Following rejection by their first choice, CCC members deliberate replacement process then vote to make offer to Holliston Town Manager Travis Ahern
At a public meeting on Wednesday during what has been a busy month with the body also introducing draft regulations for Social Consumption Establishments, the Massachusetts Cannabis Control Commission voted to offer the top job of executive director to one of the finalists from a vast field of candidates. The body will attempt to enter salary negotiations with Travis Ahern, currently the town manager of Holliston.
Ahern was the group’s second choice after a monthslong nationwide search. The first pick was David Lakeman, a former CCC Director of Government Affairs who left Massachusetts in 2022 for the Illinois Department of Agriculture, where he’s currently the cannabis division manager. Commissioners offered the post to Lakeman, but earlier this month he shocked the Bay State and industry stakeholders by declining the position.
In response to the news, the commission released a statement saying it’s “appreciative of Mr. Lakeman’s consideration of our offer to take on the Executive Director role in Massachusetts and respects his decision to remain in Illinois.” If there was mostly quiet disappointment bubbling within the CCC, across the state, the groans among cannabis business owners and industry watchers were loud enough to hear from Worcester.
Deliberations around proceeding with Ahern
Acting CCC Chair Bruce Stebbins opened this Wednesday’s meeting reflecting on the process the group already went through. “Based on my recruiting and hiring other candidates in a similar position,” he said, “I was doubtful, maybe a little skeptical, not that we couldn’t or wouldn’t find experienced, incredible candidates, but whether three or more professionals would want to participate in such a public interview process.”
Stebbins continued, “Each candidate brought their own set of unique skills and professional experience and they all warranted our consideration. After careful discussion and interviews with commissioners in October, we voted to move ahead and enter into negotiations and hopefully identify a start date with David Lakeman. … Mr. Lakeman ultimately made the decision to stay at his current position for both personal and professional reasons. I respect that decision and again respect his willingness to go through the process.”
The acting chair was clear from the start of Wednesday’s meeting about his goals and intentions—to proceed with the next steps to meet their obligations to appoint a new executive director, and for that new ED to be Travis Ahern. Stebbins even noted early on that he hoped to set a starting date.
Commissioner Kimberly Roy, often the voice of reasonable though sometimes awkward dissent on the body, expressed skepticism about the motions in progress to simply bump Ahern up in Lakeman’s place. Roy emphasized that they didn’t give numbered scores to all the candidates, leaving the open question of whether the perceived penultimate selection really came in second place. “I have a different philosophy of what we should have done moving forward,” the commissioner said.
Saying that her beef was with the process rather than the prospect, Roy also raised some points that seem worthy of upcoming consideration. She mentioned previous discussion of Ahern potentially being a good fit for another role besides ED at the commission, and asked to see the “public statement” that Lakeman sent the commission. Things then got briefly weird, with Stebbins saying, “We can certainly see if we can find it.” To which Chief People Officer and acting ED Debra Hilton-Creek added, “That statement was meant to be released after discussions, but we’re not in that same place right now.”
What started off like a scenario that would have sent these same members to the mat just a few months ago, however, quickly simmered. Commissioner Nurys Camargo said that gleaning from the conversations she already had with Ahern during the initial search process, she was “okay with moving forward.”
“What I would love to see and what we need to do,” Camargo said, “is move quickly.”
How the search for a new executive director started
It was a year ago that Massachusetts Cannabis Control Commission Executive Director Shawn Collins announced his resignation from the agency. Prior to that, his employment status had been unclear since July 2023, when then-CCC Chair Shannon O’Brien shocked industry stakeholders, fellow members, and Collins alike with an unwelcome impromptu human resources announcement during a public meeting.
Quite a bit has changed at the commission since that mass commotion, especially around job titles, duties, and positions. O’Brien was suspended and then eventually fired, while the remaining commissioners played musical chairs in the top appointed spot. Meanwhile, last October, members tapped Chief People Officer Debra Hilton-Creek to serve as acting ED, but then clashed eight months later as some members moved to redelegate her director duties to various department heads.
In January 2024, the CCC established an executive director search committee to “identify and engage search committee participants,” and to write a new job description. The regulations that established the agency left room for interpretation when it came to who does what around here and who is basically in charge, aggravations that demonstrably spurred confusion and disagreements between hired and appointed employees. Toward the end of her active tenure, O’Brien even questioned the intended statutory pecking order at a public meeting.
The results of the CCC’s initial executive director search
With a new job description, commissioners made clarifications. And in October, roughly 10 months after officially starting their search, the three active members at the time—Nurys Camargo, Kimberly Roy, and Bruce Stebbins, the chair—chose former CCC Director of Government Affairs David Lakeman to fill the position Collins left last December. The unanimous vote came after interviews with four finalist candidates.
The three commissioners narrowed the field of four down to two—Lakeman, and Travis Ahern, the town administrator for the Town of Holliston. “I think both candidates bring unique sets of skills to this role,” Camargo said in October. Despite having had some legendary stalemates in the past, after conducting interviews and meeting with each other over a span of more than six hours, all members approved a motion to direct the agency to enter salary negotiations with Lakeman.
After Lakeman backed out, the agency wrote in a statement, “After reviewing more than 170 candidates for the position, on Oct. 28, the Commission interviewed four finalists who conveyed interest in managing our 140-person staff and helping to maintain and grow the Commonwealth’s reputation as a leader in legal cannabis nationwide. The Commission is considering next steps for the hire, and any decisions to move forward will be noticed and voted upon as part of a future public meeting, according to the normal course.”
But what’s the normal course for something that an agency has never done before?
An Open Meeting Law complaint
At the Dec. 17 meeting of the Cannabis Control Commission, members acknowledged a Massachusetts Open Meeting Law complaint filed by Meghan Dube. A watchful eye on the inside, Dube is the CCC’s business operations manager, and took issue with discussions that were had in two private executive sessions that could have impacted the body’s course of action in proceeding in the wake of Lakeman’s rejection.
Filed with the Attorney General’s Office on Dec. 5, Dube’s complaint (which cites Talking Joints Memo as well as Boston Globe coverage) reads: “Given that no scoring of candidates was completed at the October 28, 2024 Public Meeting and that all deliberation and candidate selection has to be completed in Public, it appears that there may have been an Executive Session to deliberate and select a new top candidate. There were two Executive Sessions held since the selected candidate declined the offer on November 19, 2024. These Executive Sessions were held on November 25, 2024 and December 4, 2024.
“This appears to be a violation of Open Meeting Law as deliberation about and candidate selection for Executive Director would not be an appropriate use of Executive Session.”
Under a section asking what action she wants the CCC “to take in response to your complaint,” Dube wrote, “Cease any negotiations related to hiring of CCC Executive Director until deliberations and selection is completed in public and immediately publicly release any 11/25/24 and 12/4/24 Executive Session recordings / minutes related to deliberations and selection of the next CCC Executive Director.”
Commissioners move forward with Ahern
Once all of the commissioners informally appeared to be on board with Ahern, CCC members and staffers started to address the ED’s salary and other particulars. Hilton-Creek said the position was posted for a range of $156,000 to $187,000, and “depending on the experience and background … there would be a consideration up to a maximum of $217,000.” Shawn Collins earned $201,879 in his last full year as CCC ED in Mass.
After meeting for about an hour, all four current commissioners voted unanimously to initiate negotiations with Ahern following a background check. Commissioner Roy remained skeptical, but found some comfort in a tandem motion they passed to go back and reevaluate the process if their second choice rejects them too.
Roy said that she voted yes because there were adequate safeguards in place for a contingency plan, but asked for the commission to aim for increased transparency on such essential matters in the future.