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Ohio Legalization Campaign Submits Additional Signatures To Qualify For Ballot
Activists in Ohio last week submitted an additional 6,500 signatures in support of a recreational marijuana legalization initiative after originally falling short of the number needed to qualify the proposal for the ballot.
The supporters of a proposed ballot measure to legalize adult-use cannabis in Ohio last week submitted petitions with more than 6,500 additional signatures from voters who would like to see the proposal appear on the ballot for this year’s general election. The supplemental signatures were collected and delivered by the Coalition to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol on Thursday after the group’s original submission last month fell just short of the threshold to trigger a vote on the proposal.
“This submission validates what we’ve said all along: regulating marijuana is popular in Ohio,” campaign spokesman Thomas Haren said in a statement to The Columbus Dispatch on August 3. “We’re looking forward to giving Ohio voters a chance to make their voices heard at the ballot this fall.”
Signature Gathering Originally Fell Short
The coalition submitted more than 222,000 signatures to Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose in early July, far more than the 124,046 needed for the initiative to qualify for the ballot for the November 2023 general election. But three weeks later, LaRose revealed that the campaign had collected just over 123,000 verified signatures, adding that the signature verification and tabulation results “indicate that petitioners filed an insufficient number of valid signatures.” He also noted that the campaign would have 10 days to obtain and submit the additional signatures needed to hit the goal.
“To submit a sufficient number of valid signatures, petitioners need an additional 679 valid signatures that are not contained in the original or prior supplementary petitions,” LaRose wrote in a statement on July 25.
After the announcement from the secretary of state, the legalization campaign acknowledged the group’s shortfall in a statement, saying that making up the difference to reach the signature goal would be “easy.”
“It looks like we came up a little short in this first phase, but now we have 10 days to find just 679 voters to sign a supplemental petition – this is going to be easy, because a majority of Ohioans support our proposal to regulate and tax adult-use marijuana,” Haren said in a statement to The Columbus Dispatch. “We look forward to giving Ohio voters a chance to make their voices heard this November.”
The group set to work to gather additional signatures from voters across the state of Ohio, using social media platforms including Reddit to publicize signature-gathering drives. Last week, the campaign submitted an additional 6,545 signatures, one day before the 10-day deadline.
The supplemental petitions will now be delivered to county election boards, where signature verification will take place over an eight-day period. Results from election boards will then be reviewed by LaRose, who will announce if the campaign has received enough signatures to qualify for the ballot. On Thursday, the coalition said that legalizing marijuana will benefit the community.
“It works, generates hundreds of millions of dollars in tax revenue every year and makes sure that consumers have an alternative to the illicit market where they can buy products that they’re confident aren’t laced with illicit substances,” Haren said.
Proposed Ballot Measure Would Legalize Adult-Use Cannabis
If passed, the proposed ballot initiative would legalize recreational marijuana in Ohio for adults 21 and older, who would be permitted to possess up to 2.5 ounces of marijuana and up to 15 grams of cannabis concentrates. The proposal also legalizes marijuana cultivation for personal use, with adults allowed to grow up to six cannabis plants. Households with more than one adult would be permitted to grow a total of 12 plants.
The commercial production and sales of cannabis products would be regulated by a new state agency named the Division of Cannabis Control, which would have the authority to “license, regulate, investigate, and penalize adult use cannabis operators, adult use testing laboratories, and individuals required to be licensed.” Cannabis products would carry a 10% tax, which would be dedicated to administrative costs of regulation, substance misuse treatment programs and a social equity and jobs program. Local governments with licensed recreational marijuana dispensaries would also receive a share of cannabis tax revenue. Under the proposal’s social equity program, some cannabis cultivation and dispensary licenses would be reserved for individuals from communities that have faced disproportionate enforcement of Ohio’s current marijuana laws.
“We are proposing to regulate marijuana for adult use, just like we do for alcohol,” Haren said in a press release when the campaign was launched nearly two years ago. “Our proposal fixes a broken system while ensuring local control, keeping marijuana out of the hands of children, and benefiting everyone.”
Ohio legalized medical marijuana in 2016 through a bill passed by the state legislature, leading to the opening of the state’s first regulated cannabis dispensaries in 2019. In 2015, an earlier proposal to legalize adult-use cannabis was successfully added to the ballot, but the measure was defeated by more than 65% of the state’s voters.
New Mexico regulators fined a cannabis operator nearly $300,000 and revoked its license after the company allegedly created fake reports in the state’s traceability software.
The New Mexico Cannabis Control Division (CCD) accused marijuana manufacturer and retailer Golden Roots of 11 violations, according to Albuquerque Business First.
Golden Roots operates the The Cannabis Revolution Dispensary.
The majority of the violations are related to the Albuquerque company’s improper use of BioTrack, which has been New Mexico’s track-and-trace vendor since 2015.
The CCD alleges Golden Roots reported marijuana production only two months after it had received its vertically integrated license, according to Albuquerque Business First.
Because cannabis takes longer than two months to be cultivated, the CCD was suspicious of the report.
