PA Cannabis Coalition, Aplt. v. 23rd Judicial Dist

[J-57-2025] IN THE SUPREME COURT OF PENNSYLVANIA MIDDLE DISTRICT TODD, C.J., DONOHUE, DOUGHERTY, WECHT, MUNDY, BROBSON, McCAFFERY, JJ.

D.M. AND THE PENNSYLVANIA : No. 73 MAP 2024 CANNABIS COALITION : : Appeal from the Order of the : Commonwealth Court at 283 MD v. : 2023 on August 21, 2024. : : SUBMITTED: June 17, 2025 23RD JUDICIAL DISTRICT, BERKS : COUNTY : : : APPEAL OF: PENNSYLVANIA CANNABIS : COALITION :

OPINION

JUSTICE MUNDY DECIDED: March 26, 2026 This is a direct appeal from a Commonwealth Court order dismissing a petition for review for lack of standing. The question presented is whether a cannabis trade association has standing to challenge a judicial district’s policy concerning the use of medical marijuana by treatment-court participants, based on the alleged financial harm such policy causes to the association’s member dispensaries through the loss of sales.

Appellee, the 23rd Judicial District of Pennsylvania (Berks County), offers several treatment court programs designed to help defendants with substance abuse and mental- health issues through a non-adversarial process that integrates legal proceedings and treatment strategies. 1 Per the 23rd Judicial District’s policy and procedure manual, These include a DUI treatment court, a veteran’s treatment court, a mental health treatment court, and a drug treatment court. treatment court enrollees are subject to periodic drug testing and are generally prohibited from using opioid-based medications and other addictive medications. As originally conceived, this aspect of the policy prohibited medical marijuana use. Thereafter, in Gass v. 52nd Judicial District, Lebanon County, 232 A.3d 706 (Pa. 2020), we held that a judicial district’s policy that affirmatively prohibited all probationers and all other individuals under court supervision from using medical marijuana violated the immunity provision of the Medical Marijuana Act (MMA). 2 We clarified, however, that judges and probation officials “may make reasonable inquiries into the lawfulness of” an individual’s medical marijuana use. Id. at 715. After the Gass decision was announced, the 23rd Judicial District amended its policy to state as follows: Medical Marijuana use will be addressed on a case-by-case basis.

Consideration for use should be accompanied by a letter addressed to the Court from a treating physician that details diagnosis and medical necessity for use.

Berks County Treatment Court, Policy and Procedure Manual (March 2023), at 11, reprinted in RR. 282a.

Following this policy change, Appellant Pennsylvania Cannabis Coalition (PCC) and D.M., a United States Air Force veteran, jointly filed a petition for review in the Commonwealth Court’s original jurisdiction, alleging the amended policy violates the MMA’s immunity provision, see supra note 2, and requesting declaratory and injunctive relief. They argued the policy allows treatment courts to reject applicants based solely upon their lawful use of medical marijuana, thus violating the MMA as interpreted in Gass.

2 Act of April 17, 2016, P.L. 84, No. 16 (reposited at 35 P.S. §§ 10231.101 – 10231. 2110).

Pursuant to the MMA, patients under a practitioner’s continuing care for a serious medical condition may use medical marijuana after, inter alia, obtaining a Department of Health identification card and a doctor’s certification. See 35 P.S. § 10231.403; Gass, 232 A.3d at 708. The MMA’s immunity provision states that patients shall not be “subject to arrest, prosecution or penalty in any manner, or denied any right or privilege. . . solely for lawful use of medical marijuana . . . in accordance with this act[.]” 35 P.S. § 10231.2103(a).

[J-57-2025] - 2 As for PCC’s interest in the matter, they averred PCC is a trade organization comprised of 75% of Pennsylvania permit holders authorized to dispense medical marijuana to patients, including three of the four dispensaries located in Berks County. When patients stop purchasing medical marijuana based on the policy, they asserted, PCC’s member dispensaries are financially harmed, and hence, those members are aggrieved by the policy. See Petition for Review, at ¶¶ 66, 71, 73, 76. The 23rd Judicial District answered, denying its treatment courts ban the use of medical marijuana, alleging such use is assessed on a case-by-case basis, and asserting some enrollees have been allowed to use medical marijuana while in a treatment court per the amended policy.

Following discovery, the parties filed cross-applications for summary relief in which the threshold question was whether the petitioners had standing. 3 The Commonwealth Court determined D.M. lacked standing in light of his specific circumstances. See D.M. & the Pa. Cannabis Coal. v. 23rd Judicial Dist., Berks Cnty., No. 283 M.D. 2023, slip op. at 14 (Pa. Cmwlth. Aug. 21, 2024). D.M. has not challenged that ruling, and it is not before this Court.

Insofar as PCC is concerned, the court indicated an association has standing as a representative of its members if it alleges at least one of its members “is suffering immediate or threatened injury as a result of” the challenged action. Id. at 9 (quoting Ivy Hill Congr. of Jehovah’s Witnesses v. DHS, 310 A.3d 742, 748 (Pa. 2024)). Applying that precept, the court found the asserted financial harm to PCC’s members was too remote to confer standing and, as such, PCC lacked associational standing. See id. at 14-15.

