self- medicate for pain, anxiety, depression, substance use disorders and substance withdrawal. Kratom products are banned or restricted in other states and countries, but are currently legal and accessible online and in stores in many areas of the United States. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration has listed kratom as a drug of concern. The kratom and kratom compounds are not listed on the U.S. schedule of controlled substances. The US Food and Drug Administration considers kratom an unapproved new dietary ingredient and unsafe food additive. It has not been approved for any use. Any supplements that are or contain kratom are considered adulterated by the FDA. Similarly to THC or CBD products, the Health Department does not currently regulate kratom products but does require retailers to remove from sale any food products that contain kratom. The Health Department shares the concerns about the availability of hemp and kratom products and their potential for abuse. Due to the regulatory complexity, we look forward to continuing to work on proposed amendments within City Council. Thanks for the opportunity. We're happy to answer any questions.

Are there any questions from the committee? Councilmember Gilmore Richardson.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thank you for your testimony, and thank you to the Health Department for working with my team on this legislation. For the record, does the Philadelphia Department of Public Health have all the resources necessary to effectively implement this legislation, both bills?

Not currently.

Thank you. Thank you very much. And are there additional tools that you all need in order to continue addressing unpermitted tobacco sales?

Yes.

Okay. And you all are willing to continue to work with us as we go through the budget process relative to the needs of the Health Department around effectively enforcing not only this legislation, but others?

Yes, we are.

Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you, Madam Leader. Councilmember Gauthier.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I wanted to -- I have a comment, not so much a question, but I wanted to thank the Majority Leader for putting these bills on the table and for your sustained efforts on this topic. I also want to thank the Health Department. Thank you, Dawn. Thank you, Ben. We've been working together most recently. We were successful with a nuisance business on Baltimore Avenue. And I appreciate the efforts of the city, but also sometimes this feels like such a losing battle. And so, I'm so glad that you're putting other tools on the table. I recently had a situation that's sort of similar to what you're trying to address in your bill come up. My staff and I were working in a very focused and deliberate way with a residential block off of 52nd Street that was essentially held hostage by illicit drug operations and activities that were happening in several properties, including a corner store that was right next to the block. And so, we were strategically going after every property that was adding to this problem, including the smoke shop. And the neighbors were telling me, I see people going in this store and drug transactions. And I called the landlord to ask for his help to get this business out. And he said to me, well, they're paying their rent. That's all I care about. And was very indignant, very indignant. And eventually the city did come out and cite them for I guess a list of violations they had. And it was only then that I got a call back from him like, oh, Councilwoman, can you help me to communicate with the city, can you tell them all the things that they're working on, but was because the city -- he felt boxed in, right. It wasn't from the perspective of just wanting to do something good for the community. And so, I think we have to have more legislative tools to make landlords responsible to our communities. And so, I'm in support of both of these bills. And I thank you because this will help quality of life all across the city.

Chair now recognizes Councilmember Jones.

I too want to add to the chorus to thank the author of these bills, because on a day-to-day basis on a commercial corridor people are impacted by this. The author knows clearly about one commercial corridor, 54th Street where she lives quite near. And the level of interaction between elements that aren't legal, working with businesses that often accept this. And I think this is a step in the right direction in dealing with this. And I say this because there's a it's-not-my-problem attitude. And now, this legislation makes it your problem. What I would have a question about is, is there an evolving list of products that are allowed or are not allowed or banned in commercial retail establishments?

In terms of?

So I know you have a federal list of banned products, I would imagine. Liquor and tobacco is regulated amongst that. With the evolution of these types of products, how do we know what's in them? You know, when they put soda pop out on the -- we don't know how -- based on the ingredients, how can we safeguard by the time we figure it out, you know, people are impacted.

That's a really good question. Unless there's laboratory testing of these products, who knows what's in them, right. And there is a list that the FDA provides, a book of these products that lists, it's like 2000 pages long. There's a lot of substances.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you. The Chair recognizes Councilmember Gilmore Richardson.

Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Briefly, I wanted to thank both Councilmember Gauthier and also Councilmember Jones for your continued work in your districts on this issue. Councilmember Gauthier, to your point, we have received reports of a number of landlords who will accept payment for years in advance in cash from these retailers, which is why they do not feel the need to address the overarching issues that we know to be true in these locations. And in addition to that, to Councilmember Jones' point, I wanted to thank you, Councilmember Jones, for walking with us in 2021 when we first started to learn about this challenge in the City of Philadelphia right after the onset of the pandemic. And to your point, we typically don't hear about this until it's a challenge. And so, I asked my team to share with the members of the committee the link to the news article that referenced the individual who broke into a store that sells kratom because apparently he was addicted to some level of the products or the products they sold at the store, so that you all could see that this is becoming a larger issue. We've received reports in my office of young people who have gotten addicted to a number of these products and, in fact, had to refer one family to one of the facilities in the 4th over at Belmont. And so, this is becoming a real challenge for us here in the city. And we just want to seek a process to be in place to help us regulate what's going on. So thank you very much.

Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you for your testimony. Is there any additional questions to this committee? (No response.)

Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. Mr. McMonagle, can you please read the names of the next panel to testify.

Can we please have, I apologize in advance, Bella Kalayilparampil and Kevin Osterhoudt. (Witnesses approached witness table.)

I'll let you two say your names and testify. But thank you for being here. And again, just state your name for the record and then proceed with your testimony on either Bill No. 260162 or 260163.

Awesome. Thank you so much and good afternoon. My name is Dr. Bella Kalayilparmpil. Only 15 letters, not that bad. Thank you all for being here and for just really giving us this opportunity. So I am Board-certified in internal medicine and addiction medicine. I serve as a physician lead for one of Penn Medicine's addiction medicine clinics. I also work as a consultant on the Addiction Medicine Consult Service for the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. I'm providing this testimony today in my individual capacity. So over the course of my career, I've treated many patients with substance use disorders, including opioid, alcohol and tobacco use disorders as well as addictions involving newer or less familiar substances. There are a ton of new designer substances out there. Wouldn't be able to name them all, but designer benzodiazepines, gabapentin. Different types of opioids to more recently less familiar substances like kratom I have been treating as well. I have even been treating patients with kratom- associated substance use disorder. These patients are often highly motivated and hard-working individuals facing significant financial, social and health- related stressors. Over the past two years, I've cared for more than a dozen patients with kratom- associated substance use disorder. One of my first patients initially began using kratom to improve focus, increase energy and help him relax. He worked in a high-pressure job and was preparing for the birth of his first child. After researching kratom online, he began using powdered kratom leaf, typically which he brewed into a tea. Initially, he felt that kratom improved his focus and energy at work while helping calm his nerves at home. Because he viewed it as a natural product, he did not consider it dangerous. Over time however, his use escalated. He transitioned to more concentrated capsule products and began taking them multiple times per day. He also noticed at this time that kratom relieved chronic pain from an old shoulder injury. As his use increased, he developed tolerance and began experiencing withdrawal symptoms between doses, including restless legs, sweating, goosebumps, nausea. He spent increasingly amounts of money on kratom and his wife noticed changes in his behavior. Ultimately, a family member who is a physician encouraged him to seek treatment for kratom dependence. By the time he came to our clinic, he felt overwhelmed, anxious and defeated. This all stemmed from a substance readily available at gas stations, convenience stores and online retailers. As you guys have heard earlier, kratom is derived from the leaves of the Mitragyna speciosa tree native to Southeast Asia. Traditionally, laborers use kratom in small amounts for energy and in larger amounts for pain relief after physically demanding work. One of kratom's unique characteristics is that it can act as a stimulant at lower doses and produce opioid-like effects at higher doses. Kratom became increasingly popular in the United States in the late 2000, as it appeared in smoke shops, gas stations and online marketplaces, especially during the opioid epidemic. Some individuals begin using kratom to manage opioid withdrawal symptoms, often believing it was a natural and non-addictive alternative. However, today's commercial kratom market, particularly the highly concentrated extracts that are now widely available, is far removed from the traditional leaf product. Kratom contains more than 40 alkaloids, including mitragynine and 7-hydroxymitragynine, which is commonly known as 7-OH. Both of which activate the mu-opioid receptor, the same receptor targeted by morphine, oxycodone, fentanyl, methadone, buprenorphine, to name a few. In concentrated forms, such as products marketed as 7-OH or Percs, the substance functions essentially as an opioid. These products are often sold to consumers who may not realize they are using a potent opioid-like substance.

As we know, regular opioid exposure can lead to tolerance, physical dependence and addiction. The CDC had a recent report that reported roughly 1,200% increase in poison center calls related to kratom between 2015 and 2025, with the sharpest rise occurring between 2024 and 2025, which was likely driven by the growing availability of concentrated 708 products. The report also noted concerns regarding highly unregulated kratom markets, including having contamination with heavy metals, toxins, bacteria and even fungal contaminants. The medical literature has documented several cases of liver, kidney, cardiac, and neurologic toxicity associated with kratom use. There have also been reports of opioid overdose from kratom products that responds to naloxone or Narcan. At present, we lack sufficient human safety data to establish standardized dosing or determine safe consumption levels. Kratom has not been approved by the FDA for medical use. The FDA has issued warnings regarding its use. In my own practice, I have treated patients using highly potent kratom products who experience significant withdrawal symptoms when attempting to stop or reduce their use. Many of these patients are now being treated with buprenorphine or Suboxone, a standard medication for opioid use disorder. Patients frequently report reduced cravings, improvement in withdrawal symptoms and a meaningful improvement in their quality of life after beginning treatment. I'm here today really to highlight the potential public health risk posed by unregulated kratom products based on my clinical experience treating patients with kratom dependence. While some traditional forms of kratom may have perceived benefits related to pain relief, relaxation, focus, energy harm reduction, especially in the setting of the opioid epidemic, many of the highly concentrated and unregulated products currently on the market carry substantial risks for dependence, addiction and toxicity. Thank you guys so much.

Thank you. We'll let you both testify and then ask questions. If you want to state your name for the record and proceed with your testimony.

Yes. Good afternoon. My name is Dr. Kevin Osterhoudt. I am a pediatrician and medical toxicologist at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia here in the city. Intoxicating drugs, murkily lurking behind the cover of confusing legal and regulatory status, are being sold at shops and gas stations at seemingly every corner of Philadelphia. And indeed, I don't need to walk too far from my CHOP office to pass signs and windows advertising these drugs for sale. As a pediatric ER doctor at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and as the Director of our Poison Control Center, I'm really grateful that you've given me this opportunity to speak of the danger that these chemicals pose to our children. I'd like to start with a story. A really nice young Philadelphia girl came home from a great day at school. She stopped in a little market. She picked up a krispie treat. She ate it. She went home and she was sitting with her family at the dining table when she suddenly slumped over unresponsive. You can imagine how traumatic that was for her family. They called 911 that rushed her to the hospital. As she came into the hospital ER, the doctors and nurses had to think about all types of illnesses that could be happening. Was this a stroke, was this meningitis, was this bleeding into the brain. They did blood tests and CT scans. She ended up being hooked up to a machine to support her breathing and was admitted to the intensive care unit. Later the reason for her severe sickness was discovered. The treat that she ate poisoned her with an intoxicating chemical often called delta-8. This drug was sold out in the open next to cookies and candies and very little on the package identified it as a drug. I can tell story after story like that, as scenes like this are playing out all over the city. And I know you've seen the signs to Legal weed sold here, delta-8 sold here, Kratom sold here. And you now know what these are, but I'll just reiterate for somebody who's still not familiar. When people use marijuana to get high, historically the intoxicating chemical they take in is Delta 9 THC. We don't usually say the Delta 9 part. We just say THC. And the plant that THC comes from, cannabis sativa is classified as marijuana. If it's got a lot of THC and hemp, if it has very little THC and it can't really be smoked to get high. But both marijuana and hemp have dozens of other chemicals in them, which can get people high if you concentrate them in the right way. And these chemicals are what I and what the Council are calling intoxicating cannabinoids. So these intoxicating cannabinoids can be derived from hemp. They go by names like delta-8 or delta-10 or HHC and many others. And it turns out extracting these chemicals from hemp isn't so easy. So often, although we talk about these as being derived from hemp, many times they're actually synthetic chemicals made in a laboratory or made from another product of hemp. And a very purposeful drug industry is making them and peddling them, and children and teenagers are getting injured by them. Kratom is another plant product that contains intoxicating chemicals which can be concentrated, purified or altered through chemistry. The chemicals in kratom, as you've heard, have opioid-like effects. And Philadelphia certainly is no 5 stranger to the ravages of opioids, and it can cause heavy users to have withdrawal symptoms when they try to stop. The Pennsylvania Department of Health, in conjunction with Pennsylvania's poison centers, released a health advisory warning of these products in October of 2025. So the production, distribution, sale and use of intoxicating cannabinoids and kratom is an unregulated wild frontier. Currently, they can be found for sale in small grocery stores, smoke shops, gas stations, fishing bait shore stores and the King of Prussia Mall. I know it's not in Philadelphia, but everybody knows what it is. And it's a good example -- and may I approach the Council for a second with my prop?

