Mass CCC: More Infighting Revelations

They just keep on coming

Contrarian Boston write at their substack

Another day, another coup attempt at the CCC: Embattled state pot watchdog plagued by another round of infighting

The Cannabis Control Commission’s first chair suddenly resigned under mysterious circumstances, with the agency only announcing the change when contacted by the local news media.

Brought in to try and reform a dysfunctional agency with a reputation for backbiting and mismanagement, Shannon O’Brien, a former Democratic nominee for governor, fared worse: she was suspended as chair last September over, among other things, flimsy allegations that she had made a racist remark.

Now Debbie Hilton-Creek, the commission’s acting executive director, is the latest to find herself in the crosshairs, as the agency’s penchant for palace intrigue and plotting rears its head again.

More (Paywall)

https://scottvanvoorhis.substack.com/p/06022024

Learn more at

https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7203321881477689344/

He adds on his Linked In

NEW OVERNIGHT;

Per sources, a number of shocking news stories are expected to run in the coming days regarding the ongoing chaos, and attempted coups, within the Massachusetts CCC.

I understand the dam has broken and a staff playbook to prevent reforms of the agency has been exposed.

I am also about to report that, on Friday, a major employment hearing related to currently-suspended CCC Chair Shannon O’Brien will take place.

From what I understand, from sources indirectly familiar with the matter, a number of witnesses will testify on O’Brien’s behalf as to a “plan” by some CCC staff members to “take out” O’Brien for O’Brien’s attempts to reform an internal culture within the agency long-reported (on this feed and elsewhere) to be rife with conflicts of interest, nepotism, abuse and cover-ups.

Over the fall of 2023, and the winter of 2024, I reported a number of stories (escalating in severity) as to resignations within the CCC, Ethics Committee and State OIG investigations of the agency and, then, shocking a federal probe was confirmed (by the Boston Globe) into the regulatory juggernaut.

Earlier this week, in June of 2024, further reports emerged in the hashtag#mapoli media apparatus, via Scott Van Voorhis, indicating that some staffers, still with the CCC, tried, as recently as May of 2024, to run the same playbook on acting agency Executive Director Debbie Hilton-Creek.

Hilton-Creek, a military veteran with 25 years experience running a complex bureaucratic institution, is apparently being subject to retaliation by allies of former agency ED Shawn Collins, and allies of former COO Cedric Sinclair and HR Head Justin Shrader, after Hilton-Creeek’s sweeping reform efforts in the fall of 2023 led to the ouster of the three controversial former government officials.

Just last week, reporting in WBUR 90.9 FM confirmed my 2023 coverage related to serious allegations of abuse against Sinclair (and allegations that Collins and Shrader helped to cover up same).

This story is developing. Presumed innocent, etc.