After inspecting the company’s premises, the CCD alleged Golden Roots reported cultivation, transportation and sales in BioTrack but wasn’t able to provide officers who inspected the site evidence that the operator was cultivating cannabis.
In April, the CCD revoked Golden Roots’ license and issued a $10,000 fine, according to the news outlet.
The company requested a hearing, which the regulator scheduled for Sept. 1.
At the hearing, the CCD testified that the company’s dried-cannabis weights in BioTrack were suspicious because they didn’t seem to accurately reflect how much weight marijuana loses as it dries.
Company employees also poorly accounted for why they were making adjustments in the system of up to 24 pounds of cannabis, making comments such as “bad” or “mistake” in the software, Albuquerque Business First reported.
Golden Roots was fined $298,972.05 – the amount regulators allege the company made selling products that weren’t properly accounted for in BioTrack.
The CCD has been cracking down on cannabis operators accused of selling products procured from out-of-state or not grown legally:
- Regulators alleged in August that Albuquerque dispensary Sawmill Sweet Leaf sold out-of-state products and didn’t have a license for extraction.
- Paradise Exotics Distro lost its license in July after regulators alleged the company sold products made in California.
Golden Roots was the first alleged rulebreaker in New Mexico to be asked to pay a large fine.
Source: https://mjbizdaily.com/new-mexico-cannabis-operator-fined-loses-license-for-alleged-biotrack-fraud/
Four marijuana companies, including a multistate operator, have filed a lawsuit against U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland in which they allege the federal MJ prohibition under the Controlled Substances Act is no longer constitutional.
According to the complaint, filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Massachusetts, retailer Canna Provisions, Treevit delivery service CEO Gyasi Sellers, cultivator Wiseacre Farm and MSO Verano Holdings Corp. are all harmed by “the federal government’s unconstitutional ban on cultivating, manufacturing, distributing, or possessing intrastate marijuana.”
Verano is headquartered in Chicago but has operations in Massachusetts; the other three operators are based in Massachusetts.
The lawsuit seeks a ruling that the “Controlled Substances Act is unconstitutional as applied to the intrastate cultivation, manufacture, possession, and distribution of marijuana pursuant to state law.”
The companies want the case to go before the U.S. Supreme Court.
They hired prominent law firm Boies Schiller Flexner to represent them.
The New York-based firm’s principal is David Boies, whose former clients include Microsoft, former presidential candidate Al Gore and Elizabeth Holmes’ disgraced startup Theranos.
Similar challenges to the federal Controlled Substances Act (CSA) have failed.
One such challenge led to a landmark Supreme Court decision in 2005.
In Gonzalez vs. Raich, the highest court in the United States ruled in a 6-3 decision that the commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution gave Congress the power to outlaw marijuana federally, even though state laws allow the cultivation and sale of cannabis.
In the 18 years since that ruling, 23 states and the District of Columbia have legalized adult-use marijuana and the federal government has allowed a multibillion-dollar cannabis industry to thrive.
Since both Congress and the U.S. Department of Justice, currently headed by Garland, have declined to intervene in state-licensed marijuana markets, the key facts that led to the Supreme Court’s 2005 ruling “no longer apply,” Boies said in a statement Thursday.
“The Supreme Court has since made clear that the federal government lacks the authority to regulate purely intrastate commerce,” Boies said.
“Moreover, the facts on which those precedents are based are no longer true.”
Verano President Darren Weiss said in a statement the company is “prepared to bring this case all the way to the Supreme Court in order to align federal law with how Congress has acted for years.”
While the Biden administration’s push to reschedule marijuana would help solve marijuana operators’ federal tax woes, neither rescheduling nor modest Congressional reforms such as the SAFER Banking Act “solve the fundamental issue,” Weiss added.
“The application of the CSA to lawful state-run cannabis business is an unconstitutional overreach on state sovereignty that has led to decades of harm, failed businesses, lost jobs, and unsafe working conditions.”
Alabama regulators are targeting Dec. 1 to award the first batch of medical cannabis business licenses after the agency’s first two attempts were scrapped because of scoring errors and litigation.
The first licenses will be awarded to individual cultivators, delivery providers, processors, dispensaries and state testing labs, according to the Alabama Medical Cannabis Commission (AMCC).
Then, on Dec. 12, the AMCC will award licenses for vertically integrated operations, a designation set primarily for multistate operators.
Licenses are expected to be handed out 28 days after they have been awarded, so MMJ production could begin in early January, according to the Alabama Daily News.
That means MMJ products could be available for patients around early March, an AMCC spokesperson told the media outlet.
Regulators initially awarded 21 business licenses in June, only to void them after applicants alleged inconsistencies with how the applications were scored.
Then, in August, the state awarded 24 different licenses – 19 went to June recipients – only to reverse themselves again and scratch those licenses after spurned applicants filed lawsuits.
A state judge dismissed a lawsuit filed by Chicago-based MSO Verano Holdings Corp., but another lawsuit is pending.
Source: https://mjbizdaily.com/alabama-plans-to-award-medical-cannabis-licenses-dec-1/
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