I went to the King of Prussia Mall and I went in and I bought this krispie treat. And that krispie treat was made to look like a popular children's cereal. And it alleges to have 500mg, which you probably don't know dosing. That's a whopping dose of delta-8 THC. And I bought it inside the mall. And when people buy these products, they have no way of knowing what's really in them or if the dose is right or if the dose is true or if there are other harmful contaminants. They may not be packaged safely and they're just too accessible to curious young children and experimenting teenagers. Some people describe these incidents of young children eating these cannabinoids as accidents, but they are no 2 accident. They're entirely predictable and they're entirely preventable. So just to share a couple of other statistics with you, in 2023, 11% of high school seniors reported using delta-8 THC. 30% of all the cases of intoxicating cannabinoids that are reported to Pennsylvania poison centers involve children under the age of 5. And in the first ten months of 2025, Pennsylvania's poison centers took reports on 90 cases involving kratom among people aged from 12 months of age, 1 year, to 80 years of age, and several of these poisoned patients were placed on ventilators in ICUs. So I make no judgment on whether the sale or use of intoxicating drugs should be legal or illegal. But I am here to say that we do know enough, both from epidemiological research but also just from basic sensibility, to take steps to protect our children. And Bill No. 260163, introduced by Councilmember Gilmore Richardson, offers many safeguards to protect children, that I am happy about. My written comments list several other child poisoning prevention recommendations that I would like to offer for your examination. And the Poison Control Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia is dedicated to community benefit in Philadelphia through clinical support, education, research and advocacy. We're eager to support the Philadelphia City Council now and in the future. And once again, I'm grateful for your attention and consideration. Thank you.

Thank you so much for your testimony. And you mentioned different levels of kratom. Since they're not regulated, there's really no way to know whether it's a leaf product or a synthetic product. And so, how could any I guess product that's using kratom be distributed without us knowing what the levels are? Because I was reading even the package you gave us to see, it says use one serving or start with one serving, but you don't really know what that means. So by regulating these products or by not allowing them to be used, then guarantees us the ability to at least stop the use of them until they're regulated or until the government comes up with something. So is there any governmental rules that you know of that actually allows the use of any of these kratom products?

There is the Kratom Consumer Protection Act. And so, this is sort of like an approach at regulating the kratom market to help protect consumers of kratom products. And so, the premise of this is to create certifications on kratom, kind of like the cannabis industry to certify that it is safe, that it has been tested, that there are no contaminants and toxins in it. And then businesses can sell it as a certified kratom product. However, this is a costly certification and a lot of gas stations and smoke shops and small industries do not do that. But there is perhaps something like that out there, but it hasn't been adopted by many. So that's to kind of answer your question.

And it would probably be difficult for our Health Department or anybody else to be able to know the difference between those products?

Oh, absolutely not. It doesn't show up in a standard urine drug screen. You have to do specialized testing, so gas chromatography, liquid chromatography, things like that to identify it. And so, we don't readily have those machines to test what's in this person's system really. Big toxicology and poison centers can have that, but that's Penn. So if you go outside of Penn, what resources do you have.

All right. Thank you very much. Do you have any questions? Councilmember Gilmore Richardson.

Yes, very quickly. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman. And thank you for notating that for the record. And you were stating that only specialized testing will be able to be utilized. Where do we have it here in Philadelphia?

There are different organizations. Kensington in particular, they have PA Groundhogs and they regularly test substances and they for sure have this particular machine that analyzes for. It's usually for mitragynine and 7-hydroxymitragynine. But we do not have, like at our clinic let's say that I do addiction work at, any accessible urine testing or blood testing to identify if kratom is present.

A point of information. How about the product itself, if I were to take those rice krispie treats or what it says on that package, can you test that package of what actually is in there?

Yes.

A hospital can't -- like the average person could not walk anywhere and say, would you test this for me and tell me what's in here. We can take it, we can either -- if we can refer it to some kind of a law enforcement thing, we could get the state police lab to test it. There are great organizations like PA Groundhogs that are doing street testing and can test it or if somebody can pay for it, we can send it to a national reference laboratory where they can do the testing. But there's no emergency department or clinic really, pretty much in Pennsylvania, maybe a couple, where any patient that were ever using one of these could just go in and be tested and they could find this. It's not like the way that you can find heroin or you can find THC or something.

Thank you. Chair recognizes Councilmember Gauthier.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I think to some degree we also test substances at the forensics lab. But obviously, they have a lot of work to do and then they need a new space which they're working on. But I think to some degree that's a part of what happens there, unless I'm mistaken?

Point of information. To your point, that's in the commission of a crime. This is in the commission of commerce. And so, that's a big distinction.

Okay.

Thank you. Are there any other questions for this committee? (No response.)

Seeing none, thank you so much for your testimony. If you can hang a little bit to hear some other testimony to see if we have any additional questions. If not, we understand you have to go. We appreciate your time.

Okay. Thank you. Have a nice holiday weekend.

Thank you.

Mr. McMonagle, can you please read the names of the panel to testify on Bill No. 260162 or 260163.

Can we please have Elaine Petrossian, Crystal Morris and Kate Allen come forward. I think we only have three chairs, right. (Witnesses approached witness table.)

Just state your name for the record and then proceed with your testimony.

My name is Elaine Petrossian and I am here to testify in support of the landlord accountability -- illegal smoke shop accountability bill. And to recap, what brings me here today, I'm here in my individual capacity. But by way of background, I live in the North Broad Street corridor in the Spring Garden community. I am a committee person, a block captain, a member on behalf of my civic association, our 9th District PDAC, and I am also the Ward leader of the 8th Ward. And again, here in my individual capacity as a neighbor. Before I even start, I just want to say I think I understand what we just heard here from the medical panel, that people could take kratom, for example, and be in a job like a machine operator or a pilot or a driver and there would be no drug test commonly available to test them for safety on the job. I'm not testifying on that, but that's what I heard. And so, I'll put that on the record. Okay. I want to share a few things. On the illegal smoke shop accountability bill, I want to address each kind of main term from a neighborhood perspective. The first is when we talk about the smoke shops, I think we've talked at length about what we find in these smoke shops, the products that are in them. So I'll leave that to speak for itself. What I would say is with respect to landlords, let's address that in local communities. We know most of our communities know our commercial landlords. And the ideal commercial landlord tends to communicate with the community. They tend to try to engage with the community. They want tenants who pay rent, so does the community. They also try to find tenants that will serve positive needs for the community. And a lot of those needs may be consumer needs. They also tend to rent to tenants who will enhance the neighborhood and the commercial corridor around it for the practical reason that most decent commercial landlords don't want to bring down the commercial corridor and they don't want neighbors constantly complaining and being up in arms. This is common sense. And most commercial landlords in a neighborhood commercial corridor operate in this manner. We also know as neighbors that we can usually find somebody who is a commercial landlord. We can find that landlord. We can talk to that landlord. And that is important to the community and to a good, thriving neighborhood commercial corridor. Most good landlords in the commercial space want a tenant that is going to not only pay the rent, but protect their building from harm and protect the neighboring buildings from harm, and will operate a business or a nonprofit or other use safely, smartly and legally with respect to this bill. The main focus is tobacco. And of course, tobacco is a harmful product, especially when it is used by minors and people who are not regulated or not safe for them to consume it. And I would urge that we in the future expand this to include all nuisance uses so that landlords are on the hook for all of the nuisances that it has been declared that they are allowing to operate. But we'll hold that for another day. The next thing, accountability. That's in the title of this bill. This legislative body, your role is to do what you're doing now, which is to get the needs of the community, try to develop the see the illegal loopholes and try to develop legislation in a package or in an omnibus, whatever, to solve those problems. However, it is not this branch of government's responsibility to implement those laws. It is this branch's responsibility to perform the watchdog duties of meaningful oversight. And in that regard, I ask that this Council, if and I hope we do, pass this suite of bills, that we are going to hold the Administration accountable. Not because we think the Administration doesn't care about these things. But I want to share a story about how this has shown up with respect to our neighborhood and a part of the solution that we were thrilled to have in our toolkit.

And that was the recent bill that went into effect around hours of operation of a whole variety of consumer mini marts and smoke shops and things of that nature. m. m. for a chunk of the North Broad corridor, Girard Avenue to the west and Ridge Avenue, so not an insignificant set of corridors. Since that ordinance 15 went into effect, the closest smoke shop to me which is on the same block actually, if you think of the block as a square, it's on the same block, and that went into effect toward the end of April. m. m. operation rule. Now, I share this because if we're going to pass these legislative solutions, we need there to be clear accountability, implementation and enforcement. So in that time, there were efforts night after night with video and everything to report to 311, being told call the police, call the police. I brought it up to PDAC. I said, by the way this is going into effect, what is the plan for enforcement. Call the police. So we call the police 911. No one comes. We ask if we should call in a non-emergency basis. We get referred back to 311. When 311 gives an answer, they say it's not our area, it's not L&I's responsibility. And then they say go to the Vice Unit. So we call the Vice Unit and they say, no, it's not our responsibility. So again, the neighborhood is left in a Squid Game of who is supposed to hold the shop accountable and enforce the law that the neighbors and this body helped to create. So all I'm saying is whatever we do here, to quote the Wire, all the pieces matter, but it doesn't matter, it does not matter one bit if it's just words on a page that no one in the executive branch either has the resources or the knowledge about the law or possibly the will to make sure that these quality-of-life and health and safety bills are actually implemented and enforced. So with that, I close my testimony.

Thank you so much for your testimony. Kate, if you want to state your name and proceed with your testimony.

My name is Kate Allen and I'm the President of the Queen Village Neighbors Association. Members of the committee, thank you for inviting me to testify once again on behalf of my community and every other community in Philadelphia. I'm here today to support Bill 260163 to regulate the sale of intoxicating substances. This bill 12 will provide a mechanism to control the sale of substances that have proliferated our neighborhoods and are often marketed directly to our children. Because these products exist through legal loopholes, there is no ability for us to intervene if they pose a risk to our communities. There are 17 smoke shops in Queen Village and Bella Vista. And because many have swapped their inventories from tobacco to THCa products, I have lost every normal mechanism to address concerns from residents and other business owners. Last year the city shut down a smoke shop that was a chronic nuisance to our neighborhood. It reopened a few months later and is now exclusively selling THC products. And even though it's still a nuisance, there's nothing that we can do about it because these products are unregulated. We regulate every other similar substance, alcohol, tobacco and marijuana. One of the main reasons that we do this is to protect the consumer and allow them the peace of mind that whether they buy liquor from a Fine Wine & Good Spirits or cigarettes from Wawa or cannabis from a medical dispensary, they can trust that what they bought is actually what they're going to be ingesting. But study after study has shown that the contents of gas station heroin does not match the packaging. In 2025, an independent analysis funded by the Inquirer tested ten products from ten different stores in Philly and found that eight samples tested positive for contaminants that are illegal to sell in many state-run recreational cannabis programs. Seven contain Aspergillus, a fungus with spores that can cause respiratory infections. , Canada and the EU. One sample contained mold, pesticides and high levels of chromium, a carcinogenic metal. Would any of you want to ingest something laced with pesticides or neurotoxins? In 2024, the LA Times published a story about their own independent analysis of 150 hemp- derived products and found that several contained pesticides, disinfectants and fungicides, and several exceeded the legal THC limit. In 2019, the FDA published an analysis of kratom products and found that several had significant levels of lead and nickel. Prolonged exposure to which can cause kidney and nervous system damage. So that's worst case, that what you think you're buying actually contains a lot of harmful substances that could kill you. How about best case, someone purchases a product that isn't laced with something that can cause respiratory paralysis or death. In 2024, the Mayo Clinic published a paper discussing the health effects of kratom. S. received more than 3400 reports about kratom use from 2024 through 2019. These include reports of death, side effects reported included high blood pressure, confusion, and seizures. Kratom has also been reported to react with other medications. This may lead to severe side effects such as liver damage and death. In a study testing kratom as a treatment for symptoms of opioid withdrawal, people who took kratom for more than six months reported withdrawal symptoms just like those from opioid use. So those people are just going to be right back where they started. And remember, that's the best case. The only reason that these substances are currently for sale is because of loopholes that legislators are actively working to close. Letting these substances go unchecked just moves the illegal drug market off the street corner and into the corner store. The argument that regulation will hurt mom-and-pop corner stores is absurd, as if no such business could possibly survive without these products.

There are plenty of stores that do just fine without selling mislabeled products that can cause death. If the only way your business model can be successful is by selling products laced with pesticides, often marketed specifically to children, then change your business model. Just like we regulate the sale of tobacco, alcohol, and marijuana, we need to regulate the sale of intoxicating substances. I applaud the Committee and Councilmember Gilmore Richardson for taking this very necessary step to protect every community across Philadelphia.

Thank you for your testimony. Before we ask any questions, you want to proceed. State your name for the record and then proceed with your testimony.