PCC filed a direct appeal to this Court, challenging the Commonwealth Court’s holding in this regard. As D.M. has not joined in the appeal, PCC is the sole appellant herein.

3 The only other issue was whether the policy violated the MMA and was thus invalid.

The Commonwealth Court did not reach this second issue in light of its resolution of the threshold issue.

[J-57-2025] - 3 Standing is a prudential doctrine designed to protect the courts and the public from “improper plaintiffs,” meaning, plaintiffs who have no legally-enforceable interest in the matter complained of. S. Bethlehem Assocs. v. Zoning Hearing Bd. of Bethlehem Twp., 294 A.3d 441, 446-47 (Pa. 2023). The “core concept” of standing is that the litigant must be aggrieved, or “adversely affected,” in some way. Trust Under Will of Ashton, 260 A.3d 81, 88 (Pa. 2021). Expanding upon this concept, we have held that to show aggrievement, a complaining party’s interest must be substantial, direct, and immediate – meaning the party’s interest must surpass that of the general public in procuring obedience to the law, the harm alleged must be caused by the matter complained of, and the causal link must not be remote or speculative. See id. (citing In re Milton Hershey Sch., 911 A.2d 1258, 1261-62 (Pa. 2006)).

An association such as PCC has standing to commence litigation, absent injury to itself, if it alleges at least one of its members has suffered, or will suffer, 4 an immediate or threatened injury as a result of the challenged action. See Firearms Owners Against Crime v. Papenfuse, 261 A.3d 467, 473-74 (Pa. 2021). In practice, this means the association must “establish[] that at least one of its members has standing individually.”

Shirley v. Pa. Legis. Reference Bureau, 318 A.3d 832, 852 (Pa. 2024). As applied here, PCC has standing if at least one of its member dispensaries has a “substantial,” “direct,” and “immediate” interest affected by the 23rd Judicial District’s medical-marijuana policy.

It is undisputed that the 23rd Judicial District’s policy does not regulate medical marijuana dispensaries. PCC’s argument is that it regulates treatment-court applicants in a way that financially affects dispensaries. The issue before this Court is whether such alleged financial consequences are sufficient to comply with the standing litmus as delineated above, or whether instead they are remote or speculative. This question

4 See Barbieri v. Shapp, 383 A.2d 218, 221 (Pa. 1978).

[J-57-2025] - 4 implicates the third prong of the standing litmus, concerning whether PCC members’ interest is “immediate.” Accord Brief for Appellant at 13.

In analyzing whether PCC’s allegations establish aggrievement sufficient to confer standing, we find our decision in Beauty Hall v. State Board of Cosmetology, 210 A.2d 495 (Pa. 1965), instructive. In that matter, this Court held that a beauty school lacked standing to challenge a Pennsylvania statute requiring individuals to have a 10th grade education to sit for the state beauty licensing exam. The school alleged the law would reduce the number of tuition-paying students. We found no legal injury to the school as the law did not regulate the school’s conduct. The fact some students might decide not to enroll due to the lack of a tenth-grade education was deemed a “collateral concern.” Id. at 498. Therein, we surveyed other standing decisions and concluded their import was that “an adverse, economic impact which is merely an indirect, remote, and nonpurposeful consequence or merely a side effect of the direct, governmental regulation of or imposition of burdens upon other persons does not constitute a deprivation” sufficient to confer standing. Id. The Beauty Hall Court also differentiated other cases where standing was found to exist. In Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U.S. 510 (1924), a parochial school had standing to challenge a law requiring attendance at public schools because the inevitable effect was to abolish parochial schools. In International Railway Company v. Davidson, 257 U.S. 506 (1922), a company that owned toll bridges connecting the United States to Canada had standing to challenge a federal order ceasing customs operations on Sundays and holidays unless the company paid extra compensation to customs officials and posted a bond. The Beauty Hall Court concluded those cases involved either direct regulation of the plaintiff’s activities or a purposeful abolition of the plaintiff’s business.

See Beauty Hall, 210 A.2d at 500-01. Beauty Hall also distinguished a common pleas

[J-57-2025] - 5 court decision where an embalming school had standing to challenge a provision prohibiting persons who had not served a two-year apprenticeship from attending such schools, as that involved direct interference in customer relationships. None of those cases “involved an indirect, remote and nonpurposeful economic loss as a result of the direct regulation of other persons.” Id. at 501.

PCC disputes the application of Beauty Hall to the instant controversy. It relies on Pennsylvania State Education Association v. Public School Employees’ Retirement Board, 311 A.3d 1017 (Pa. 2024) (PSEA), and William Penn Parking Garage v. City of Pittsburgh, 346 A.2d 269 (Pa. 1975), for the position that standing may be found based on the “downstream consequences” or “secondary effects” of the challenged regulation.

Reply Brief for Appellant at 7-9.

