This week, Oregon U.S. Attorney Billy Williams had strong words for the state’s handling of legalized marijuana following the release of an interstate report on the legal marijuana industry. Elsewhere, in Florida, Attorney General Pam Bondi’s office filed a brief arguing than an appeals court should uphold a decision by the legislature to ban smoking medical marijuana.
Here, we’ve rounded up the 10 headlines you need to know before the end of the week.
- Federal: The former head of the Wrigley chewing gum empire is getting into the medical marijuana business. William Wrigley Jr., once the president and CEO of Wm. Wrigley Jr. Co., has been named chairman of the board of directors at Surterra Wellness, a medical cannabis company with operations in Florida and Texas, after his investment fund led a $65 million equity fundraising round that Surterra closed in July. Read more
- California: Outspoke, a cannabis consulting company, is hosting an ongoing silent auction to raise funds for Northern California cannabis growers affected by the wildfires raging across the region. The cannabis business-to-business platform has taken its silent auction to the internet, where donations will be given directly to cannabis growers and families affected by the fires. Read more
- Sonoma County supervisors have advanced revisions to rules governing cannabis businesses and farms outside city limits that would include allowing recreational sales at dispensaries and limiting most cultivation sites to properties 10 acres or larger. The Board of Supervisors rejected two proposals aimed at addressing an increasingly contentious debate over where outdoor growing should occur in Sonoma County. Read more
- Colorado: A lawsuit that accused Colorado regulators of quietly and illegally concocting a policy to police doctors who recommend medical marijuana to patients was entirely hidden from public view during a nearly three-year court battle, secreted behind a judge’s order to keep it that way, The Denver Post has found. Nine physicians filed the lawsuit in Denver District Court in March 2015 against the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, which regulates and maintains the state’s medical marijuana registry, and the Colorado Medical Board, which regulates doctors. Read more
- Oregon: U.S. Attorney for Oregon Billy J. Williams had strong words for the state’s handling of legalized marijuana, following the release of a new interstate report on the legal marijuana industry: “The recent HIDTA Insight Report on marijuana production, distribution, and consumption in Oregon confirms what we already know—it is out of control," he said in a statement. “The industry’s considerable and negative impacts on land use, water and underage consumption must be addressed immediately.” Read more
- This fall, outdoor recreational cannabis growers in Oregon will be required to notify the Oregon Liquor Control Commission (OLCC) of their harvests in a statewide push to prevent diversion from the legal market. According to OAR 845-025-2090, which went into effect Aug. 1, a licensed producer in the state’s recreational marijuana program “must file a harvest notice before harvesting usable marijuana from any mature plant located in an outdoor canopy area.” Read more
- Georgia: It’s still illegal to buy or transport cannabis oil in Georgia—even though the state authorized registered patients to use it three years ago—and state legislators are holding the first in a series of public meetings this month about how to improve access. The meetings of the Low THC Medical Oil Access Commission could result in legislation to change Georgia’s medical marijuana law next year. Read more
- Oklahoma: The campaign gathering signatures to put recreational marijuana on the ballot grossly inflated its totals in the weeks before turning them over to state officials, a former Green the Vote board member alleged Monday. Dody Sullivan, who said she left the organization a week ago, said the signature count for State Question 797 on July 31 was 31,244, drastically short of the roughly 124,000 needed to put it on the ballot. Read more
- The leader of the Oklahoma Health Department shared with a legislative working group a list of concerns raised by state agencies over implementation of State Question 788. Controversial rules included prohibiting smokable forms of marijuana, putting a pharmacist in every dispensary and capping THC concentration. Read more
- Florida: Pointing in part to smoking-related health effects, Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi’s office filed a 57-page brief arguing that an appeals court should uphold a decision by the Legislature to ban smoking medical marijuana. The brief, filed at the 1st District Court of Appeal, came as the state challenges a May ruling by Leon County Circuit Judge Karen Gievers, who said the smoking ban violates a 2016 constitutional amendment that broadly legalized medical marijuana. Read more
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