Good afternoon. My name is Crystal Morris and I am testifying in support of nuisance business enforcement legislation, Bill Nos. 260162 and 260163, introduced by Majority Leader Gilmore Richardson. I'm here both on behalf of the Wynnefield Residents Association as well as the Wynnefield Overbrook Revitalization Corporation. As this problem exists for both residents and business owners alike, and we both share the impact, while the Commerce Department is working hard to increase funding to businesses along our commercial corridors, that money loses its impact if quality businesses can't stay open because customers don't feel safe traveling to them. As our leaders were often asked, how did you let this happen, we don't let it happen. Loopholes in the law let it happen. This legislation seeks to further close those loopholes and restore some control to residents over what commerce exists in their communities. Many of our public safety issues stem from convenience stores, smoke shops and the like that sell intoxicating substances, their drugs along our commercial corridors. These businesses often escape regulation because of legal wordplay. Clearly, defining intoxicating substances allows conversations to be more targeted and enforcement options more robust. We understand that we're experiencing a cultural shift in recreational appetites, as many use whatever substance they can find to numb the pain and anxiety produced by daily life. These products promise to help with sleep, reduce stress, or relax the feelings away. Whether you choose them or not, it's an adult decision. There is no credible reason why these products should be specifically marketed to vulnerable children or access to them be made so convenient that the stores have the audacity to exist on the walking route. As our children travel back and forth to school in just the past few months, a drug ring was closed down and we continued to be plagued by shootings. Yet we stand powerless to permanently close down those businesses that we know are doing harm. We don't look to impact anyone's ability to conduct business, just not at our expense. Our seniors are afraid to leave their residents because the large number of people congregating outside multiple convenience stores is threatening. Our property owners struggle to rent their storefronts or their apartments above because of undesirable activity and open-air drug transactions 24/7. And our children must walk past stores selling drug paraphernalia on their way back and forth to school, realizing that children learn what they live. What constitutes a nuisance business? It's any business that adversely impacts community quality of life. These businesses tend to be those that attract or tolerate undesirable behavior, with a willingness to look the other way as long as they are profiting. Landlording is also a business, and building owners can no longer be allowed to collect rents and return back to their safe, stable communities while their tenants destroy ours. Both landlord and tenant are equally responsible for the impact the business has on the surrounding community. Doing business in our communities is a privilege, and we hold our business owners to a high standard. Gone are the days where you can print a sign at your local print shop, throw it up on the outside of a building and deem yourself open for business. There must be a standard of measurement and more importantly, disciplinary procedures for the habitually uncompliant. We understand the need for quality businesses in our communities and we build with intention. Thriving commercial corridors can be directly linked to a decrease in crime, an increase in walkability and used as a measure for overall community health. Nuisance businesses rarely represent the best our communities have to offer. How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. This legislation represents one more bite of the elephants that are trampling our communities.

We want to do more than survive. We want to thrive. Help us take our communities back by passing this legislation. Thank you.

Thank you so much for your testimonies. Are there any questions? The Chair recognizes Councilmember Jones.

So I don't like to clap. I really try to be stoic, but that was a good job. That was a good job, all of you. And to the author, once again you're taking into account that this is one bite at a time. And I would like for the record to reflect that it's not just the people from the city that are patronizing these stores, because where some patrons come from, there are no stores like this. So they come to neighborhoods where there are stores like this in order to get these types of products. There is one area that if you're from Wynnefield, you know where I'm talking. There's a gas station and a fruit place down the street where once upon a time you could come in, you could get vegetables, you could get bread, butter, cheese, all of the staples of life. And now you have more gambling machines and more product like this that you're able to acquire. We have to take a stand. You represent a community that has always took a stand. For a very, very long time, we didn't like alcohol in the area. That was a taboo. So thank you for coming out and testifying today. And thank the author for standing ten toes down about it. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you. Thank you so much for your testimony. If there's no other questions, Mr. McMonagle, can you please read the next panel to testify on Bill No. 260162 and 260163.

Can we please have Bonita Cummings, Danny Rosenberg and Darnetta Arce. (Witnesses approached witness table.)

Thank you for coming in today. Just state your name for the record and proceed with your testimony.

My name is Bonita Cummings. Good morning, Chairwoman Katherine Gilmore Richardson and members of Council. My name is Bonita Cummings, Director of Strawberry Mansion Community Concern and RCO, a longstanding environmental and quality-of-life organization serving Strawberry Mansion. I am here today in support of Bill Nos. 260162 and 260163, addressing illegal smoke shop accountability and intoxicating substances. These issues are not just about products or storefronts. They are about the conditions being normalized in Philadelphia communities and the long-term damage to public health, youth and community stability. As a community advocate, I must speak about health impacts that are often ignored in public conversations. We cannot continue sending mixed messages to our youth by normalizing intoxicating substances in the name of raising tax revenue, while avoiding honest conversations about addiction, mental health, trauma, healing and the long-term impact these substances have on them and their communities. The harsh impact on women, not to mention Black women, includes disproportionate health disparities, chronic stress barriers to health care, complications during pregnancy, and poorer healing outcomes after surgeries. Yet many of our neighborhoods continue to be saturated with smoke shops, intoxicating substances, unhealthy conditions and businesses that profit from instability instead of community wellness. There is also a deeper issue that is difficult to discuss in today's political climate, race, culture and historical trauma. Many communities continue to experience concentrated exposure to harmful environmental and social conditions while being told these conditions represent freedom or progress. We must ask ourselves why these conditions continue to be concentrated in neighborhoods already struggling with inequity and why our youth are constantly exposed to environments that undermine their success, their healing, and their future opportunity. So our communities deserve investment, protection, enforcement, healing, accountability, and real opportunities to thrive. So we thank you for allowing us -- I think Councilman Squilla is the Chair for this. I may have mentioned it wrong, but just to acknowledge that. So we just do also want to thank all of the Councilmembers because this subject is not an easy subject to do as a legislator, and we appreciate the deep dive that you're willing to take in order to protect humanity. This is a question of whether we live as a quality human life or whether we live as animals on two legs. So we thank you. I really do thank you for your sincerity in taking on such a difficult, difficult subject matter.

Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. Please state your name for the record and proceed.

Yes. Good afternoon. My name is Darnetta Arce. I think first I'd like to give honor to God for being here today and giving me the courage to speak, because this is a hard thing to do. But I come today as a grandmother, a mother, a community resident, a committee person, and a business owner. And our neighborhoods are plagued with drugs in our community that's now being overseen. We have smoke shops that's also come under the name of convenience stores. So these stores are targeted to our youth as candy stores. They are inviting. They have our youth come in there every day getting used to going into these stores, being around smoke, inhaling this every day. We want to have enforcement. I'm not going to repeat everything that was just said. We heard from the medical department. We heard from the health department. We heard from the community, and we heard from the corridor managers. I come to you to say that let's enforce what's already on the books. We're in support of what Gilmore Richardson is doing, but we need more enforcement and we need accountability. Right now in the 1700 block of West Cecil B. Moore Avenue, there are two smoke shops that are less than 500 feet away from a school, the school called Alliance for Progress Charter School Annex, two smoke shops less than 500 feet away. Where's the enforcement? We have another smoke shop at 2137 Ridge Avenue adjacent to a daycare. This is something that our children are subjected to every day. Where's the enforcement? In addition to that, these stores are operating 24/7 again. Where is the enforcement? We spoke about -- we know how dangerous this is. What's going on? Where's the enforcement and the accountability? How does the Health Department and the Department of Planning and Development allow these stores to be open when the rules say you can't be within 500 feet of a school? So how did they open up from the beginning? Let's stop going around the mulberry bush and address the issues that we already deal with right now today. Where is the enforcement? I had a script, but excuse me, I got off script because I was getting upset. Because as I listened, we hear that this is intoxicating. We know what this drug does. We understand this. The Health Department is saying, hey, we have no control over this. Again, when complaints are put in through our Councilpeople, through 311, through the Health Department, through the Planning Department, where is the enforcement? That is where I stand today. I live in my neighborhood. My grandchildren go to the store. I don't even go into those stores. I don't want my grandchildren to think that this is normal. And also, what about smoking? Maybe I'm wrong, but I thought smoking was not allowed in public buildings or offices or spaces, am I correct? So when you walk into a smoke shop, it's clear it's a smoke shop because you smell the smoke, you see the haze over you. 23rd and Ridge, Cecil B. Moore, you go in there, I had to walk out. It's also a gas station. I needed gas. I couldn't go inside the store. It was just overwhelming, the smell, shooting dice. I don't know what some guy was doing. Look, somebody might have been having sex, I don't know. But this is what goes on. It's funny, but it's not because this is what's going on in our communities. And we complain and we sit here and thank you for this bill and it should have some meat to it. But again, where is the enforcement? Who is doing their job? We all pussyfooting around right now, but who's doing their job? This is what we need to do. This is what our children deal with every day. We're trying to bring the corridors up, but with this nonsense we can't. People are afraid to come to the corridors. People don't even want to shop on the corridors. But also, you're letting these shops open up as "convenience stores" and they look like candy stores. They're not candy stores. They don't sell milk. They don't sell bread. They don't even sell a hot dog.

They are just selling drugs and other addictive snacks. I like potato chips too, but I'm just saying. They're selling chips, pretzels, sodas. But again, stop allowing them to open up as convenience stores. They are adult -- like the lady said, this is an adult decision to go in those stores. This is not for children. So if they're going to be a smoke shop, let them identify themselves that way and operate themselves accordingly. They're open hours 7 a day. When is the enforcement 8 going to begin? That's my 9 testimony. 10

11 Thank you. Before the next person 12 testifies -- 13

Excuse me. 14 I'm sorry. We do have a proposal 15 to bring in some type of task force 16 because what they're doing right 17 now is ineffective. So we believe 18 we have an effective manner to stop 19 this nonsense. 20

21 Thank you so much. We'll take that 22 for the Chair and we'll add it to 23 the record. 24 And Chair recognizes Councilmember Gilmore Richardson.

Thank you. I want to say thank you not only for your remarks today, but for all your work in the North Philadelphia community. And thank all of the community organizations who are represented today. We appreciate your continued work on this. I want you to know that we do have folks here from the Administration, and we will continue to work with them and press them on enforcement around these issues and these stores. And I can tell you that we keep a running tab of all the stories that we report. We do follow up with all the city departments that need to inspect the location based on the circumstance. But in addition to that, our challenge from a city perspective is that most of these locations apply to be a grocery or a convenience store. It is not until they open up and are operational that they begin to sell these products and/or drug paraphernalia. And so, it's a cat-and-mouse game. And then they're fined by the city and they find loopholes or gray areas in the nuisance abatement plans, which is why I did the last two bills on this, because of the loopholes and the nuisance abatement plans that these business owners were skirting. Then they changed their LLCs, which is why we did the other legislation so that the violations would carry forward under the new LLC. And so, this is the fifth and sixth bill that we've been doing on this topic. But we will continue to push the Administration on ensuring that enforcement is happening because we keep up with these locations as well in our office. So I just wanted to thank you for the suggestion as well as the proposal that you sent that we will review, in addition to the stories that you notated that I did take in my notes. But we need to continue to push on this because it's happening not only in our communities, but it's all across the City of Philadelphia. It started with us in 2021 and now, it's everybody. And they have really become a hub for criminal activity and really diminished the value of our commercial corridors, which typically -- we know Cecil B. Moore even back when it was Columbia Avenue, were thriving corridors in our community. So I thank you very much for your testimony. I do receive what you are stating relative to enforcement and we're going to continue to push.

Yeah. Because again, these businesses do not even have a permit as of today. They do not have a permit. So how are they allowed to stay open.

Right. And so, we will be sure to submit those addresses to the Administration and then follow up on the outcome of their investigation, and also for the location that does not possess or have a permit at all, we will follow up with them.

Okay.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. The Chair recognizes Councilmember Gauthier.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. One thing that was illuminating to me recently, my staff and I had a conversation with the Law Department about how we can do more to kind of limit and enforce on these businesses that are dragging down quality of life, most smoke shops in particular. And a part of this might be my own ignorance, but I'm an urban planner, not a lawyer so I just didn't know. But one thing that was always confusing to me in the past was how these businesses are allowed to just be open hours a 20 day. But what I found out from 21 Law, I had always thought that 22 there was a particular law limiting 23 the hours of businesses, period, 24 and that just doesn't exist. As far as my conversation, I learned that only certain types of businesses have any restrictions on their hours. And so, if we don't want these businesses open hours a 7 day, currently the only remedy we 8 have are these curfew bills on 9 particular corridors that every 10 Councilmember has to do. But I 11 honestly think -- and I don't know 12 what jurisdiction this would be, 13 this might be at the state level, 14 I'm not sure -- but I wish they 15 were just limited, period. 16 I don't understand why 17 these businesses need to be open 24 18 hours a day. And so, I just wanted 19 to share that because it was 20 something that was very 21 illuminating for me. But I wonder 22 if there's something broader we can 23 do just about, you know, the folks 24 that are able to get a legal permit, at least they don't need to be open every single hour of the day. And it would be easier to do that I think, or I think more effective to do that in a broad- based manner than have every District Councilmember do different curfew laws. So just wanted to add that to the discussion. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. Please state your name and begin.

Hello. My name is Daniel Rosenberg. I'm here in regards to 260163. This is something that I'm very passionate about. So I thank you guys for being here, Chair, Vice-Chair, Councilmembers and you, Ms. Richardson, for passing this bill. I've actually been in touch with your office for many months now in regards to this. I didn't think I was going to make it. I came here from work. Hence, why I'm a little disheveled and underdressed. But I'm here and I'm grateful. I do have a script, but I'm probably going to go off of this because I feel like this is -- I feel more comfortable just speaking from the heart. I will say that you've had a perspective from organizations and from representatives, but I'm going to give you a perspective from someone who was addicted to kratom and fell victim to the marketing scheme. And it's been eight and a half months since I have had any and I'm very grateful for that. It was excruciating -- (Applause.)