PSEA was a declaratory judgment action in which a union and the state public school employees’ retirement board had varying interpretations of legislation, and if the board’s interpretation – memorialized in a resolution – continued in effect, it would have substantially interfered with the union’s ability to negotiate effectively concerning subcontracting employment decisions by school districts. The status quo established by the resolution, and challenged by the union, placed the union “in an inferior bargaining position” relative to such employment decisions. PSEA, 311 A.3d at 1030. Because this was characterized as a “downstream consequence” of the resolution, id. at 1029, PCC reasons that, here too, the potential downstream consequences of the 23rd Judicial District’s policy give rise to standing. But the consequences in PSEA were direct and immediate. See id. at 1030 (“Right at the moment, the union has a problem”) (emphasis added). Here, any alleged downstream consequences to PCC’s members are more remote and attenuated than in PSEA. Thus, even if we assume, arguendo, that PCC’s

[J-57-2025] - 6 interests can be characterized as direct, nothing in PSEA dictates a conclusion that they are immediate.

Nor does William Penn Parking aid PCC’s position. The relevant holding in that litigation was that the operators of private parking lots had standing to challenge a tax levied upon their patrons pursuant to a Pittsburgh local ordinance, given that the tax was imposed directly on the interchange between the patrons and the parking lot operators.

See id. at 289 (noting the tax was “levied upon the very transaction between them”). Here, by contrast, nothing in the policy imposes a tax or other legal burden upon transactions between PCC’s members and individual patients. Indeed, the William Penn Parking Court expressly distinguished Beauty Hall on this basis, observing the tax imposed upon transactions entered into by the parking lot operators made their complaint different from that of the beauty school and more akin to the harm suffered by the parochial schools in Pierce. See id. at 289 & n.36.

PCC also relies on a passage in William Penn Parking indicating that an earlier decision, Northwestern Pennsylvania Automatic Phonograph Association v. Meadville, 59 A.2d 907 (Pa. 1948), should be overruled because it is not in line with the “modern trend” of enlarging the class of parties who may challenge governmental action. William Penn Parking, 346 A.2d at 290. The facts in Automatic Phonograph were analogous to those in William Penn Parking. A municipality enacted an ordinance that imposed a juke box licensing fee on any business that maintained a jukebox on its premises. This affected the plaintiff’s members, which consisted of corporations that owned and leased jukeboxes to the businesses in question. The direct effect of the ordinance placed a burden on such lease transactions in light of the lessee’s obligation to pay the fee any time it leased a jukebox for on-premises use. The city in William Penn Parking and this Court in Automatic Phonograph reasoned that only the person actually liable for, or required to pay, the tax

[J-57-2025] - 7 or fee in question, is aggrieved by it, and William Penn Parking rejected that premise as an improper application of the criteria for standing. See id. at 288-89. 5 Here, PCC’s complaint is that the policy will lead some individuals to cease purchasing marijuana, which will financially harm its members. But this asserted causal

5 In light of this distinction between Automatic Phonograph and the present case, and our acknowledgement that William Penn Parking overruled that decision, the dissent is incorrect in stating we presently “resurrect” Automatic Phonograph. Dissenting Op. at 11.

Furthermore, while the dissent criticizes our decision to follow Beauty Hall, see id. at 9, that decision has never been disapproved, and the parties do not ask us to overrule it.

As for the dissent’s reference to Robinson Township v. Commonwealth, 83 A.3d 901 (Pa. 2013), see Dissenting Op. at 10, that dispute involved a challenge under Article I, Section of our state Constitution – known as the Environmental Rights Amendment – to Act 13 of 2012, which comprised “sweeping legislation affecting Pennsylvania’s environment and, in particular, the exploitation and recovery of natural gas in a geological formation known as the Marcellus Shale.” Robinson Twp., 83 A.3d at 913. Standing was recognized in favor of an associational plaintiff, the Delaware Riverkeeper Network, that claimed Act 13 would adversely affect its members’ “health and their ability to enjoy natural beauty, environmental resources, and recreational activities in the Delaware River corridor, such as fishing, boating, swimming, and bird-watching.” Id. at 921. This Court recounted that the property owners asserted that they are likely to suffer considerable harm with respect to the values of their existing homes and the enjoyment of their properties given the intrusion of industrial uses and the change in the character of their zoning districts effected by Act 13. These individual members [of the associational plaintiff] have a substantial and direct interest in the outcome of the litigation premised upon the serious risk of alteration in the physical nature of their respective political subdivisions and the components of their surrounding environment. This interest is not remote. Id. at 922 (citation omitted). Thus, the primary interests in view pertained to the enjoyment of a clean environment, the need for local zoning limitations, and the enjoyment and value of real property. See also id. at 952 (highlighting the judiciary’s obligation to vindicate Section 27 environmental rights). These interests were directly undercut by Act 13 which preempted existing local oil and gas regulations.

We do not believe Robinson Township’s analysis is easily transportable into a case like this one, which has nothing to do with environmental rights and instead involves a speculative loss of money from reduced marijuana transactions. The claim made by the Coalition here is more akin to the one involved in Beauty Hall than to the contentions forwarded by the Delaware River Keeper in Robinson Township.

