Thor Benson / Cannabis News Box Contributor

We’ve talked about Nevada’s need for cannabis lounges before, but it looks like Las Vegas could be on its way to making them happen. According to the Las Vegas Sun, officials in the city are working on regulations that would allow cannabis lounges to open as soon as March of 2018.

Will Adler, director of the Sierra Cannabis Coalition in Nevada, told Cannabis News Box he thinks these regulations have about a 50-50 chance of going through. He thinks there is support for lounges in Las Vegas and the rest of Nevada, but people are worried about regulating lounges properly, how the federal government is going to handle social use cannabis in the future and more.

“The state of Nevada had the ability to do this this session,” Adler said. “We had a bill to do it, and it didn’t go anywhere. In a Democratic held senate and assembly, it didn’t even make it to the governor’s desk.”

One of the problems critics of plans like this one have brought up is that lounges cannot legally sell cannabis under Nevada’s current cannabis law, only dispensaries can, so people would likely end up bringing cannabis to the lounges from unknown sources. Those sources could be from within the black market.

“How do you know what’s going into this social club?” Adler asked.

Adler said they could set it up so people have to bring receipts for the cannabis they purchased to get into a club or the dispensaries could deliver the cannabis to the lounge for them, but that might get complex and become unappealing to tourists. He said if they don’t do this right, it could cause major problems.

“If they do the ordinance right, and put a lot of details and restrictions in there, that’ll be great,” Adler said.

With Attorney General Jeff Sessions often expressing his desire to go after social use cannabis in states that have legalized, many worry about putting their state in his crosshairs by allowing too much cannabis access and use. Lounges could be one thing Sessions might want to put a stop to, but no one can be sure until he acts on his plans.

“The federal government has its finger on the marijuana button right now,” Adler said. “I think caution is always to be taken with anything marijuana-related right now.”

With millions of people passing through Las Vegas every year, many are going to want to buy cannabis now that it’s legal in the state. But, there’s currently no where they can consume it. Until lounges come, they’ll likely consume it in public or in their hotel rooms illegally. However, if lounges aren’t properly regulated, they could get out of control and possibly cause the federal government to intervene.