Yeah. Thank you. And so, I'd rather just kind of tell you my story in a nutshell from the heart instead of what I have written here. I had years sober. I was addicted to OxyContin when I was younger. And listen, there was no one to blame for that. I was young, I was dumb and I wanted to party and things got carried away and I got sober from that. 5 years and then COVID happened. And I used to go to a lot of AA and NA meetings and I stopped going to meetings during COVID and there was no meetings to go to. I got a lot of anxiety and I felt very isolated. And I started, you know, my thinking got a little screwed up and I started looking for something to take some of the anxiety away to help me focus. I was vaping at the time and I went to a vape shop and they had this bottle called Feel Free. It was a blue bottle. It was a tonic. It was marketed as a botanical elixir. And it said kava on the back. And I'm familiar with kava. Kava is a Polynesian root. And it is used as a stimulant. But if you take it in certain doses, it gives you a slightly euphoric feeling. So I asked what that was. I saw somebody buy it and it says on the back -- well, in microscopic print it says kratom, but you literally need a microscope to see this. It's marketed as kava. And so, I thought it was kava. So I didn't even know what kratom was, but I did know what kava was. And I was like, oh yeah, it's harmless. So I went home and I took half the bottle. The guy told me it's good for energy. It's good for focus. I took half the bottle and it felt like I had eaten some Oxycontins again. It felt like I was right back to where I was. I was nodding out, gave me that euphoric feeling that I used to love. And needless to say, it was kind of off to the races after that. I started buying it more frequently. And it was kind of back to everything that I had learned and my years of sobriety 11 was out the window. This just kind 12 of triggered something in my brain 13 that said, oh, hello, old friend. 14 And I listened, that's my fault. I allowed it to get to that point. Yes, I had control up to a certain time, but my obsessive- compulsive mind, once I get to a certain point with addiction, it kind of, you know, I lose control. And so, that's kind of what happened with this stuff. But it was in moderation for a long time. I was doing the regular kratom. As mentioned earlier, there's a difference between the regular kratom, which comes from a plant and the 7-hydroxy kratom, which I had discovered later on. And that's when the real problems came in. I was doing the regular kratom moderately a couple times a week for a while. And I thought, okay, this is fine, like I have it under control. I'm just doing a couple days a week. It's curing my anxiety and it's doing what I want it to do and it's not getting carried away. And then I went and they didn't have -- I went to the vape shop. They didn't have the kind that I usually get. And there was this other brand that the guy just said, yeah, this is just a little bit stronger, same stuff. And I said, okay, I'll take that one. I went home and he said, oh, but if you do this one, you just take a quarter of the bottle. And so, we're talking about all the concentrated versions. Now, you know, I started off doing -- as mentioned earlier, there's tea that you can make. That's not what's being sold in stores, guys. That's not what's being sold in stores. They're doing shots. They're doing all these concentrated -- they're marketing that this one's five times stronger than this one. And so, from like a financial standpoint, you're like, okay, if this one's stronger, it makes sense to buy this one. I don't have to take as much, blah, blah, blah. So I did this kind and I found out that it was 7-hydroxy and I didn't even know what that meant.

But after doing that for about a month or two, I noticed that I was waking up in the middle of the night, my legs and my arms were going crazy and I had cold sweats and I didn't want to. I didn't realize that that's what it was. I had experienced that when I was younger from the oxys. But I didn't want to kind of -- there was no way that that's what this was because this was legal and I bought it in a store, so it couldn't be that. And then it happened several more times. And then it hit me like, oh, wow, I'm going into withdrawal. So I would have to take some kratom. I would have to. And this was only when I started the 7-hydroxy. I found out, I looked it up, I started researching it. Probably should have researched it before I did it, but I didn't know what it was. I didn't know that it was different until I kind of put two and two together. And I thought, why all of a sudden am I experiencing these withdrawal symptoms when I've been doing this for a year. Oh, maybe it's that new kind that -- so I started looking at the bottle, realized like, okay, what's this 7-OH, started researching it and found out how bad it was. So it's basically a synthetic version. It basically, you know, it's a partial agonist. Kratom is a partial agonist that binds to your opioid receptors. 7-hydroxy basically magnifies that by like a thousand. And it's highly addictive. And I found that out the hard way. And so, by that time that I realized that I was addicted, it was too late and I just needed it. The euphoria went away. My tolerance went way up and it got to a point fast-forward over a couple years that I was just using it against my will and just using it not to get sick. I would break out in cold sweats during the day. My body temperature was always off. It would be hot out, but I'd be freezing. It was very uncomfortable. And it just got to the point where I knew that I could not go on doing that anymore. And I decided to go to detox about nine months ago. I mean, I knew that the amount that I was taking, there's no way that it was sustainable. I was just taking way too much. It wasn't fun anymore. I was just using to not be sick. And I couldn't believe that I was able to get this stuff from a store legally. And I was ordering it online. I was finding places online that were cheaper, come in pill forms, 100 milligram pill. I started off doing like milligrams a day. I was up to 800 mg a day at the end. It was just keeping me -- well, I went to detox, which was excruciating. I detoxed from Oxycontins when I was in my 20s. This was ten times worse. Maybe because I'm a little bit older. But four days in detox, I could not get out of bed. My arms and my legs were going crazy. They had to give me buprenorphine/Suboxone. The medication that they were using at the detox was not working. So they ended up giving me Suboxone for a few days, a taper. And that actually helped. It took all the symptoms away and I was able to kind of wean off of that. And when I got out of there, I came back to Philadelphia and I started going to AA again. And I wanted to be proactive. And that's when I reached out to your office. Because I wanted to use my negative experience as a positive for other people. And this stuff should not be on the shelves. It should not be legal. What I went through should not be experienced by anyone who -- I knew better. I had experience with drugs and alcohol as a kid. Some people don't know better. They think that this is just a natural elixir that is going to bring them focus and energy. And guess what? They go home. They take a little bit. It feels good. They want to do it again. And before they know it, they're going to end up just like I did. I know this because I know several people that have fallen into the same trap that I have. So I'm really, really, really trying to be proactive and do something about this. And when I found out that this bill was written up and could be passed, I was ecstatic.

It might not solve everything, but it's a great start. And I will continue to do what I can to get this stuff off the shelves and to save as many people as possible from what I went through. So thank you for listening to me.

Thank you. Thank you. Chair recognizes Councilmember Richardson.

Well, I want to thank you very much, not only for your testimony and for sharing your story, but for contacting my office months ago and for working with us. This was not your fault. This was a product being sold in a store without clear ingredients and guidelines. And I'm just so sad you had to go through that again. But I am very happy that you are here today. No, it is not your fault what happened to you. So thank you very much for sharing your story and also for working with my office. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. Seeing no other questions, thank you for your testimony. Mr. McMonagle, can you please read the next panel to testify.

Yes. Can we please have Ed Boyer, Meredith Buettner Schneider and Ali Smith please. (Witnesses approached witness table.)

Thank you. Please state your name for the record and then proceed with your testimony.

My name is Edward Boyer.

You stated your name. Just please testify.

Okay. So my name is Edward Boyer. I'm an emergency physician at Ohio State University, and I'm actually not here as an advocate for anything other than regulation. This is an area in which regulation is desperately needed. Give you a little bit of my background. I'm at Ohio State now. I am a practicing emergency physician. I work in the Central Ohio Poison Center. I work on the toxicology consulting service at Nationwide Children's Hospital, which isn't quite as awesome as CHOP. I did my residency at University of Pennsylvania and at CHOP, so it's good to be back. It's not quite as awesome as CHOP, but it's pretty good. Before that, I was a full professor at Harvard Medical School in emergency medicine and I was on the toxicology service at Boston Children's Hospital. And I've trained about 20% of the medical toxicologists in the United States, but not Dr. Kevin Osterhoudt. He was actually a fellow when I was a resident. So I'm not here to advocate for a product. I'm not here to advocate for a company. I'm here to advocate for thoughtful regulation. And one of the great difficulties in going towards the end is that everybody has said everything already. And I'm not going to try to repeat what people have said. I'm just going to point out a couple of things that I think you already know, but I just want to sort of let you think about it a little bit more. It's my day job to keep people alive. And when we think about a public health catastrophe, when we think about public health threat, when we think about outbreaks of poisoning, we know what that looks like. It's multiple people in isolated locations. To be blunt, it sounds a lot like Kensington. The issue that I have is -- I don't want a show of hands because that's a dangerous place for politicians to go -- just think to yourself, how many of you had heard of 7-hydroxymitragynine or kratom before this legislation had happened or before this legislation was in work? My experience has been is it's not widely recognized because, yes, people come into poison control, come into hospitals and get reported to poison control centers. Yes, people can develop problematic substance use, but it's not like Kensington. And I personally, since July of last year, have had the specialists in our poison control center call me about every single kratom, 7-hydroxy case, MGM-15, pseudoindoxyl case, anything related to kratom since July of last year. And we've had I think seven calls the whole time. Now, that doesn't sound like a public health catastrophe. Does that mean that there's no role for regulation? Absolutely not. And I think one of the huge problems is multiple servings per dosage unit. I've seen up to eight individual servings in one standard size tablet. Nobody is going to divide something up eight times. And even if they intend to divide it up competently, to get eight equal servings out of a single tablet is going to be impossible to have a little 15cc bottle and say, this is three servings and you successfully drink 5cc is never going to happen. I believe Dr. Osterhoudt is correct. I think the rubber hits the road on hemp products. Hemp is a problem in our center. We can count on between and toddlers per day who get admitted to our hospital for cannabis exposure. And over all time -- and I confirmed this yesterday because I was working with the director of the Poison Center and I was on call last night. Over all time in our consult service and in our poison control center in Central Ohio, we've had zero cases of kratom or 7-hydroxy exposure in kids. That's not to say that you don't want to keep kids from becoming exposed to it. So child protective packaging is an obvious thing to do. You wouldn't want to sell it near stores, but I think the most important one is going to be avoiding orally dissolvable or sublingual tablets.

If I take 7-hydroxymitragynine and eat it, you know, take it, swallow a tablet, your body does certain things to the medication to prevent you from becoming intoxicated, from becoming poisoned and overdosed. And one of the things is that the liver chews it up, and the liver is so effective at doing it that the bioavailability is 3%. So the doses are enormous that are administered. The doses in a tablet are huge. And I think that -- I know it scared the living daylights out of me when I first heard about it. But they're so huge, precisely because the pharmacokinetics are so, so bad. So you would want to eliminate the things that bypass the liver. And that's going to be orally dissolvable and sublingual formulations. I neglected to mention earlier that I published the first adverse event in the literature related to kratom all the way back in 2016. I also published the first case of an individual problematic substance use from 7-hydroxymitragynine. But at the same time, I recognize that there are individuals who can potentially benefit from these things. We live in a fentanyl world sadly. And if I'm an injection drug user and I don't want to inject and I don't want to have the risk of dying from an inadvertent fentanyl overdose, I could easily see how if I don't want to die of opioid overdose, if I don't have availability to get into drug treatment because drug treatment is very short availability in this country right now, if I don't have the 750 to 1000 bucks a month of disposable income to pay for Suboxone out of pocket, I can see how kratom could be a very reasonable alternative until I can get into formal drug treatment. So I'm going to stop at that point. If you have any questions, I'd be happy to answer them as well.

Thank you. Before we go to the next testifier, Chair recognizes Councilmember Gauthier.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you for your testimony. I hear you. From what I hear, you seem to be saying regulate, but don't do it in a way that's too restrictive. Do it in a way that's thoughtful and compared to the level of the crisis, or at least that's what I heard in summation. But I was wondering if you could say more about your personal or professional stake in that position. So for instance, I understand when the industry groups come and they're against regulation, I understand that because I understand their stake. Even though my challenge is always you should have regulated yourself and set your own standards if you didn't want government to regulate you. But I'm also having a hard time understanding from a research, university or a medical center perspective what's your stake in the position that you're taking? Why is this important to you that the legislature or that the regulation look a particular way?

Yeah. So I'm not here -- I'm not paid to be here by any industry. I do emergency medicine, medical toxicology and I also do product liability consulting. And to be honest, it's my day job to keep people alive. If I thought people were going to die from this, I wouldn't be here.

Can you say more about what product liability consulting means? What's your line of business with respect to that? And how do you get compensated for that?

Yeah. So I work with individual law firms to teach them how they can advise clients to avoid downstream problems related to their products. We heard from Mr. -- is it Mr. Rosenberg? Yeah. We heard from Mr. Rosenberg about Botanic Tonic Feel Free. So it's a co-formulated product. It's kratom and kava. And the problem with that is it's essentially like taking an opioid with a benzodiazepine. Kava is a mild sedative, but it's got a much shorter duration of action than mitragynine does. So if you like the combination of kava plus kratom, right, because that's a unique experience that people will have one of those components, the kava will lose its effect first, which means that the mitragynine persists to get the effect back that you wanted, you've got to redose. But now you've redosed with an opioid, which can lead to problematic substance use disorder. So in my work I would say to a company -- and I wasn't working with the companies that work for the people who manufactured Botanic Tonic's Feel Free product, but I would have said, do not coformulate these products because you're creating a perfect storm for problematic substance use by doing it this way.

But to be clear, so that I'm understanding, you are representing a particular medical perspective, but you're not just representing a medical perspective. You are contracted by lawyers who represent these companies?

They don't necessarily represent the companies. They would advise the companies.

I just want to be clear sort of what your stake is so that we understand your testimony. It's not purely sort of you're here representing this medical center. So thank you.

No, I'm not here representing my medical center.

Thank you. Chair recognizes Councilmember Gilmore Richardson.

Thank you. Thank you very much, colleague. And thank you very much, Dr. Boyer, for your testimony. And I heard you talk about Kensington, right. This conversation that we're having today feels very much like seeking to prevent what we see now in Kensington. Again, this is literally reminding me of one of the documentaries that I watched around the beginning of the opioid crisis in America, where they specifically talked about the small towns in West Virginia and even the doctors who were addicted to opioid medication. This is what this feels like. And so, I appreciate -- and that's what we're trying to avoid. Okay. Because that's how we got to that point in Kensington, that's how it got that bad. All right. So I appreciate your testimony and you being here relative to the regulations. And I always check the witness list of every witness and try to read in advance the testimony and appreciate the question of my colleague Councilmember Gauthier. But to be clear, you are not representing the medical center. Were you invited by an attorney group or another association to be here today?