[J-57-2025] - 8 connection is not as direct as in William Penn Parking and Automatic Phonograph. For the policy to result in such harm, a number of events tangential to the dispensaries’ business must occur. First, a dispensary customer or likely customer must be charged with a crime. The customer or likely customer, now a criminal defendant, must be referred to a treatment court. The defendant must then choose to apply for entry into treatment court rather than proceed through the ordinary criminal process. The defendant must then meet all eligibility requirements, and, if deemed eligible, must undergo a multi-step screening process. The treatment court team, after reviewing the information from the intake and evaluation process, must then decide to transfer the defendant into a treatment court program rather than denying the application. Once in the program, the defendant’s use of medical marijuana is evaluated on a case-by-case basis and subject to the court’s discretion. For a dispensary to be affected (assuming it is one of PCC’s members), the court must then exercise its discretion to deny the defendant’s request to continue using medical marijuana. 6 To the degree PCC may be seen as arguing this chain of events might nonetheless occur, such contention pertains to the directness qualifier, which asks if a causal connection exists, rather than the immediacy requirement, which relates to the remoteness of that connection. To illustrate, the William Penn Parking Court compared two cases in which a horse racing license applicant challenged the licensure of other applicants. Where all four available licenses had been awarded to others, standing was present as there was no possibility of the plaintiff obtaining one; whereas, where only one of the four licenses had been awarded, standing was absent. See William Penn Parking, 346 A.2d at 283-84. More to the point, the result in Beauty Hall depended on the

6 These procedures are reflected in treatment court’s policy and procedure manual. See RR. 271a-284a.

[J-57-2025] - 9 circumstance that the challenged statute did not regulate the school or impose a burden on transactions between the school and tuition-paying students, and not on whether the school was able to show that one or more students in fact decided not to enroll as a result of the statute’s enactment.

The William Penn Parking Court indicated further that in close cases standing will more readily be found where the type of interest asserted “is among the policies underlying the legal rule relied upon by the person claiming to be aggrieved.” Id. at 284; see also Ken R. on Behalf of C.R. v. Arthur Z., 682 A.2d 1267, 1270 (Pa. 1996) (explaining that an immediate harm is demonstrated where the interest the party seeks to protect “is within the zone of interests sought to be protected by the statute or constitutional guarantee in question”). 7 In the present case, PCC’s member dispensaries have an interest in not losing income from reduced marijuana sales. Economic actors have a legitimate interest in pursuing financial remuneration for goods and services lawfully rendered, and thus, they may complain about pecuniary loss. Accord William Penn Parking, 346 A.2d at 289. Still, the MMA’s immunity provision is not designed to protect that type of interest. It is intended, rather, to ensure the availability of safe and effective treatment and therapy options via access to medical marijuana through traditional medical and pharmaceutical avenues. See 35 P.S. § 10231.102 (declaration of policy). Thus, to the extent this is a close case, a zone-of-interests consideration does not favor PCC’s position. 8 “A zone of interests analysis may be employed where a party’s immediate interest is not apparent, but it is merely a guideline that may be used to find immediacy, not an absolute test.” PSEA, 311 A.3d at 1032 (internal quotation marks and emphasis removed) (citing Johnson v. American Standard, 8 A.3d 318, 333-34 (Pa. 2010)); see also Johnson, 8 A.3d at 331 (noting Pennsylvania law does not require that a plaintiff be in the zone of interests for the immediacy prong of a standing analysis to be satisfied).

8 PCC argues a zone-of-interest evaluation favors it because dispensaries are included in the MMA’s immunity provision and protected from being prosecuted or penalized in any (continued…) [J-57-2025] - 10 For the reasons given above, we conclude the Commonwealth Court properly held PCC lacked standing to challenge the 23rd Judicial District’s amended policy. In light of its justiciability determination, it appropriately declined to reach the substantive issue raised. Accordingly, we affirm its order.

Chief Justice Todd and Justices Dougherty and Brobson join the opinion.

Justice Donohue files a dissenting opinion in which Justices Wecht and McCaffery join.

way solely for dispensing medical marijuana. See Brief for Appellant at 18. However, the interest presently asserted by PCC on behalf its members does not pertain to a fear they will be prosecuted or penalized, but that they will lose sales. See id. at 10-12, 14.

[J-57-2025] - 11

[J-57-2025] [MO: Mundy, J.]

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF PENNSYLVANIA MIDDLE DISTRICT

D.M. AND THE PENNSYLVANIA : No. 73 MAP 2024 CANNABIS COALITION : : Appeal from the Order of the : Commonwealth Court at 283 MD v. : 2023 on August 21, 2024 : : SUBMITTED: June 17, 2025 23RD JUDICIAL DISTRICT, BERKS : COUNTY : : : APPEAL OF: PENNSYLVANIA CANNABIS : COALITION :

DISSENTING OPINION

JUSTICE DONOHUE DECIDED: March 26, 2026 Because the Majority erases over fifty years of standing jurisprudence in our Commonwealth, I dissent. Under our established case law, the Pennsylvania Cannabis Coalition (“PCC”) established that it has standing to bring this challenge, and the case should be remanded to the lower court to address the merits of PCC’s claims.

