On Thursday morning, Upper West Side Councilmember Gale Brewer was all set to take a victory lap in her more than year-long quest to get the illicit weed shop Zaza Waza, which opened its doors in April of 2022, closed. On Wednesday, according to Politico, the City's Department of Consumer and Worker Protection padlocked Zaza Waza's door, citing the shop not for selling weed without a license, but for "repeatedly selling untaxed tobacco products," and Brewer planned a triumphant press conference to, as NY1 noted, "show how the City can successfully utilize tobacco law to shut down unlicensed sellers."
Zaza Waza has been under more scrutiny than the vast majority of New York City's weed bodegas. NY1 reported that since it opened, the store has been issued dozens of violations and fines worth $225,000. In 2023, Brewer also claimed a sort of premature victory, after the Sheriff's Office cleared Zaza Waza of its wares—only for the store to be fully stocked with weed two days later.
Earlier this year, the landlord, after being warned by the Sheriff's Office that they would be fined if they didn't take action against Zaza Waza, the landlord sued their own tenant for violating the lease by selling unlicensed tobacco and cannabis products.
But even with all of this enforcement, Zaza Waza was not to be denied—somehow, by yesterday morning, the weed shop was open again, a move that Brewer said was "pretty lawless."
Zaza Waza's reopening this week, however, was brief. On Thursday, the NYPD, according to CBS, "cut the store's locks and replaced them with new ones," closing the store yet again.
If this is what it takes to get a single illicit weed operation shut down, it's hard to imagine the City succeeding in clearing the path for legal cannabis providers. What are we going to do, devote the full force of the City bureaucracy to an anti-weed bodega campaign?
As for the legislation that would give the City more authority to shut down illicit shops, its passage isn't exactly guaranteed—while both the governor and the State Senate are in support, the Assembly is more tepid. Zaza Waza is dead, long live Zaza Waza.
And now some links that refuse to be shut down:
- A man was shot on an A train in Downtown Brooklyn on Thursday. Video posted online shows the man, who was shot by his own gun, went on an anti-migrant rant before the physical altercation began.
- The massive redevelopment of Willets Point inches closer to reality.
- "Housing Vouchers to Be Reinstated Following Settlement With Social Services"
- Via the New York Times: "A few days after a violent confrontation in which the police struck and used a stun gun on a Venezuelan migrant at a City-run shelter in Queens, that man’s family and three other families staying at the shelter received unexpected news with little explanation: They had to move out. Two of the families said in interviews that they were told to pack their belongings and were then placed in taxicabs and Ubers that dropped them off at other shelters. The abrupt relocations and lack of clarity—shelter staff told them only that they were being moved for “security reasons” — left the families scrambling for answers in their new environs. 'We weren’t even given a warning,' said Alexander Monsalve, 40, who was put into a car with his wife and two daughters around 9 p.m. on Tuesday that dropped them off about 30 miles away, at a hotel on Staten Island that had been turned into a migrant shelter. 'I don't know what's going on.'"
- Donald Trump's trial over his hush money payments to Stormy Daniels will likely be pushed back.
- "Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie Has Been Dating a Legislative Lobbyist"
- The head of the TWU continues to be very upset at Governor Kathy Hochul.
- "NYPD Ousts Vendors Selling Islamic Goods Just Before Ramadan"
- This weirdly contentious saga between the feds and the Adams admin over a paltry amount of migrant funding is finally over.
- "We won't see behavior change until these buildings are taken from landlords or they're arrested."
- "Climate activists halt Jeremy Strong, Michael Imperioli Broadway play 'An Enemy of the People' mid-show"
- Via Streetsblog: "The driver who ran down and killed an 8-year-old boy as he came home from school on Wednesday was driving with a valid license despite having been previously arrested four times for driving without a license, cops said. It's unclear why Jose Barcia, who cops say killed Bayron Palomino Arroyo on 31st Avenue in East Elmhurst, was able to obtain a driver's license after his quartet of arrests for getting behind the wheel without a license in 2009 and 2010."
- And finally, some good news: Offshore wind power (whose long-term prospects in the state are admittedly murky) has finally arrived in New York!