An attorney group.

Attorney group. And which one was that again?

I believe this was Yusenius -- no, Frost Brown and Todd.

I'm sorry. I can't hear.

I'm sorry. I believe it was Frost Brown and Todd.

Fost?

Frost, Brown and Todd.

Oh, Frost. I'm sorry. I can't hear you very well. I apologize. Frost, Brown and Todd. And they represent who?

I don't know. I advise them on scientific matters.

Okay. And then do they work with a specific association or other individuals? I'm only asking because you came all the way from Ohio, so I just wanted to understand who invited you to be here?

I got an invitation from -- yeah. It was Frost, Brown and Todd. Who the client is, I don't know. The reality is it doesn't change the science one way or the other. If there's an adverse event, I publish it in the literature. If there's benefit, I'm going to publish it in the literature too.

Okay. So were you contracted by these attorneys to represent a certain position or are you here based on the work that you do solely?

Based on the work. It's based on the work that I do. I don't advocate for a particular position.

Okay. And you weren't asked to be here for a particular position?

No. 17

Received. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. Please state your name for the record and proceed with your testimony.

My name is Meredith Buettner Schneider, and I serve as the Executive Director of the Pennsylvania Cannabis Coalition. We represent the medical marijuana businesses in the licensed medical marijuana market here in Pennsylvania. Thank you for the opportunity to testify today in support of efforts to regulate intoxicating cannabinoids and other regulated substances -- unregulated intoxicating substances currently being sold throughout Philadelphia and the Commonwealth. Over the last several years, we've seen an explosion of intoxicating hemp-derived products being sold in gas stations, smoke shops, convenience stores and online marketplaces. With no 24 regulatory oversight, these products are often marketed as legal alternatives to cannabis or medical marijuana, but may contain synthetic or chemically-altered cannabinoids that can produce powerful psychoactive effects. Unlike products sold in Pennsylvania's regulated medical marijuana program, these intoxicating products are frequently untested, improperly labeled, and accessible to minors. The reality is that consumers often have no idea what they're purchasing. These products are manufactured outside of any meaningful regulatory framework. Independent testing across the country has repeatedly found products containing unsafe levels of heavy metals, residual solvents, pesticides and synthetic compounds. In some cases, products advertised as hemp have contained intoxicating levels of THC far beyond what consumers expected. Others have included synthetic cannabinoids that pose serious health risks. This regulation recognizes that the current status quo is unacceptable. It creates reasonable guardrails to ensure that intoxicating products sold in Philadelphia meet basic safety standards and are kept out of the hands of children. It prohibits the sale of products containing synthetic cannabinoids or unsafe levels of THC, requires laboratory testing, mandates accurate labeling and restrict sales to those and 18 over. Those are not extreme 19 measures. Those are commonsense 20 consumer protections. 21 As someone who represents Pennsylvania's legal cannabis industry, I want to emphasize another important point. Regulation works. Pennsylvania's medical marijuana program demonstrates that cannabinoids can be safely regulated when there are strict standards for testing, packaging, labeling, age restrictions and accountability. Licensed operators are required to comply with rigorous state oversight, invest heavily in compliance infrastructure and ensure products are safe for patients. But today, unregulated, intoxicating products are being sold next door to highly regulated medical cannabis without those same obligations. That creates an uneven playing field for compliant businesses while exposing consumers to potentially dangerous products that have bypassed every safeguard we require in a regulated cannabis market. I want to commend the Majority Leader for approaching this issue thoughtfully and pragmatically. This legislation acknowledges evolving federal policy, aligns definitions with pending federal and state standards and provides a framework for enforcement that prioritizes safety rather than confusion. While the state legislature has recognized the urgency of this issue through proposals like Senate Bill 49, which is a bipartisan effort to address intoxicating hemp-derived products, progress in Harrisburg has been slow. Unfortunately, what should be a straightforward public health and safety issue increasingly appears to be caught in a broader political struggle over executive authority and regulatory control. In the meantime, these products remain widely available to minors and gas stations and corner stores across Pennsylvania. That is why I applaud Philadelphia City Council for stepping forward and acting now to protect consumers and children while the state continues to debate broader reforms. Consumers deserve to know what they're putting in their bodies.

Parents deserve confidence that intoxicating products are not being marketed to their children, and responsible businesses deserve a fair and regulated marketplace. I urge Council to advance this legislation and help establish meaningful protections for Philadelphia residents. Thank you.

Thank you for your testimony. Can you state your name for the record and proceed with your testimony.

Hello. Can you hear me?

(Nodded affirmatively).

Okay. Apologies. Let me get my testimony just pulled up really quick. Hi. My name is Allison Smith. I am here on behalf of the Global Kratom Coalition, here on the behalf of GKC. We appreciate the Council's attention to consumer safety, youth access and commonsense regulations. However, we do have a concern with Bill No. 260163 as drafted, because it does not simply regulate. There is one provision in this ordinance that risks functioning as a de facto ban on all natural kratom products. All the provisions before that are very clearly thought-out, but this single regulation nullifies all of that. This bill defines intoxicating substances as any hemp or kratom product. It should be clearly noted that natural kratom is not intoxicating. However, there are derivatives that masquerade as natural kratom, which are intoxicating. It then makes it unlawful to sell these intoxicating products, which now include natural kratom, unless that product is subject of an application approved under Section 505 of the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act. The bill also requires a retailer seeking a license to demonstrate that any intoxicating substance sold at that location has been approved under Section 505. This is the problem. Section 505 is the FDA drug approval pathway. It is not a regulatory pathway for dietary supplements or natural botanical products like natural kratom. These are marketed for drugs that are marketed as drugs. FDA does not pre-approve dietary ingredient supplements before sale, and in the way that it approves prescription or over-the-counter drugs. Instead, dietary supplements are regulated under a framework called DSHEA, which includes rules against adulteration, misbranding, unlawful disease claims or unsafe/contaminated products. So by requiring Section 15 505 drug approval, the bill creates a standard that natural kratom products cannot satisfy, not because they failed all of the previous criteria, but because they are being placed in the wrong federal category that no botanical product could meet. This is especially important because that bill already contains language that addresses the real safety concerns. It prohibits mixing with harmful non-creative substances. It prohibits kratom extracts with unsafe residual solvent levels. It prohibits products with more than 2% 7-hydroxymitragynine and the alkaloid fraction. It prohibits synthetic alkaloids, including synthetic mitragynine, semi- synthetic 7-hydroxymitragynine. It also includes testing, certificate certification, labeling, age restrictions, and enforcement provisions. It's clear that the intention of this bill is to regulate and to ban dangerous products. The bill directly addresses adulterated, contaminated, synthetic and high potency products. However, Section 505 does not add consumer protection. It actually converts a regulatory bill into a prohibition for natural kratom products. Philadelphia can protect consumers without banning adult access to natural kratom. The right approach is to regulate, which is what you are trying to do with this bill. And so, our position is simple, do not turn regulation into prohibition. We respectfully urge you to amend this bill before moving it forward so that it targets the unsafe synthetic products without unintentionally banning natural kratom products that comply with the bill's safety standards. Thank you and I'm happy to answer any questions.

Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. Are there any questions from the committee? The Chair recognizes Madam Leader Gilmore Richardson.

Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair, for the recognition. I wanted to thank you very much for your testimony and for the input you have shared. We certainly value the opportunity to engage in a robust amendment process that we have continued to undertake up until minutes before this hearing. But I wanted to state for the record for this proceeding that for Bill No. 17 260163, we have circulated a number of amendments that have been shared with the members of the Commerce and Economic Development Committee that include updates to Section 22 9-6701 around the definitions to update the definition of hemp to reference the relevant federal regulation and legislation, updates to the definition of kratom product. Also, you should know, and I'm sure you do, that the Philadelphia Department of Public Health does not currently regulate topical products and they don't have the capacity to do that. And so, we have to do something that is realistic based on the capacity of our enforcing departments. We've also updated Section 9-6702 around the prohibition on sales, updated references to the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act, Section 9-6703, licensed sale of intoxicating substances around additional changes to the license requirement to a permit requirement, ensuring that Health will be the relative and regulatory department for this legislation, updated the request of all the District members, updated the permit application fee to align with other applications, changed the implementation date as listed in Sections 9-6701 and 9-6702 to align with the implementation date of the hemp regulations as it relates to the FY26 Agriculture, Rural Development, Food and Drug Administration and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, and other additional changes. And so, I just wanted to ensure that I stated that for the record. But we have to ensure that any legislation that passes out of this legislative body is something that is enforceable for the City of Philadelphia on the other side. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you, Madam Leader. Any other questions? (No response.)

Seeing none, thank you so much for your testimony. Mr. McMonagle, can you please read the next panel to testify on Bill No. 260162 or 260163.

Yes. Can we please have Craig Katz and Jake Sitler. (Witnesses approached witness table.)

Thank you. If you would like to state your name for the record and then you can proceed with your testimony.

Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Vice-Chairman and members of the Committee. My name is Craig Katz. I am the Government Relations Manager for CBD Kratom and Brands. As you can tell by the name of the company CBD Kratom, we have a product line in both industries. And so, I'm going to put on both hats here. I had originally prepared a statement, but based on the previous testimony that we've heard, I'm going to deviate a little bit from that. I'll tell you a little bit about our company. I know that, Councilman Jones, you have one of our stores in your District. It is not a smoke shop. It is not a gas station. It is not a convenience store. I say that because just to give you a little background, I'm not a very popular guy with a lot of different people. It's a pretty long list. But right at the top of that list is the NACS, the National Association of Convenience Stores, the marijuana lobby, the liquor industry and the petroleum guys. They don't like me very much because I want regulation. We have been trying to get regulation federally and in states and local governments for years. My company has been in this business since 2013. We have 57 brick-and-mortar stores in five states, Illinois, Missouri, Texas, New York and Pennsylvania. , to implement regulation, reasonable, robust, responsible regulation. How often do you have an industry that comes to you and says please regulate us. We're begging you, put some rules in place. Why are we doing this because of the reasons that Councilwoman Gilmore Richardson has very aptly brought up. I met with her in November, had a great conversation with her. I appreciate exactly where she's coming from on this. Her heart is absolutely in the right place. There are too many products out there in the marketplace that are dangerous. They're dangerous to consumers. They're especially dangerous to children. Now, my company, again been in business for quite some time now, we have regulations. We self-regulate. Someone brought up self-regulation earlier in the conversation. We age-gate. You cannot get into one of our stores unless you're 21. I don't know, Councilman Jones, if you've been in our store or not in Wynnefield Heights, but our stores have a 21 age-gate. You cannot get into our store or buy a product unless you're 21. We test our products with third-party independent lab testing. Those are generally done by DEA labs or ISO-certified labs. If our products were illegal, the DEA labs would be turning us over to the federal government for prosecution. , they can't use DEA labs. Because while she did say that they were the "legal medical marijuana business in the state of Pennsylvania," they're fully illegal in the United States of America. It is federally illegal to sell marijuana. Whether a state abrogates that is a different situation entirely. But for them to claim that they're the legal industry, while we're the illegal industry is just patently false. So that's that. We age-gate, we test, we label, we label and we package in childproof packaging. When I say we label, if you go to any one of our products, there's a QR code on the packaging. That QR code will take you directly to the certificate of analysis for that product. It tells you exactly what's in the product, and the package tells you exactly what's going to be in the product as well. Our employees, and I've got two of our senior managers from Philadelphia here today, our employees go through an explicit and extensive training program before they are allowed on the floor to sell products. It is the equivalent of a college course. It takes weeks and many, many hours for them to pass that course. Now, what are we talking about here? We're talking about regulation and what we should be doing. These products should be regulated. We need to get the bad products out of the marketplace so consumers know what they're getting. And so, they're getting safe products.

The package that you were shown earlier as well as the one that Councilwoman Gilmore Richardson held up, those are not the products that we sell. Those are not the products that the large and vast majority of this industry sells. Those products should be off the shelves. The people who make those products should be prosecuted. I'm still not quite sure why some of the companies like Skittles, their parent company, isn't suing those people for trademark infringement. There are all sorts of things that we can be doing here. But the key here is regulation. The KCPA, the Kratom Consumer Protection Act, sets down a list of very stringent robust rules to regulate the industry. 708 should be off the market. Dr. Boyer said earlier, and I don't know, I've never met him before, never heard of him before, but he did say something that I think was pretty important. He brought up how long ago was it that you became aware of these products. And I'll tell you something, kratom became available in the United States in the late 1960s when servicemen came back from Vietnam in Southeast Asia, where they learned of using kratom. Kratom has been used for hundreds, if not thousands of years in Southeast Asia as a relaxant, as a tea. Just like we drink coffee every day. We go to Starbucks, they go to kratom. It's no 1 different. So it's been in use for decades in the United States and no 3 one has ever heard of an issue with it. The reason that you have heard of an issue of it is some brilliant guy in Kansas City, Missouri, a couple of years ago recognized how to extract the tiny amount 2% or less than 2% of 7-OH that naturally occurs in kratom leaf and take that into a lab and blow it out basically into something that really is not the intention. Anyone who refers to 7-OH as kratom is misrepresenting the case. 7-OH is not kratom. Kratom is a natural leaf product. It's all that we sell in our stores. It is natural leaf product to kratom. And the hemp side, the ordinance claims or intends at least to bring it in line with what the federal government is or is not doing. I think that's kind of interesting because the federal government right now is in the process of redefining the redefinition that they passed in Section 781 of the continuing resolution last November. That's what changed the definition of hemp. And that's what this bill 10 refers to. However, there are bills currently pending and about to be pending in Congress that would redefine the redefinition. Why is that? Because both the White House and a bipartisan -- this is not a red or blue issue, by the way, the White House and bipartisan members of Congress recognized that there needs to be regulation and not to kill an entire industry, which by the way is a $29 billion industry in the United States. So if you are going to comport with what the federal government says, then this bill 3 should have language in it that says that if the federal government changes Section 781 before November 12, 2026, that you will align yourselves with those changes. Right now it doesn't say that. It just says that it won't go into effect until November of 2026. Now, I gave Councilwoman Gilmore Richardson's office an amendment and she ran it past your Law Department. And they said they can't do it. I don't understand that, to be perfectly honest with you. I've done this amendment in multiple states and multiple cities. I'm going on too long. I apologize. I could talk for hours on this. Obviously, you can tell that. I won't do that to you, I promise. I just want to point out that what you really need to be doing here is regulating these products, not throwing out the baby with the bath water. There are plenty of good people in these businesses that have built their life around these businesses, because they thought what they were doing was legal.

