2 top managers suspended at Cannabis Control Commission

Two top managers at the state’s Cannabis Control Commission were suspended this month, adding to the turmoil surrounding the embattled agency, whose chair also is currently suspended.

Acting Executive Director Debbie Hilton-Creek suspended chief communications officer Cedric Sinclair and director of human resources Justin Shrader on Dec. 4, according to two people with direct knowledge of the events who are not authorized to speak publicly.

Shrader has since resigned from the commission, according to a copy of his resignation letter described to WBUR. The commission has also posted his position on its online job board.

The reasons for the latest suspensions have not been disclosed. A commission spokesperson declined to answer questions for this story, saying the agency does not comment on “internal personnel matters.”

Reached by phone last week, Shrader declined to comment before hanging up. Sinclair did not respond to emails or calls from WBUR.

The suspensions were handed down the same week the former executive director, Shawn Collins, officially stepped down from his former role, and commission Chair Shannon O'Brien went to court to stop a review of her own suspension by Treasurer Deborah Goldberg.

“The management staff overseeing the commission, the agency, is in disarray,” said state Sen. Michael Moore, who has advocated for more scrutiny of the commission. “We need an oversight hearing. We need to find out what’s going on, what’s taken place.”

Goldberg had tapped O’Brien for the post overseeing the state’s $5 billion cannabis business in 2022. But she suspended O'Brien with pay in September. According to records made public in court, a commission investigation found O’Brien had made “racially, ethnically, culturally insensitive” comments, including using the word “yellow” in reference to an Asian person.

Goldberg also alleged that O'Brien yelled at an executive assistant and inappropriately referred to Collins, the former executive director, as "missing in action" while he was on paternity leave.

O’Brien says her words were taken out of context and that she’s being denied due process. In court filings, she said she’s being punished for trying to do the job Goldberg appointed her to do — reform a commission in need of an overhaul. The clash between the two officials appears to have been sparked when O'Brien publicly described the commission as an agency “in crisis.”

The commission has a number of key positions vacant and a rift has developed between its staff and the board, according to current and former employees. The disconnect is so extreme that the death of a 27-year-old woman working at a cannabis facility in 2022 was not reported to the board for months. 

Sinclair joined the cannabis commission in 2018 after working as communications director for UMass Boston’s College of Advancing and Professional Studies, according to the commission's website and his personal LinkedIn page. Shrader's LinkedIn shows he was hired by the commission in 2022 after working as human resources director for the city of Everett.

These additional departures only raise more questions, lawmakers say, about instability at a commission tasked with overseeing a young but growing industry that sends valuable tax dollars to the state.

“This agency, to have lost basically all of its management team in 10 to 11 months, I think that signifies that there’s a problem there,” Moore, the state senator, said.