Issues of standing present questions of law for which our standard of review is de novo, and our scope of review is plenary. Allegheny Reproductive Health Center v. Pa. Dep’t of Hum. Servs., 309 A.3d 808, 831 (Pa. 2024). Standing is a matter of justiciability, “implicating a court’s ability to adjudicate a matter.” Firearm Owners Against Crime v. Papenfuse, 261 A.3d 467, 481 (Pa. 2021). We “must resolve justiciability concerns as a threshold matter before addressing the merits of the case[,]” to ensure that we do not issue “inappropriate advisory opinions.” Id. Our standing doctrine is “a prudential, judicially-created tool,” affording the courts discretion in making such determinations. Id. As we have observed, “[i]n contrast to the federal approach, notions of case or controversy and justiciability have no constitutional predicate, do not involve a court’s jurisdiction, and are regarded as prudential concerns implicating courts’ self-imposed limitations.” Robinson Twp. v. Commonwealth, 83 A.3d 901, 916-17 (Pa. 2013). In essence, this means that standing in Pennsylvania courts is granted more liberally than in federal courts. Allegheny Reproductive Health Center, 309 A.3d at 832.

To establish standing, a putative plaintiff must demonstrate that they have been “aggrieved” by the challenged conduct. Id. To determine that a party is aggrieved for purposes of standing, we examine whether they have a substantial, direct, and immediate interest in the outcome of the litigation. Id. “A party’s interest is substantial when it surpasses the interest of all citizens in procuring obedience to the law; it is direct when the asserted violation shares a causal connection with the alleged harm; finally, a party’s interest is immediate when the causal connection with the alleged harm is neither remote nor speculative.” Commonwealth v. Donahue, 98 A.3d 1223, 1229 (Pa. 2014).

Accordingly, the question is whether PCC has established that its interest with respect to the policy of the 23rd Judicial District, Berks County Court of Common Pleas (“Judicial District”) is substantial, direct and immediate. This Court has explained that a non-profit, such as PCC, can demonstrate it has associational standing “as a representative of its members, even in the absence of injury to itself, if it establishes at least one of its members has standing individually.” Shirley v. Pa. Legis. Reference Bureau, 318 A.3d 832, 852 (Pa. 2024).

Although the Majority does not concede that PCC has established that its interest is substantial and direct, its analysis focuses exclusively on the third prong of our standing test: whether PCC’s interest is immediate. Majority Op. at 4-6. To fully establish why I

[J-57-2025] [MO: Mundy, J.] - 2 am of the position that PCC has standing to bring this lawsuit, I will set forth why it has satisfied all three prongs of our standing analysis.

I. Substantial PCC contends that its interest is substantial because its member dispensaries are financially harmed when patients stop using medical marijuana to comply with the policy.

PCC’s Brief at 11-12. The Judicial District counters this by arguing that PCC’s issue is not with the policy but with individual judicial decisions and the outcome of criminal proceedings. Judicial District’s Brief at 18-19. In so arguing, the Judicial District suggests that PCC’s financial motives are simply in conflict with these judicial determinations. Id. at 18.

I disagree with the Judicial District’s assertion that PCC’s claim is a challenge to judicial discretion in individual criminal cases rather than the policy itself. It is the policy’s allowance of discretion in the trial court to render medical marijuana users ineligible for participation in the program that harms PCC. Thus, it is the source of the jurists’ discretion (i.e., the policy), not the exercise of that discretion itself that PCC challenges. However, the Judicial District has offered little other opposition to PCC’s claim of a substantial interest.

As PCC has set forth, its members are dispensaries licensed by the Commonwealth to sell medical marijuana to authorized patients. Three out of the four medical marijuana dispensaries in Berks County are included among PCC’s members.

PCC has alleged that in at least two instances, medical marijuana patients have ceased purchasing medical marijuana from its member dispensaries as a direct result of the policy; and it avers that this number may be even greater. Petition for Review, ¶¶ 74-81.

The Judicial District has not challenged this assertion, and the Commonwealth Court seems to have acknowledged that PCC’s members experienced some pecuniary harm.

[J-57-2025] [MO: Mundy, J.] - 3 D.M. v. 23rd Jud. Dist., 283 MD 2023, 2024 WL 3886657, at *7 (Pa. Commw. Aug. 21, 2024) (acknowledging PCC’s members have experienced “the loss of some sales under the Policy”).

A substantial interest “must have substance,” meaning beyond that of the rest of the citizenry. William Penn Parking Garage, Inc. v. City of Pittsburgh, 346 A.2d 269, 282 (Pa. 1975). The average citizen is unlikely to have an interest in the eligibility requirements for a judicial district’s treatment courts. Nor would the average citizen have an interest in the particular business of medical marijuana distributors. PCC, however, is interested in the impact of the Judicial District’s policy and its eligibility requirements because of the impact on medical marijuana dispensaries’ business in Berks County. The substance of its interest, therefore, is pecuniary in nature, which is a relevant harm for our standing analysis. As we explained in William Penn Parking, “there is no minimum threshold on its magnitude[,]” meaning that we do not attribute a dollar amount to the degree of harm for the purpose of establishing a substantial interest pursuant to our standing analysis. Id. Because PCC’s members have experienced a loss of revenue due to the policy, I find PCC’s interest to be substantial.