After the 2018 Farm Bill 11 was passed, these people thought they were doing a legal thing and they built their lives around it. Don't take that away from them.

Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. And I do believe there are good people out there looking to do the right thing and what they think is legal. But there's also other people, like you said, that are doing the wrong thing and taking advantage of some of our folks. I think it's -- I know the sponsor of the bill is very thoughtful in this process and does take those things into consideration. And we'll continue to do that. And I know if federal guidelines and rules change, you know, we will adapt. I mean, I'm not going to speak for the sponsor. But before I recognize her, I'd like to recognize Councilmember Jones.

Yeah. Thank you for your testimony and insights. My only question is how many other comparable products are out there? Chemicals that are out there that we don't know about that are going to just keep coming?

So you regulate alcohol, you regulate tobacco, you regulate everything else. There's no reason why you cannot regulate this and make people go through a process. Things have to be tested. I believe it was the Health Department who said that they couldn't enforce this at this time. And I think that's a budgetary question. Well, I'm going to tell you something right now. If you regulate this and create a robust regulation framework and you impose a licensing fee, you impose a tax, which I believe Philadelphia has the right to impose a tax on these kind of products, it's been done in other places, you'll pay for whatever the enforcement issues are. And I will tell you, the other thing is that the companies pay for the testing at the manufacturing level. So you're not paying for that either. And if you require independent third-party labs, there's no question as to what the veracity of those testing protocols are. So it can be done. There needs to be a will. If there's a will, there's a way. So again, we are absolutely 100% in favor of regulation. We are absolutely in favor of getting bad products off the streets and out of the marketplaces. If no gas station ever was allowed to sell a product like this for the rest of humanity, we would stand and applaud and have the same issue with the convenience stores.

The --

Again, I'll just tell you, is it anecdotally -- I know, I'm going on and on and on. I'm sorry. I apologize. Driving down to one of our stores on South Street, I passed ten smoke shops and it made my hair stand up. Walking down Market Street, I saw a kiosk on the street that was selling 7-OH products, and the guy behind the counter there had no 5 clue what he was selling. And when I tried to take a picture of it, he went absolutely nuts. Probably thought I was a police officer or something like that. But the bottom line is those products need to be off the streets and out of the marketplace. We want that. They make us look bad.

I really appreciate your testimony and your insights to this matter. And I'm thankful, even doubling- down, that the author of this legislation is doing what she's doing. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chair recognizes Council Leader Gilmore Richardson.

Thank you. Thank you so much, Mr. Chair. And I want to thank you for your testimony. And I apologize for having to step out for a moment. However, I wanted to be clear for my colleagues on this committee that we did take every amendment we received into careful consideration and have provided a set of comprehensive amendments to this legislation that we did offer to our colleagues for their review. That will be all the amendments that we are considering at this time. And I wanted to be clear about that. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. Please state your name for the record and begin your testimony.

Hello, my name is Jake Sitler. Councilmembers, I would like to thank you for your time today and for allowing me to speak on behalf of the Pennsylvania hemp industry. I'm a father. I'm a husband. I'm owner of Endo, where I started as a coffee shop in Lancaster City. And I'm also the President of the Pennsylvania Hemp and Cannabis Guild. And just so you know, I formed the Pennsylvania Hemp and Cannabis Guild not just to represent the hemp industry here in Pennsylvania, but also small businesses and true community Pennsylvanians that would like to one day enter the cannabis market in the state of Pennsylvania, not the corporations that generally occupy it at this point. In 2016, I was one of the top American finishers at the Philly Cycling Classic, an institutional sporting event in this great city. Growing up on a small farm in Central Pennsylvania, competing in a race that I once stood and watched, my sporting heroes was one of the proudest moments of my entire life. To finish as one of the top Americans in front of a home crowd is something I will proudly tell my children about forever. Unfortunately, two years later my life changed forever. In 2018 while training, I was back home from Europe and a woman ran a red light and hit me at over 40 miles an hour. The impact burst my L2 vertebrae, leaving me nearly paralyzed and ended my professional cycling career. After, my injury didn't feel political to me. The Farm Bill had just passed and I used hemp and CBD products while recovering bedridden. I was suddenly trying to figure out what life looked like after my career ended overnight. These products helped me recover physically and mentally during one of the most uncertain periods of my life. So I didn't enter this industry as a gold rush or an unregulated market at this point. I literally entered it to rebuild my life and not be on opioids. I mean, that's the fact. And from this moment forward, I threw myself completely into this industry because I believe this plant could help people the same way it helped me. So since 2019, you're not going to find a person in this room that has done more to bring hemp and hemp-derived cannabinoids to be regulated by the state of Pennsylvania. I've sat down with the state police, the Bureau of Liquor Control Enforcement, the Department of Agriculture. I've worked with the Department of Revenue, I've worked with the Governor's agencies, and I've worked with every state legislator. I've spoken at the Farm Show. I have worked so hard. So you don't have to be here doing this, because our state has not passed a law to regulate these products, right, but it is important. And frankly, I'm just going to be honest with you going off the cusp here. Policy has gotten in the way. Politics has gotten in the way of policy. That's just the reality. And that's what's happening in the state of Pennsylvania. And small business owners like ourselves are the ones that are actually coming down and getting the crux of it. I understand your concerns around intoxicating hemp products. I understand your concerns around youth access, irresponsible operators and unsafe manufacturing, but destroying an entire sector is not the answer. Hemp is Pennsylvania. It's farmers, it's manufacturing, it's small business, it's urban entrepreneurship, it's rural investment, and it is community-based commerce. The industry has created pathways for people who otherwise do not have the capital dominated by the large corporations to even enter into this market. We built Pennsylvania's first national hemp brand from the ground up, developing our own IP using all natural cannabinoids from hemp plant. So it's not just bad actors. The narrative ignores thousands of responsible people trying to build legitimate businesses the right way. And importantly, many consumers are not turning to these products to become heavily intoxicated.

They are turning to the beverages and wellness products as alternatives to alcohol and other harmful substances. That matters. Harm reduction does matter, consumer choice does matter and pushing responsible operators out of the market is not going to eliminate demand. I think we all know that, right. It's going to push demand underground into unregulated markets with fewer safeguards, testing standards, taxes and accountability. Our guild stands for age restrictions, lab testing, contaminant standards, manufacturing standards, labeling requirements, and enforcement against unsafe actors. We want guardrails. The Department of Revenue, I'm sure you're aware, has started with the OTP crackdown on illicit vapes. They're doing that with vapes now. They are able to enforce on vapes that are not registered. That is the direction that this industry should be moving. 4 mg THC limit is effectively prohibition standard that would nearly eliminate every compliant hemp product currently sold. So the tinctures that a lot of our grandparents are using, gone. You guys would have to enforce on those types of products if the language that exists currently. That's the topicals, everything, it becomes illegal substances. A recent Whitney Economics study estimated that Pennsylvania's hemp and cannabis economy represents nearly 50 million in annual tax revenue in the Commonwealth. I think it's safe to say Philly's probably about 20% to 30% of that annual revenue in terms of taxation. So it's not a question of whether or not this is a legitimate economic driver for Pennsylvania. It is. The question is going to be, are we going to create thoughtful regulation that actually does regulate and safekeeps or are we just going to completely destroy a market. And unfortunately, we haven't really been given a pathway to creating that market beyond the 2018 Farm Bill. The state has been quite slow to adopt that, as we all realize that reality. As Craig mentioned, the federal government is currently creating a very robust package, and I have been played a large hand in that meeting with all of our Congress members, our House members and there is going to be a bill that will be brought forth by November. So really, all I'm asking you is to essentially be open to the industry. People here, work with me, talk with me. Let me show you my concerns. I understand your concerns. I've sat beside district attorneys on this matter. And let's actually create something that doesn't destroy the whole entire hemp industry here, but rather puts the guardrails that you guys want to see eliminated from the smoke shops, but don't take away complete consumer access, because you can go across to New Jersey and you can go into Total Wine and you can buy my cannabis drinks where I'm celebrated. You can go to the Total Wine in Delaware and you can buy my drinks where I'm celebrated. But in Philly, am I a criminal in Philly? I mean, I'm a Pennsylvania boy through and through. So I'm launching into these markets. I should be the type of products that you guys want to support. So, yeah, that's about it. And I really appreciate your time. Thank you.

Thank you so much for your testimony. Are there any questions from the committee? (No response.)

Seeing none, thank you again for your testimony. Thank you. Mr. McMonagle, are there any others to testify on Bill Nos. 260162 or 260163?

We have no 2 further panels, but we do have public commenters.

Can you please call the public commenters to testify.

Can we please have Melissa Robbins, Colin Zurich and Christopher Dini. (Witnesses approached witness table.)

Melissa, if you want to start first. Just state your name for the record and then proceed, and then we'll go down the line.

Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Melissa Robbins. I'm a community advocate and activist and local media personality. And when I received the email, because I signed up for your email list to find out what legislation you're working on and how it benefits or impacts the community, when I received the email from Councilwoman Katherine Gilmore Richardson, I literally stopped what I was doing to read through what she was proposing. And I immediately emailed the staffer to say I'd like to come and support her legislation. So I'll tell you why. About ten years ago, I can recall being in Brooklyn and I remember driving through the community and I remember asking myself, what is it, something's making me feel uncomfortable. Something had me uncomfortable. So I was trying to get to the bottom of what was making me feel so uncomfortable. I'm thinking it's bright colors. It's little bodegas, little stores, bright colors, a lot of bright colors. It was the same lack of comfort that I feel when I walk into casinos because it's too much stimulation, right. So I said, well, what are those bright colors. So out of curiosity, because I'm very curious, I went into one of them and it was a smoke shop, because this is prior to Philadelphia having this influx of smoke shops. And I explored it and I learned that they had all kinds of products, products that I'd never heard of, products that I did not understand. Fast-forward 2019, I took a position with a nationwide organization that was anti- marijuana. The reason that I took this position is because I learned through this organization that, one, they were looking to legalize marijuana in a lot of states. Meanwhile, we had people who were currently incarcerated because illegal marijuana had been classified as an illegal drug. So I took the position to advocate against it until it was decriminalized, until the people who had been convicted and indicted were serving time had been released until they had expungement clinics to give people the opportunity to restore their lives. I said no one should make a dime in this country selling marijuana until people who have been prosecuted for the sale of marijuana have some level of justice, right. So I took that position, not that I was anti-marijuana. I was anti-hurting people and allowing others to make hand-over- fist money. So I took that position and I learned that a lot of the products on the market were being sold and packaged. Again, the bright colors, the fruity colors, the ones that look very, very attractive to your child. I just learned how predatory the products were. And I also learned how just an innocent child could be coming home from school and go into the store, get a product and just the product, irreversible damage, so on and so forth. You all know how this works. So the pandemic comes, It's about 2021. And a good friend of mine where he and I were having a conversation about Olney, because we noticed on every corner there was a smoke shop in Olney. So we said, okay, let's do this. You go on this end and I'll go on this end and we'll go in and we'll pretend that we're your typical people in Philadelphia who just want to go and get some drugs. What did we find out? We found out that you could go into those smoke shops, say the right words and guess what, you were buying marijuana. Although marijuana is not legal in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, right. So this is when he got really upset and I did too. We said we have to do something about this. So time moves on. It's the pandemic, you're limited with your movement. And I'm looking all over the City of Philadelphia, and they're popping up left and right, left and right. I live in Fox Chase. I saw them all over the city. I didn't see one in Fox Chase, not one. Not too long ago there it was, right there at the corner of Rhawn and Verree. Do you want to know what takes place at the corner of Rhawn and Verree during the school year?

