Brooklyn Law School last week was the epicenter of a growing movement to legalize and regulate recreational marijuana in New York.

The school’s Center for Urban Business Entrepreneurship (CUBE) on November 6 hosted Cannabis Law: From Criminalization to Opportunity, billed by organizers as the largest cannabis policy reform event ever held in New York.

As the seven-member panel of legislators, lawyers, entrepreneurs and advocates weaved through the myriad topics facing the nascent industry, the conversation zeroed in on the socially responsible business practices that could be established within the confines of full legalization and regulation.

“Was there ever an industry better situated to be a for-profit/social impact dual function?” asked CUBE CEO John Rudikoff in his opening remarks.

The political winds blowing around marijuana have shifted and New York should be the next state to legalize marijuana, State Senator Liz Krueger said. Federal prohibition prevents the state and private entrepreneurs from capitalizing on the full economic potential of cannabis, she said.

“We see our neighboring states legalize, we see the economics escaping us,” said Krueger, whose district 28 stretches along Manhattan’s Upper East Side. “You just see other states going down this road, and the world didn’t end out in Colorado.”

Even as New York’s medical marijuana program inches forward, Krueger has proposed legalizing marijuana statewide. [Read more at The Denver Post]