Colorado’s Natural Medicine Program is moving from legislation to lived practice, built not by corporations but by the people preparing to guide patients through psychedelic care.
Colorado is trying to do something no state has ever succeeded at: create a regulated, statewide psychedelic care system from scratch. Not decriminalization-only. Not theoretical. A real, clinically governed model for legal psychedelic services with licensed facilitators, licensed centers, and a controlled supply chain.
But while the state finalizes rules, approves training programs, and begins issuing the first provisional licenses, the people preparing to actually do this work have already begun building the culture around it.
On an October night at the Clayton in Denver, that future took shape. Not through speeches or policy briefs. Through small circles of people — facilitators, attorneys, future healing-center founders, advocates, survivors — comparing notes, anxieties, and hopes for a system that does not fully exist yet but soon will.
It looked less like an industry kickoff and more like a community trying to decide how not to repeat the mistakes that doomed other states.
A Program Defined by People, Not Products
What stood out most that night was not the regulatory complexity. It was the human stakes.
Facilitators spoke openly about the emotional load they already carry as they prepare for licensure: working with survivors of abuse, people navigating addiction, and clients facing end-of-life fear. These stories rarely surface in legislative hearings, but they are driving much of the urgency behind Colorado’s model.
“People act like implementation is paperwork. But for many of us, this is survival. It’s healing. It’s reclaiming pieces of ourselves,” said Rhonda DeSantis, a long-time community facilitator who has established Psylutions, one of Colorado’s first licensed cultivators and manufacturers serving the wellness centers in the state.
“This work is not about commerce,” echoed another facilitator. “People come because something in them hurts. Our job is to hold them safely, not sell them an experience.”
The room wasn’t talking about product SKUs or scaling. They were talking about trauma, accountability, and the responsibility that comes with guiding someone’s psyche.
The Fragile Middle Space: Hopeful, but Not Naïve
Colorado’s approach is collaborative and precarious.
Tasia Poinsatte, Colorado Director of the Healing Advocacy Fund, stressed the challenge ahead. “If this becomes a luxury wellness model, we’ve failed before we’ve begun,” she said. “This must function as a public health tool. Access and affordability are not side issues. They’re the core.”
Others raised concerns about training quality, consistency, and the psychological toll on facilitators. Unlike Oregon, which launched with high costs and limited access, Colorado is trying to build a model that is both patient-centered and economically viable. Unlike decriminalized cities, where practices remain fragmented, Colorado is betting on structure and oversight. Several attendees compared notes on exactly what they fear. Not bad actors. Not the medicines. But becoming the next cautionary tale.
Oregon’s rollout struggled under cost, politics, and slow licensing. Oakland’s decriminalization-only ecosystem remains fractured and inconsistent. Colorado’s aim is a middle path: regulated, trauma-informed, community-shaped, and built with enough guardrails to withstand political scrutiny.
Across the room stood Henry Baskerville, Psylutions’ general counsel and a veteran of Colorado’s protracted debates over how to legalize and regulate natural plant medicines. A veteran of Colorado’s cannabis legal landscape, Baskerville is open about his own history with depression and recovery, and his transition into psychedelics law is as personal as it is professional.
“Most people don’t realize how fragile this moment is,” Baskerville said. “We have one chance to get this right. If we don’t protect patients, if we don’t support facilitators, if we let bad actors in, the whole system collapses.”
Inventing Solutions as the State Builds the System
Because no national model exists, the people preparing to operate in Colorado’s framework are doing two things at once: learning state rules and building best practices where none exist yet.
Future healing-center founders asked peers how to design spaces for clients who might be crying, shaking, or confronting lifelong trauma. Facilitators discussed ways to maintain standardization while still honoring the deeply personal nature of the work. Attorneys compared interpretations of rules still being refined by the state.
Everyone acknowledged the same reality: Colorado’s regulatory structure may be written by policymakers, but its culture will be created by the people in rooms like this one. And the stakes are enormous. If the system works — if it proves safe, compassionate, equitable, and clinically credible — it becomes the model other states adopt. If it falters, national momentum could stall for years.
Why This Moment Matters Far Beyond Colorado
Psychedelic policy is one of the most divisive arenas in modern drug reform. Clinicians, lawmakers, advocates, and long-time underground guides rarely agree on the path forward. Colorado is the first state attempting to show what regulation can look like at scale: structured, licensed, trauma-informed, and legally defensible.
Success here could shift federal attitudes, shape clinical pathways, and create guardrails for communities that have long operated in legal gray areas. Failure would embolden opponents and reinforce the narrative that psychedelics are unmanageable outside underground circles.
That is why gatherings like this feel so charged. They are not celebrations. They are working groups made of people who have lived through their own darkness and are trying to build something safe enough — and humane enough — to meet others in theirs.
The Story Is Just Beginning
As people filtered out into the cooling Denver air that night, the mood was sober but hopeful. Colorado is not simply launching a Natural Medicine Program. It is attempting to write the first durable rulebook for a new category of care. And the people building it know exactly what is at stake.