In order for a child to get to Baldi, they have to stand at the corner of Rhawn and Verree to take the 67 in order for a child to get to George Washington High. Got to stand at the corner of Rhawn and Verree in order to get to Benjamin Rush. God is staying at the corner of Ron and Verree. So at that one corner, you have children going this way to go to Fox Chase Elementary. There's footsteps from Rhawn and Verree. It is a hub for children. And guess what's right there? You got it, a smoke shop. So you get the idea of how many of our children are standing at that corner and get off the bus at that corner at that one smoke shop. So you go into the smoke shop. Someone testified earlier and talked about the fact that you can't go in these stores and get eggs, milk, bread. Well guess what? Of course, I went in the store to see what they had, outdated products with expired numbers. If you look at products, they're outdated and expired. But their main product are the kratom and the hemp and the marijuana. It's all there. Our communities deserve better. We are in a time -- as my grandmother would say, we are in a time in our society, right, we are right here in the City of First. You all are members of a legislative body that serve in the City of First. You have the power in your hands. You have an obligation to the people who you serve. And people have come here one, by one, by one advocating for our communities, advocating for the safety of our children, advocating for our families. What about the market value of homes in these properties that have these nuisance of smoke shops hours a day? You go in 5 there and you get what you go for. 6 Someone has to take a stand. And I 7 am so proud to be here to support 8 you all today for saying not in my 9 city. 10 Now, I hear a lot of 11 people coming here representing 12 industries that make a lot of 13 money. And they may have built 14 their entire lives and careers 15 around these products, but the 16 question is, does the risk outweigh 17 the benefit. And here we are. 18 Would you rather put the families 19 in the communities of the City of 20 Philadelphia at risk so that you 21 can make money, because I'm sure 22 you don't welcome them into your 23 communities? 24 If you had to go home and pass bright yellow, bright green, bright orange, bright red, bright blue at all hours of the night, I'm almost positive that your neighbors would be opposed. So all that I say is move forward with your legislation. Take a stand. Just imagine what our communities will look like six months from now, a year from now, and neighbors will be having the conversation. Oh, well. Councilmember Katherine Gilmore Richardson took a stand. And as a result of her taking a stand, now we don't have this as a nuisance anymore. So I commend you. And I've not been down here in a long time. It's been a long time since I've been here to testify, but I support what you're doing. It's not always popular, but it's brave. And it's the noble thing to do for your city, for our entire city. So I thank you. And if there's anything that I can do to promote you all or support you, I'll do more. But take a stand and fight for Philadelphia because we deserve safe neighborhoods and safe business corridors. Thank you all.

Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. Please state your name and then continue with your testimony.

Hello. My name is Colin Zurich, members of the Council. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak today. As I said, my name is Colin. I'm a Public Policy Advisor for the American Kratom Association, a consumer protection advocacy organization. I want to begin by discussing some positive language that I've seen of this bill, primarily the language revolving around 7-OH and synthetic products as well. These products, which contain synthetic 7-OH, mislead consumers into taking products that is not safe, natural nor kratom at that point. The 2% threshold for 7-OH is a regulation that many localities and states, including some such as Rhode Island, which banned kratom and then reassessed and passed the Kratom Consumer Protection Act to implement these changes and keep consumers safe and keep these harmful products off the store shelves while protecting natural kratom products. As you've heard from others today, the language is concerning in some parts of this bill. The labeling of kratom as an intoxicating substance being one kratom in its natural form does not produce any euphoric senses. It does not produce a euphoric high. Kratom, in its natural form, is not a drug. It has a similar effect to caffeine, which you have also heard earlier today as well. Assigning kratom the title of an intoxicating substance does not fit the science beyond the dietary supplement. Additionally, the FDA commissioned a single ascending dose study in February of 2024, which found that kratom, a natural kratom, appears to be well tolerated in humans at all dose levels. Out of 40 people in the study, 2 showed signs of nausea, and this was after consuming over 12g of a single substance within a five-minute period. Of course, you're going to get nauseous. Kratom is a very bitter substance, 2 out of 40. This was an FDA paid for study that showed that it was safe at all levels. This bill shows the Council's intent to regulate, not prohibit. I urge the Council to reassess some of the language involved in this bill, to allow this legislation to truly protect the people of Philadelphia and also to protect kratom consumers who use it to better their lives every single day. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you for your testimony, sir. If you want to state your name for the record and then proceed with your testimony.

Good afternoon, members of the Philadelphia City Council. My name is Christopher Dini. I am here to speak about Bill No. 260163. I support responsible regulation. I support age restrictions, third- party lab testing, clear labeling, consumer safety standards and enforcement against adulterated, synthetic and deceptively marketed products. But I'm asking Council not to turn regulation into prohibition. I was hit by a car when I was 8 years old, and I've lived with long-term pain, chronic discomfort and challenges that come along with trying to stay functional and productive and present for my family. About 2015, I started drinking natural kratom tea. I drank about 5 grams or one tablespoon. For me, natural kratom gave me a better quality of life. It has been about structure, balance and being able to keep moving forward responsibly. That real concern, the real concern should be synthetic kratom products, adulterated products, and chemically modified compounds being marketed as if they are the same as natural kratom. They are not the same. Natural kratom leaves, the traditional botanical product that has been used for hundreds of years, it comes from the Mitragyna speciosa tree or plant, which is related to coffee. It is used by adults in tea, leaf powder, tincture and capsule form. Synthetic kratom products are different. These can involve isolated alkaloids, altered compounds, manufactured ingredients or enhanced products do not reflect the natural leaf. The bill already recognizes this problem. It prohibits kratom products that contain synthetic mitragynine, synthetic 7-hydroxymitragynine or any other synthetically derived compounds of the kratom plant that is the right direction. The problem is the language requiring FDA approval under Section 505 of the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act. Natural kratom leaf is not a pharmaceutical drug. It does not belong in the same approval pathway as a prescription medication. If that language remains, the bill could effectively ban natural kratom leaf in the City of Philadelphia even when the product is tested, labeled age-restricted and free from synthetic compounds. Please amend the bill to separate natural kratom leaf from synthetic, adulterated, chemically modified or deceptively marketed kratom products. Kratom is already regulated by CFR Part 111, which is the FDA's rule for good manufacturing practices for dietary supplements. The FDA did conduct a dose-finding study in 2024, which shows that natural kratom is well- tolerated. Regulate the bad actors, set clear safety standards, require testing and accurate labeling. Keep synthetic kratom products out of the marketplace, but do not take responsible adults backward by banning access to natural kratom leaf. Regulate the marketplace, protect consumers, preserve access to natural pain relief. And I appreciate your time. Thank you.

20 Thank you. Thank you so much for 21 your testimony. And we do hear and we'll consider all those things brought up at today's hearing. Are there any questions from the committee? (No response.)

Seeing none, thank you so much. Mr. McMonagle, can you please read the next list of commenters.

Can we please have Sean Zamorano, Adam Suib and J.D. McCormick. (Witnesses approached witness table.)

Thank you. State your name for the record and then proceed with your testimony.

Sean Zamorano.

Please proceed.

Good afternoon, Councilmembers. My name is Sean Zamorano. I am a United States Navy veteran and a kratom consumer. Over the past years, I have watched this industry change from one that was focused on natural kratom into a marketplace flooded with synthetic and semi- synthetic products like 7-OH. These compounds interact with the opioid receptors in a much more aggressive way than natural kratom. These products can produce intense euphoria, and they leave the body quickly. This is what encourages compulsion and addiction. Natural kratom does not do this. This is why consumers have been able to use it responsibly for things like discomfort, quality of life, and staying away from more dangerous substances. One question lawmakers often ask is why hasn't kratom or why hasn't the federal government acted on kratom. The FDA completed an eight-factor analysis under the standards of the Controlled Substances Act and did not have cause to schedule natural kratom. The World Health Organization also conducted a scientific review and would not recommend an international ban. The DEA has not scheduled natural kratom, but a ban on synthetics is imminent. Natural plain leaf should not be treated the same as synthetics. I am asking City Council to strike this action in this ordinance that kratom must be approved by Section 505 of the Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act. This act is for pharmaceutical drugs. Applying it to a botanical supplement creates a standard that natural plant products cannot meet. And I do understand that you did make a small amendment. I know that you guys have probably received hundreds, if not thousands of emails from kratom consumers just like me. I encourage you to please take them into consideration when making your choice on natural kratom, because it has helped so many people and it saved my life. And in closing, I just want to say that I think me, you, and one other were the only kratom consumers here. And I know there's a lot more in Philadelphia that couldn't show up. But I hope that you guys, I encourage you to ask us some questions. As people who have been consuming natural kratom, it's been 11 years now. I've been consuming kratom and I've been fighting for kratom for almost that long. So thank you.

Chair recognizes Council Leader Gilmore Richardson.

Thank you. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. And I want to thank you for coming in and for your testimony and for being here for the duration of this proceeding. And you should be aware that we sent out a massive email. We did speak with a number of the kratom associations as well and I think they're here represented, American Healthy Alternatives Association, their Vice-Chairman and we reached out to as many folks as we could find and placed the information on social media as well and asked folks to share. We did receive outreach via email from a number of kratom consumers. And they did not indicate that they would come to the hearing today to provide public testimony and/or written testimony for this proceeding. Okay. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Please state your name for the record and proceed with your testimony.

My name is Adam Suib.

Please proceed.

Good afternoon. My name is Adam. I am a father, a business owner, and I am a former heroin addict. Fortunately, I have ten years clean. I was able to change my life. I'm one of the lucky ones. Years ago I overdosed and I had to be revived with Narcan. I tried over and over and over to get clean, rehab meetings, 12-step programs, sponsorship, cold turkey. You name it, I tried it. Sometimes I did put, you know, some decent clean time together, but it just didn't really stick for me. Then somebody introduced me to plain leaf kratom, and that is what changed my life. Since that day, I haven't had a single drink or drug since. I'm a business owner. I have three kids at home that I raise. Kratom helped me become a present father, run my business, live a stable life. What frustrates me is that traditional kratom is now being grouped together with dangerous, highly-concentrated products that have started appearing in the market. 7-OH is one of the big ones. There's a couple different offshoots from that. These are not kratom products. These are totally different things. 7-hydroxymitragynine doesn't occur naturally in kratom. There's this misconception that when the leaves come off the tree, 7-OH is kratom. It's not. It's a metabolite. Those products are not what many long-term kratom consumers have been using responsibly for years. Kratom is also not intoxicating in the slightest. It is not legal for sale under a loophole. It's legal for sale under the same conditions as turmeric, fish oil, St. John's- wort, melatonin. These are just things I could think of off the top of my head. I would encourage looking at the Act of 1994. The FDA does not approve creative products like kratom. They remove dangerous products, post-market entry if they are proven to be dangerous, which they have not. Synthetics are dangerous and that is why they are being actively removed and pure leaf is not. If there are concerns about purely kratom products, then I would suggest regulating those products directly, age-gating, lab testing, things like that, manufacturing standards. This ordinance would effectively ban all pure leaf kratom unless it receives FDA approval. And that just fundamentally misunderstands how these products are treated under the law. They don't approve botanical supplements the same way they approve prescription drugs. Their role is to remove the dangerous products. Despite years of scrutiny, kratom in itself has not been federally banned, and the broader scientific and public health landscape does not support this kind of prohibition. HHS did not support federal scheduling. The World Health Organization reviewed kratom and declined to recommend an international ban. Data and research from the CDC, Johns Hopkins, University of Florida and many others do not support this type of action. The data from the CDC alone says, what is it, a little over 90% of the kratom-involved deaths were all polysubstance. So that means if I use fentanyl and I die or if I get in a car accident and I die and my toxicology has kratom, that's now a kratom-involved death. Even though it didn't kill me, it's in my toxicology. So now, it's kratom- involved. And 90% of those were mostly fentanyl. And so, there's a lot of confusion with that. I understand wanting to protect public health. I do too, but creating an ordinance 2 that effectively bans plain leaf kratom because of concerns around concentrated synthetic-style products will hurt people like me and thousands of others in PA. I will admit I'm a little disappointed that there's only three of us here when I know there are thousands of people in Philadelphia that use pure leaf kratom. I personally get emails from people almost every day, how can I get off 7-OH. What is it, the MGM, I hear from these people and they were tricked by these bad actors. They put these drugs in the marketplace and say this is a kratom product. And so, people think they're using just a better way to use these products.

But really, it's something totally different. And I talk to these people every day. So I'm not big when it comes to legal jargon. I don't know what the amendments were that were made, but I'm just hoping that you take this into consideration. Pure leaf kratom is not the same thing as these synthetics. We want these synthetics gone just as much as everybody else. Thank you.

Well, thank you so much for your testimony. And it means a lot to hear all sides of these conversations. And hopefully, we'll get to a point that manages both the usable form of kratom and the synthetic and the other forms that are preying on people really in the guise of helping them, making them put them in the worst position. So thank you for your testimony. Any questions from the committee? The Chair recognizes Council Majority Leader Gilmore Richardson.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I wanted to thank you also for sharing your perspective and also your story and congratulate you on ten years of sobriety and for starting your business and being able to be there for your family. That's the most important thing in life is our family. So thank you very much for sharing that information. And I wanted to ask you a quick question. Relative to the testing in your business, are you able to test the products? We talked about this earlier. How do you test the products?

Oh, we send them directly to a third-party lab.

You do the third-party lab?

Yeah, we send them to a third -- so what we do is we send a sample directly to a third-party lab. And then we keep it, retain the sample. So we send one to the lab and then we keep one. So the lab test does all the testing, and then say a customer reaches out and says, oh, I'm having issues with this product and we get a couple. Then we have that retained sample that we can send back to another lab. So those are just two steps right there that provide protection. And a lot of people think that there's no way to tell the difference between pure leaf kratom and the synthetics. And that's just not true whatsoever.

And I will say in compiling the amendments that we have offered for consideration to the committee from a regulation and enforcement perspective, it would be nearly impossible for the City of Philadelphia to test every single product that is offered in a number of not only convenience stores, shops, stands. It would be nearly impossible for us to test every single product that is being offered. And that's the challenge that we find ourselves in while we are seeking to create a process that will be helpful to what we have been hearing from our community. So I just wanted to ask, and we talked about the testing earlier and notate that for the record. Okay. Thank you.

