The process to open the Jacksonville dispensary started back on Dec. 20, 2016, when initial permits were filed with the Jacksonville Building Inspection Division. Since then, Trulieve has had to file seven separate building inspection requests, the most recent on March 30.

The Tallahassee-based company, Trulieve, has begun the process of constructing a medical marijuana treatment center (MMTC) at 6259 Beach Blvd. in Jacksonville. This would make the fifth storefront the company has opened since July 2016.

The dispensary is expected to open within 60 days and will offer both CBD and THC products, all of which are non-smokable.

Source: Jacksonville’s first expected marijuana dispensary begins to take shape | Jacksonville News, Sports and Entertainment | jacksonville.com

SAN LEANDRO — Three approved medical marijuana dispensaries will have to pay more to operate in San Leandro now that the city has imposed a 6 percent business tax that will climb to 8 percent by 2021.San Leandro will levy a 6 percent business tax on cannabis businesses that will increase to 8 percent by July 2021.

Source: San Leandro OKs marijuana business tax

COLUMBUS, Ohio — State regulators in Ohio acknowledge that proposed licensing fees for medical marijuana businesses could initially exceed the state’s costs of operating the program.

Missy Craddock, of the Ohio Medical Marijuana Control Program, told an advisory panel Friday the program is requested roughly $2.5 million a year for operational costs in each of the next two years. That doesn’t include a number of unknown costs, including setting up the program’s licensing, product tracking and payment systems and establishing a required toll-free hotline.

If the state issues all the licenses it’s making available — 24 to cultivators, 40 to product processors and 60 to dispensaries — fees as proposed would generate $10.8 million. The state has also made application fees for the licenses non-refundable.

Ohio’s medical marijuana law went into effect in June, with a target date to be operational of September 2018. It allows people with 21 medical conditions, including cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, AIDS and epilepsy, to purchase and use marijuana after getting a doctor’s recommendation. The law doesn’t allow smoking.

Ohio has set some of the highest fees of any medical marijuana state: a $20,000 application fee and $180,000 license fee for larger growers, and a $2,000 application fee and $18,000 license fee for smaller growers.

The Source: New medical marijuana fees in Ohio may actually exceed program costs | fox8.com lists anticipated expenses for the medical marijuana program.

WASHINGTON – Republican Congressman Matt Gaetz and Democratic Congressman Darren Soto have joined forces in a bipartisan effort to make it easier for ill-patients and scientific and medical researchers to obtain marijuana.

The proposed legislation, “to provide for the rescheduling of marijuana into schedule III of the Controlled Substances Act”, is aimed at rescheduling marijuana from a Schedule I drug, on par with heroin and LSD, to a Schedule III drug, on par with anabolic steroids.

“This drug should not be in the same category as heroin and LSD, and we do not need to continue with a policy that turns thousands of young people into felons every year.  Nor do we need to punish the millions of people who are sick and seeking medical help – from pain, from muscle wasting, from chemotherapy-induced nausea” said Congressman Gaetz.

Source: Congressmen Gaetz and Soto Propose Legislation to Reschedule Marijuana | Congressman Matt Gaetz

According to The Cannabist, “If successful, the yet-to-be-named House Bill 2020 would not affect recreational cannabis businesses in operation.”

Uruguay’s three-year process of legalising recreational cannabis consumption reached its final stage on Thursday, when the government said it would authorise pharmacies to begin selling the substance as of July.

Source: Uruguay government legalises sale of recreational cannabis in pharmacies | The Independent

Massachusetts collects more than $7 million from marijuana in 2016

As of Jan. 31, 2017 nearly 40,000 patients had been certified for a medical marijuana card and paid a fee of $50, which needs to be renewed each year.

Fees for patients, doctors and medical facilities added up to more than $7 million in the 2016 fiscal year, and that number could nearly double to $13 million in fiscal year 2017.

Source: Massachusetts collects more than $7 million from marijuana in 2016 | FOX25

The 99-plant growing limit previously established in Colorado statute was far higher than any other marijuana state in the nation. Sponsored by House Majority Leader KC Becker, D-Boulder, supporters of House Bill 1220 believe that reducing the residential growing limit to 12 plants can help law enforcement agencies better deter black market growers, investigate massive, illegal operations and protect neighborhoods from potential public safety hazards and decreased property values.

The violent crime rates in Colorado have dropped since the state legalized marijuana. But some illegal operations have exploited the lenient growing limits, as discovered by recent law enforcement stings. These busts showed some illegal operators have conducted large growing operations in Colorado and then move the marijuana into the black market or across state lines where profit margins can be much higher.

Source: Colorado reduces marijuana growing limits on residential properties – The Colorado Statesman

A state commission decided Wednesday to study decriminalization of marijuana, an idea sparked by a discussion in Norfolk.

The study this year by the Virginia State Crime Commission, which makes recommendations to the General Assembly, could be a first step toward a bill in 2018 or later to change marijuana laws.

Currently, Virginia allows people with severe epilepsy to use marijuana oils, but cancer patients and people with other conditions cannot legally use marijuana to relieve pain or nausea.

Read more about the study from the Source: Virginia to study marijuana decriminalization this year, spurred by Norfolk council discussion | Virginia Politics | pilotonline.com

Or more about Virginia’s Medical Marijuana Laws here.

When the General Assembly authorized the state’s medical marijuana program, it instructed the licensure commission to “actively seek to achieve racial, ethnic, and geographic diversity when licensing medical cannabis growers; and encourage applicants who qualify as a minority business enterprise.”

Rather than seeking such a study or adopting race-neutral language that could have had a similar effect, the commission moved forward with regulations that didn’t mention race, only geographic diversity. Prospective licensees were then ranked through a blind evaluation of their applications; those awarded preliminary grower licenses were overwhelmingly headed by white men, and though minority equity participation in some companies is significant, none qualify as African-American owned.

The Legislative Black Caucus objected…sought a complete re-do of the process with a new commission, but that would have been far more unfair to the companies that had made investments based on their preliminary licenses — and would have kept patients waiting even longer for access to the drug.

Read more from the Source: Md.’s marijuana mess – Baltimore Sun