The one piece missing before Ohio recreational marijuana sales can begin
View a Yellow Springs growing facility's inaugural crop of recreational marijuana in the video player above.
COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) -- The Ohio Division of Cannabis Control shared an update Friday on how far along the state's dispensaries are in getting approval to sell recreational marijuana.
As of Wednesday, DCC Public Information Officer Jamie Crawford told NBC4 that the agency had received a total of 244 applications to convert medical marijuana businesses to dual-use. From there, it reviewed the submitted paperwork and cleared 182 businesses for different types of dual-use licenses:
- Six Testing labs
- 33 Cultivators
- 39 Processors
- 104 Dispensaries
The final number in particular reflects the high interest among the state's 126 total medical dispensaries to get an entirely new sect of customers. Some of them, alongside the lawmakers who approved the recreational sale rollout, also predicted when sales could begin. Rep. Jamie Callender (R-Concord), co-chair of the state's Joint Committee on Agency Rule Review, shared an estimate of "mid-June" after approving the dual-use process. After applications opened, the CEO of Story Cannabis told NBC4 his dispensaries could start selling recreational cannabis as early as the week of June 23.
However, both of those predictions turned out incorrect. While several of the state's dispensaries have secured provisional licenses, they're missing the next piece of the puzzle. Crawford said on Friday that until they also get a certificate of operation, the businesses can't sell recreational products.
"There have been no certificates of operation issued to dispensaries to begin selling non-medical cannabis at this point," Crawford wrote. "A dual-use provisional license does not permit the holder to sell non-medical cannabis. It is issued as a placeholder while the provisional licensee works to meet the necessary requirements to obtain a certificate of operation and the division processes all required documents."
The DCC publicly displays the applications for Ohio dispensaries to convert to dual-use on its website, as well as the status of its provisional license:
Cresco Labs, which operates both a growing facility and medical dispensaries in Ohio, has the lowest license number in the cultivator class. And Verdant Creations, with locations in Chillicothe and Newark, holds the lowest-numbered license in the dual-use dispensary category.
While Crawford noted that the DCC will "review and process applications roughly in the order in which completed applications have been received," he clarified Friday that "the order of provisional licenses in e-license is not necessarily an indication of when a completed application was received by the division." This means the lowest-numbered applicants in the database aren't guaranteed to be the first to receive the needed certificate to start recreational sales.
"Think of the BMV model, where there is a single line but multiple windows open," Crawford said. "A complicated application with multiple things that need to be resolved may get to a window first, but may not complete their certificate of operation first."
Cresco's chief communication officer, Jason Erkes, shared the dispensaries' perspective on the wait for certificates of operation. In May at the company's growing facility in Yellow Springs, his team planted the first crop of cannabis intended for recreational marijuana products. They'll later go on sale at Cresco's Sunnyside Dispensaries, with locations in Ohio towns like Chillicothe. Erkes believes his company's hands in both supplies and sales may result in receiving a certificate faster.
"Being that all the products sold to adult-use consumers must come from both a dual-use cultivator and a dual-use approved lab, we think those will be the first operational licenses issued; otherwise the dispensaries will have no approved product to sell," Erkes said.
Crawford supported Erkes' theory in his metaphor for the approval process.
"Cultivators, processors and testing labs receive some priority because they are less complicated, and to ensure that products available for adult-use consumers can be traced back to a dual-use cultivator or processor," Crawford said. "Dispensaries will be required to show they are able to properly process adult use and medical sales, as well as provide proof of training, which means they will take more time at the 'window' even if they are called up first."
Erkes also shared the latest prediction on when sales could start: July.
"Since the passing of Issue 2 on the ballot, we have made significant increases in staffing in our cultivation and manufacturing facility to accommodate the increased demand," Erkes said. "And likewise our five Sunnyside Dispensaries have beefed up to prepare for the influx of new consumers we expect to start shopping this month."
People outside of Ohio's formal marijuana industry are also trying to get in on the hype. In Ohio's first full year with legalized cannabis, two festivals were planned in the summer months. The Stargazer Cannabis Festival is set for July 26-28 and endorses personal consumption of homegrown cannabis at the event. One of its sponsored activities includes a joint-rolling contest, which organizer Chad Thompson hired judges for at $100 an hour. But the Ohio Cannabis Festival, slated for Aug. 31 to Sept. 1, fizzled out in a dispute over its compliance with state law, with legal action pending from the organizers' side.