II. Direct A party’s interest is direct when it can demonstrate that there is a causal connection between the harm and the asserted violation. Firearm Owners Against Crime, 261 A.3d at 473. In other words, a party has a direct interest in the litigation so long as the challenged law causes harm to the party’s interests and remedying that violation would in turn remove the harm.

It is PCC’s position that its interest is direct because by prohibiting certain patients from using its members’ products, the policy causes its members to lose revenue. PCC’s Brief at 12. The alleged financial injury, PCC argues, “would be obviated if the Policy

[J-57-2025] [MO: Mundy, J.] - 4 were enjoined.” Id. In response, the Judicial District argues that PCC’s harm is not direct, because the policy affects how criminal defendants seek voluntary treatment court programs, but it does not require any action from PCC or prohibit PCC’s members from selling medical marijuana or otherwise penalize them. Judicial District’s Brief at 23.

The Judicial District mischaracterizes what constitutes a direct interest for purposes of our standing analysis. Under its rationale, standing could only be established when the challenger is directly regulated by the statute or policy at issue. However, a party may still have a direct interest in the outcome of the litigation even if the policy does not directly regulate the challenger’s conduct. In Pennsylvania State Education Association v. Public School Employees’ Retirement Board, 311 A.3d 1017 (“PSEA”), for example, a labor organization representing public school employees challenged a Public School Employees’ Retirement Board (“PSERB”) regulation that directly applied to school districts, rather than its employees or related labor unions. However, this policy adversely impacted the labor organization’s members by placing them in inferior bargaining positions with the school districts. PSEA, 311 A.3d at 1021-22. Despite the policy not directly regulating the labor organization or its members’ conduct or operations, we found that the labor organization was able to “easily establish” it had standing due to the “downstream consequences” of PSERB’s policy. Id. at 1029. We explained that “[t]he consequences of a statute, or of an agency’s interpretation of that statute, can extend to others beyond those expressly targeted.” Id. The same is true here.

As explained in the above substantial interest discussion, PCC’s alleged harm is pecuniary in nature. It has alleged that this pecuniary harm is a downstream consequence of the Judicial District’s policy, because while it expressly targets potential participants in treatment courts, the effects of this regulation are borne by PCC’s

[J-57-2025] [MO: Mundy, J.] - 5 members. Therefore, declaring the policy invalid would obviate PCC’s injuries.

Accordingly, I find that PCC has a direct interest in this matter for purposes of standing.

III. Immediate An interest is immediate when the nature of the causal connection is neither remote nor speculative. PSEA, 311 A.3d at 1024. PCC alleges that, as a consequence of the policy, at least two individuals have stopped purchasing medical marijuana in Berks County, and it avers that this number may be higher. PCC’s Brief at 13-14. Because there are only four dispensaries in Berks County and three of those dispensaries are members of PCC, it is PCC’s members that will feel the effects when treatment court participants in Berks County cease their purchase of medical marijuana. This, it argues, goes beyond setting financial barriers by prohibiting some individuals from purchasing PCC members’ products entirely. Id. at 14. Accordingly, it concludes that its harm cannot be considered remote or speculative.

The Judicial District responds that whether a treatment court participant may use medical marijuana is “too far removed” from PCC’s financial harm, as “the Policy’s requirements … do not address making purchases at dispensaries.” Judicial District’s Brief at 24-25, 28. The Judicial District likens this case to our 1965 decision in Beauty Hall, Inc. v. State Board of Cosmetology, 210 A.2d 495 (Pa. 1965), where this Court held that a beauty school could not challenge a statute requiring applicants to have at least a tenth-grade education to sit for the beautician licensing exam. Id. at 27. In that case, we opined that the beauty school was not directly regulated by the tenth-grade education requirement and therefore had no standing to challenge it. The Judicial District contends that PCC’s position is no different than that of the beauty school because the policy does not directly regulate the affairs of PCC or its members. Id. at 28.

[J-57-2025] [MO: Mundy, J.] - 6 Like the Judicial District, the Majority’s analysis hinges on its interpretation of Beauty Hall. Majority Op. at 5. The Majority finds that our decision in Beauty Hall “depended on the circumstance that the challenged statute did not regulate the school or impose a burden on transactions between the school and tuition-paying students, and not on whether the school was able to show that one or more students in fact decided not to enroll as a result of the statute’s enactment.” Id. at 9. I disagree with the Majority’s suggestion that the Beauty Hall decision “depended” only on this distinction. The Beauty Hall Court noted that the “remoteness of the amendment’s impact” was demonstrated by its lack of proof. Beauty Hall, 210 A.2d at 500. Specifically, it explained that there was nothing in the record to “show that prospective students decided of their own volition not to enter beauty school when they discovered that they would have to obtain a tenth grade education or its equivalent before taking the state examination.” Id. This was not the only reason we did not find standing in Beauty Hall, but it certainly was not an insignificant part of that decision.