Thank you again for your testimony. Thank you. Mr. McMonagle, can you read the next set of people to testify for public comment.

Can we please have Brandon Thompson and David Keller. (Witnesses approached witness table.)

Thank you all for your patience during this hearing. State your name for the record and you can proceed with your testimony.

My name is David Keller. I would like to thank you for your patience. It's been a long day. So I had something I prepared, but I'd like to kind of go a little off book here. My name is Dave Keller. I own a series of stores called Paper and Leaf. I'm a cannabis specific company, specifically hemp-derived cannabinoids. My history and pedigree is actually having worked years 4 in the pharmaceutical industry, 5 develop and operationalizing 6 clinical trials for pharmaceutical 7 compounds before I took the leap 8 over to this. I'd like to kind of 9 introduce a little bit of a 10 personal story. I've heard a lot 11 of things, rhetoric regarding the 12 specific products and whatnot, but 13 really outside of a couple of 14 people talking about kratom, 15 haven't been a lot of kind of advocacy stories. I grew up as Scruff McGruff's right-hand man, like the war on drugs, like eggs in a frying pan, all of it bought in hook, line and sinker. My younger brother had very, very severe emotional issues growing up. He couldn't self- regulate. He was effectively kind of totally cast out in terms of social circles because of mental disorders that he couldn't find relief for in the pharmaceutical industry. He used marijuana in order to be able to rectify that. From his use there, he was able to move into a comfortable spot. He found friends, found his niche and very unfortunately, due to a tragic accident he passed away about years ago. I was 13 severely judgmental towards him 14 growing up for his marijuana use. 15 It's one of my biggest regrets in 16 life. And one of the reasons for 17 that is because of the stigma that 18 regulations, such as what is being 19 proposed, placed on it, that 20 cannabis is evil. Utilization of 21 cannabis is evil. There's no real therapeutic use. It's recreational, and only that in a total sense. My business was started to responsibly sell these products to individuals for effectively therapeutic use. Now, you can make the argument that, well, Pennsylvania has a medicinal marijuana industry for that. True; however, there are a great number of product segments that the medicinal marijuana industry in Pennsylvania doesn't service that the hemp industry does, such as beverages and gummies and things of that nature. There's difficulties in terms of getting medical cards, and that is where companies like mine with similar floor plans of what Craig had defined, which is the anti-smoke shop. So I'm going to be brief here because honestly, I need to get home for my kids. It sounds like the issue here is not so much the availability of the products. I've heard a lot of supporters for this bill and a lot of opponents, and I think a lot of people, including us, this bill, which is very, very well-intentioned and I support it, these smoke shops, trust me, I dislike them probably even more so than you or a lot of people that spoke in support of this bill. However. The issue that we have here is a retailer issue, not so much a product issue. This bill eliminates the product piece, but the retailer piece is going to remain. So let's say we remove 7-OH. Let's say we remove THC products from these retailers. They're going to move on to something else. They're going to move on to a new designer drug that's even less regulated than what's already on the marketplace. A reputable hemp dispensary, if you will, for the most part self-regulates. Every single product that I have is tested in an ISO-certified lab. Every single product I have does have a QR code on it. Every single product that I carry is not in such an excessive dose that it can cause harm to the people that purchase it. And there are many, many operators like myself out there that are not these stores. These stores are the problem, not the product itself. So I think we need to come up with a legislative solution that actually limits the exposure of these stores to the people, rather than the product category itself.

And I'll give you an example of why I'm not just speculating on this. Ohio very recently passed a hemp ban, and I'm involved in several different Ohio groups that involve hundreds of different retailers. And that ban, I can say a lot of these retailers that did operate these types of stores simply looked for the next thing that they can push onto their customers legally. I don't want that for Philadelphia. I've lived in Philadelphia and that is where this is going to head. If this passes, as it stands, it's a game of Whack-a-Mole. And in order to be able to come out on top, we need to deal with putting guardrails on the retail establishments rather than the product categories themselves. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Thank you for your testimony. Please state your name for the record and proceed.

Jackson Essex. I'd like to start off with a little bit of history about myself. I've been a harm reduction advocate for most of my life. When I was at Ithaca College, I 6 helped to draft a medical amnesty 7 policy, which was later adopted by 8 the state of New York and has 9 saved, in my opinion, many people's 10 lives. It's something that's 11 important to me on a personal 12 level. 13 Beyond that, I've been 14 in the retail sphere for 18 years 15 now. I don't just work at this job 16 because it's a paycheck. I work 17 here because I believe in the 18 products we sell. I truly do believe they help people. Much as we were talking about, I am from the company Craig was advocating for earlier. Anti-smoke shop is a good way to put it. We are not here to push these things as intoxicating substances. We are not here to sell these things to children. They do not have bright, colorful packaging. We are here mainly for people like the two gentlemen who spoke earlier who have had substance abuse issues in the past, or even for people who haven't, who need something to help them get through the day and haven't found something from the pharmaceutical industry that can do that. I have agreed with a lot of the things I've heard here today even from people who are very much in favor of the bill, especially around regulation. One thing that I kept noticing was people saying for the last couple of years, for the last few years, kratom has been well-known in the harm reduction community for the last 30 years. It's not a new thing to us. 7-OH has been horrible for the harm reduction community. It has led to kratom bans in many states, in townships, counties. We're not fans. I would like nothing more than to see it taken off the shelves. And I would also like to see more regulation around what retailers could sell it. I do also agree with some of the legislation around where these stores could be. I think that that's apt and appropriate. At the same time we've had some talk about what would that look like, how would testing be accomplished. I see no reason not to put the onus on the companies who want to sell these products. Have a licensing program where you need to have third party testing that's sent into the city before you can get your license. Rather than kind of letting things pop up and play Whack-a-Mole. I'm also a man about town in Philadelphia. I check in with a lot of the local smoke shops. I know a lot of those business owners, speak to them on a weekly basis. I know people who also believe in what they do and do things above board. I also know people who are selling things under the counter. They are not going to stop because of a bill like this, not with the enforcement that Philadelphia can afford to put out, making it so that there are trusted stores where people know what they're getting, know what's tested, makes those stores less appealing. So, yeah, in short I don't think I worry that this would be tantamount to a total ban, that that would lead to people who are using it for harm reduction, no 1 longer being able to access these products. And I'd urge the Council to take a moment, reassess. And if you'd like, come on down to our store. I'd be happy to email anybody our schedule. And I would love to talk to you a bit more.

9 Thank you. Thank you so much for 10 your testimony. 11 Are there any questions 12 from the committee? 13 The Chair recognizes 14 Council Leader Gilmore Richardson. 15

Thank you. Thank you 17 very much, Mr. Chair. 18 Thank you both for your 19 testimony. I had a very quick 20 question because I could not hear 21 what you were saying at the end 22 very well. You said something 23 about your store. Did you say a 24 store? I didn't hear --

Yes, I manage two stores. One in Wynnefield Heights here in Philadelphia and one over in Media.

You said Wynnefield Heights?

Yes.

Is it by the Target?

Yes.

Okay. All right. Thank you. I didn't hear what you said. Thank you very much.

All right. Thank you. Any questions? (No response.)

Seeing none, is there anyone else to testify on this bill, on the list? If not, if you do want to testify and you haven't had time, please make your way up to the table. (Witnesses approached witness table.)

Thank you. Just state your name for the record and then you can proceed with your testimony.

Thank you. My name is Bonnie Halda. Good afternoon and thank you for giving me an opportunity to testify. I'm testifying as part of public comment and as a resident of Philadelphia. I'm not representing any organization or any other type of agency. Again, my name is Bonnie Halda. I live in Society Hill. I've lived in Philadelphia for a little over 35 years. When I first moved here in the 1990s, it was a different city. And as I lived here, worked here, and really made a commitment to being a true Philadelphian, I saw Philadelphia change. I saw it improve. I saw businesses come in that interested me. I saw more residents come in. I saw vibrancy, festivals, amenities and it really became a special place to me to live and work. However, recently what I've really seen is a proliferation of the smoke shops, the illegal nuisance businesses. So my comments today are about the bill 14 that is the illegal smoke shop accountability bill. I'm not really commenting on the intoxicating substances, but I do realize they are linked. I am very concerned about the proliferation of these illegal nuisance businesses, primarily on South Street and Old City. I live right in between those two neighborhoods and I think that these businesses have really been a detriment to everything that the progressive city is trying to be. I think that they have made some of the areas less desirable, less welcoming and have really had an impact on the quality of life, and that's for residents such as myself, but also visitors, especially this year with the 250th. With Philadelphia welcoming people from all over worldwide, we need to have welcoming neighborhoods. We need to emphasize the quality of life for businesses, for residents and for visitors. Lastly, I have been very involved in my community. I've been volunteering for a lot of things that involve the quality of life. One of my most recent volunteer initiatives has been with the Head House Square, and thanks to the generous funding that we've received from the city. I watch now as Head House is starting to be renovated, starting to be improved and I think that this area Head House Square can really serve to be a real center for revitalizing a part of our city that really needs it. And I think that the smoke shops could be very much a detriment to that forward progress that we're trying to make. So thank you for your time.

Thank you so much for your testimony. Any questions from the committee? (No response.)

Is there anyone else here who did not get a chance to testify and wants to testify on Bill Nos. 260162 or 260163? (No response.)

Seeing none, there being no further questions from the members of the committee and no other witnesses to testify, I'll ask that there's anyone present to hearing whose name we have failed to call, that wishes to offer testimony on these bills and resolutions we consider today? (No response.)

Hearing none, I want to thank all the panels of witnesses for their participation. We will now go into a public meeting on Bill No. 19 260167 -- oh, I'm sorry. As for the record, we are holding Bill No. 260167 at the call of the Chair. As we're in our public meeting, the Chair will now recognize Councilmember Gilmore Richardson for a motion to the amendment to Bill No. 260465.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I offer an amendment to Bill No. 260465. A copy of the amendment has been circulated to all members of the committee. I move that the amendment to Bill No. 11 260465 be approved. (Duly seconded.)

Thank you. The Chair notes for the record that Councilmember Jones seconds. The motion has been moved and properly seconded that the amendment to Bill No. 260465 be approved. All those in favor signify by saying aye. (Aye.)

Those opposed? (No response.)

The ayes have it. And the motion carries. An amendment to Bill No. 5 260465 has been approved. The Chair now recognizes Councilmember Gilmore Richardson for a motion on Bill No. 260465 as amended.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I move that Bill No. 14 260465 as amended be reported from this committee with a favorable recommendation and further move that the rules of Council be suspended as to permit first reading of this bill at the next session of Council. (Duly seconded.)

Chair notes for the record that Councilmember Jones seconds. The motion has been moved and properly seconded that Bill No. 260465 as amended be reported from this committee with a favorable recommendation and further move that the rules of Council be suspended to permit the first reading of this bill at the next session of Council. All those in favor signify by saying aye. (Aye.)

Those opposed? (No response.)

The ayes have it and the motion carries. The Chair now recognizes Councilmember Gilmore for a motion to the amendment to Bill No. 22 260163.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I offer an amendment to Bill No. 260163. A copy of the amendment has been circulated to all members of the committee. I move that the amendment to Bill No. 7 260163 be approved. (Duly seconded.)

Chair notes for the record that Councilmember Jones seconds. The motion has been moved and properly seconded that the amendment to Bill 14 No. 260163 be approved. All those in favor of the motion will signify by saying aye. (Aye.)

Those opposed? (No response.)

The ayes have it and the motion carries. An amendment to Bill No. 1 260163 has been approved. The Chair now recognizes Councilmember Gilmore Richardson for a motion to Bill No. 260163 as amended.

Thank you, 8 Mr. Chairman. 9 I move that Bill No. 10 260163 as amended be reported from 11 this committee with a favorable 12 recommendation and further move 13 that the rules of Council be 14 suspended as to permit first 15 reading of this bill at the next 16 session of Council. 17 (Duly seconded.) 18

19 Chair notes for the record that 20 Councilmember Jones seconded. The 21 motion has been moved and properly 22 seconded that Bill No. 260163 as 23 amended be reported from this 24 committee with a favorable recommendation and further move that the rules of Council be suspended as to the first reading of this bill at the next session of Council. All those in favor signify by saying aye. (Aye.)

Those opposed? (No response.)

The ayes have it and the motion carries. Chair recognizes Councilmember Gilmore Richardson for a motion on Bill No. 260162.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I move that Bill No. 22 260162 be reported from this committee with a favorable recommendation and further move that the rules of Council be suspended as to permit first reading of this bill at the next session of Council. (Duly seconded.)

For the record, Councilmember Jones seconds the motion. It has been moved and properly seconded that Bill No. 2600162 be reported from this committee with a favorable recommendation and further move that the rules be suspended as to permit the first reading of this bill at the next session of Council. All those in favor signify by saying aye. (Aye.)

Those opposed? (No response.)

Ayes have it and the motion carries. That will conclude our business before the Committee on Commerce and Economic Development today. Thank you all very much for your attendance and participation.

Good job, Chairman. Thank you. - - - (Committee on Commerce and Economic Development concluded at 3:35 p.m.) - - - C E R T I F I C A T I O N I, hereby certify that the proceedings and evidence noted are contained fully and accurately in the stenographic notes taken by me in the foregoing matter, and that this is a correct transcript of the same. _______________________________ TANEHA CARROLL