The crux of Beauty Hall’s rationale was its reliance on case law “that an adverse, economic impact which is merely an indirect, remote, and nonpurposeful consequence or merely a side effect of the direct, government regulation or imposition of burdens upon other persons” cannot establish immediacy for purposes of standing. Id. at 498. In reaching that conclusion, the Beauty Hall Court relied upon three other decisions. First among those cases was Northwestern Pennsylvania Automatic Phonograph Association v. Meadville City, 59 A.2d 907 (Pa. 1948), overruled by William Penn Parking, 346 A.2d 269 (“We conclude that … Northwestern Pennsylvania Automatic Phonograph Association should be overruled.”). There, an association of owners of jukeboxes that leased their machines to others were challenging the collection of taxes levied upon those who kept juke boxes on their premises. Id. at 908. In other words, proprietors who rented

[J-57-2025] [MO: Mundy, J.] - 7 the machines would be paying additional taxes by virtue of having a jukebox on the premises. Id. Thus, the jukebox owners asserted that they would suffer losses because the taxed proprietors would no longer have the machines placed on their premises to avoid paying the taxes. Ultimately, we held that because the jukebox owners were not directly “subject to the challenged enactment[,]” they had no standing to challenge the taxing ordinance. Id. at 909 (emphasis added).

The next case relied upon by the Beauty Hall Court was Ex-Cell-O Corp. v. City of Chicago, 115 F.2d 627 (7th Cir. 1940), a case from a federal court relying on federal standing principles. In that case, the Ex-Cell-O Corporation, which licensed patented machines used to manufacture paper milk containers, challenged Chicago’s ordinance prohibiting the use of paper milk containers. Id. at 628-29. The Seventh Circuit recognized that Ex-Cell-O Corporation would be subject to “inevitable financial pecuniary damage[,]” but all that mattered for the purposes of its standing inquiry was “whether the damage claimed springs directly to plaintiff from defendants. If it is incidental, if it is indirect, defendants may not invoke the court’s jurisdiction.” Id. at 629 (emphasis added).

The Beauty Hall Court then moved on to In re Seitz, 43 A.2d 547 (Pa. Super. 1945), which involved a residential property owner seeking to appeal the Liquor Control Board’s order granting a restaurant liquor license to a location near his home. Id. at 547. The Superior Court rejected the property owner’s interest as being direct and immediate because it found that his interest “was not direct and immediate, but was a collateral concern generated by his desire to protect the value of his property, which might be indirectly affected by the action of the board.” Id. at 548 (emphasis added).

Based on these cases, the conclusion drawn by the Beauty Hall Court was that only those who are the direct subject of the challenged legislation can have a direct and immediate interest for purposes of asserting standing. At that time, the Court would not

[J-57-2025] [MO: Mundy, J.] - 8 find standing for those putative plaintiffs who were “only indirectly economically affected by the direct regulatory impact upon others.” Id. at 499. By hitching its immediacy analysis to Beauty Hall, the Majority is advocating for the regression of our standing principles, setting our standing jurisprudence back decades. Such a decision calls into question countless standing decisions by this Court since 1965.

In William Penn Parking, we held that operators of private parking had standing to challenge a Pittsburgh tax levied on parking lot patrons. William Penn Parking, 346 A.2d at 290-91. There, we distinguished Beauty Hall based on the fact that there was no recorded or otherwise identifiable burden on the transaction between the beauty school and its prospective pupils. Id. at 290. We then proceeded to address the primary authority from this Court upon which the Beauty Hall Court relied: Northwestern Pennsylvania Automatic Phonograph Association. Id. This Court reasoned that our decision in Northwestern Pennsylvania Automatic Phonograph Association should be overruled because it “exhibit[ed] an insufficient appreciation of the importance of secondary effects” with respect to a standing analysis. Id. As the William Penn Parking Court explained, “the injury caused by secondary effects of an action may sometimes be as great or greater than that caused by its primary effects.” Id. In other words, our understanding of who has standing to challenge laws evolved. No longer would we only consider those who were the direct subject of a law to have standing, but also those who could demonstrate that a “secondary effect” of that law caused them to be aggrieved, as well. This we considered to be part of the “modern trend … toward enlargement of the class of people who may protest (governmental) action.” Id. (citations and quotations omitted).

[J-57-2025] [MO: Mundy, J.] - 9 To my mind, our decision in William Penn Parking demarcated the transition from the Beauty Hall approach to standing to our modern approach. 1 In so doing, William Penn Parking called into question the central reasoning of not only Northwestern Pennsylvania Automatic Phonograph but that of Beauty Hall, as well. In embracing the “modern trend” towards standing, the William Penn Parking Court distanced itself from those earlier cases that resigned themselves to only find that a party had a direct and immediate interest if the challenger was the direct subject of the challenged law. See Nw. Pa. Automatic Phonograph Ass’n, 59 A.2d at 909 (finding that putative plaintiffs lacked a direct and immediate interest because they were not “subject to the terms of the ordinance”); Beauty Hall, 210 A.2d at 498 (finding that a putative plaintiff lacked a direct and immediate interest where the impact is “merely a side effect of the direct, government regulation”).

Not only was Northwestern Pennsylvania Automatic Phonograph expressly rejected by this Court, but future decisions of this Court also demonstrated why the other cases relied upon by Beauty Hall to establish its standing framework are inapt under our modern standing jurisprudence. For example, in Robinson Township we addressed the standing of several plaintiffs that challenged Act 13, a legislative scheme that sought to preempt and supersede local regulation of oil and gas operations. Robinson Township, 83 A.3d at 936. This legislation required, inter alia, that municipalities allow natural gas

Majority Op. at 8 n.5. That is because there is no reason to do so. After William Penn Parking, this Court has only cited Beauty Hall twice and only for very general propositions unrelated to its standing principles. See Guthrie v. Borough of Wilkinsburg, 478 A.2d 1279, 1282 (Pa. 1984) (noting generally that due process cannot protect a right that is too remote or speculative); Goodheart v. Casey, 565 A.2d 757, 760 (Pa. 1989) (noting that “[i]t is the sole function of the judiciary to interpret the constitutional mandate, including the intended use of powers conferred upon the legislature”). This Court has distanced itself from Beauty Hall and its rationale over the decades, leaving it an unsuitable relic of our prior standing jurisprudence. That is, until the Majority’s decision today.

[J-57-2025] [MO: Mundy, J.] - 10 development in residential zones. Id. at 931. Among those plaintiffs were landowners who were also members of the Delaware Riverkeeper Network, a non-profit environmental group and another plaintiff challenging Act 13. Id. at 914. We found that Act 13 posed a risk to those landowners because they were “likely to suffer considerable harm with respect to the values of their existing homes and the enjoyment of their properties” as a potential consequence of Act 13. Id. at 922. This Court expressly held that “[t]his interest [was] not remote.” Id. If we had applied this Court’s rationale in Northwestern Pennsylvania Automatic Phonograph, the Seventh Circuit’s rationale in Ex-Cell-O Corp., or the Superior Court’s rationale in In re Seitz, it is unlikely that this Court would have found that the landowners in Robinson Township had standing because they were not the target of the legislative scheme. 2 See, e.g., Ex-Cell-O Corp., 115 F.2d at 629 (explaining that even if the plaintiff was inevitably subject to financial damage, all that mattered for establishing standing was “whether the damage claimed springs directly to plaintiff from defendants”); In re Seitz, 43 A.2d at 548 (rejecting property owner’s standing because his interest “was a collateral concern generated by his desire to protect the value of his property, which might be indirectly affected”). However, these are the cases and the holdings that the Beauty Hall Court relied on to establish its standing jurisprudence. By virtue of its reasoning, these are precisely the standing principles the Majority would have us resurrect today. 3

[J-57-2025] [MO: Mundy, J.] - 12 County cease their purchase of medical marijuana. This effect is not too remote, but rather it is only one step removed from the express target of the policy, i.e., the treatment court participants. Id. (finding an immediate interest when “the effect of the tax upon their business is removed from the cause by only a single short step”).

In applying its analysis, the Majority has opted to apply a step-by-step recitation of every minute event that must take place between an action taken pursuant to the policy and the impact on PCC’s members. Majority Op. at 8. 4 While I acknowledge that we do not have an established procedure for tracing the remoteness of a purported interest, I find the Majority’s process here to be troubling. If we were to conduct this type of inquiry in other standing cases, we would rarely find a party to have an immediate interest. 5 By way of example, in Firearm Owners Against Crime, 261 A.3d 467, we could have drawn out each individual step to illustrate how the challenged law could cause the harm. In that case, we addressed whether Firearm Owners Against Crime (“FOAC”), “a statewide, non-partisan political action committee” with members actively working to preserve firearm rights could challenge ordinances in Harrisburg. 6 Id. at 470. Under the The Majority appears to be suggesting that this “chain of events” that it lays out only “pertains to the directness qualifier, … rather than the immediacy requirement[.]” Majority Op. at 8. However, as the Majority acknowledges, the directness qualifier is answered by whether there exists a causal chain connecting the law to the purported harm. Id. The immediacy factor, on the other hand, asks us to address how long that chain is, which is hypothetically what is being reviewed in the Majority’s “chain of events.” Here, PCC has alleged that at least two and likely more individuals have ceased purchasing medical marijuana from their members as a result of the relevant policy. The chain exists, and thus its interest is direct.

[J-57-2025] [MO: Mundy, J.] - 14 violation of the ordinance; and that the individual was subject to some sort of penalty.

Drawing out an immediacy analysis in this manner will make any law seem far too attenuated from the purported harm.

If the policy impacts whether individuals can use medical marijuana to be eligible for treatment courts, then logically the next parties to be impacted are the suppliers of that medical marijuana. We need not spell out every event in between to acknowledge this. Ultimately, this is one step removed. One step removed is certainly not too attenuated for this Court to find that a putative plaintiff has an immediate interest in the matter. Accordingly, I would find that the causal connection between the policy and PCC’s interest is sufficiently immediate to establish standing.

IV. Conclusion For the foregoing reasons, I would conclude that PCC has standing to pursue its claim against the Judicial District. Accordingly, I dissent.

Justices Wecht and McCaffery join this dissenting opinion.

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