James Call
Patricia Nelson demonstrated during 25 hours of negotiations over a 35-hour period she means business. The director of the state Office of Compassionate Use concluded negotiations for a regulatory structure for a medicinal marijuana industry saying she would submit a proposed rule as quickly as possible. She made the statement around 7:00 p.m. Thursday.
It was available for review within 16 hours; starting the clock on a 21-day public comment period.
If the proposal survives February without a challenge then by late August legal marijuana plants will be sprouting at five Florida nurseries.
Nelson led a group of regulators, growers and patient advocates in trying to find a consensus – a rule capable of withstanding a legal challenge so that the Department of Health can award licenses to cultivate marijuana and process oil from the plant to treat children with epilepsy and cancer patients.
Their finish product delighted Central Florida grower Kerry Herndon who is interested in securing a licenses and has been traveling to Tallahassee to testify at rule development workshops.
Herndon ducked out of Thursday’s meeting before its conclusion and when informed the proposal to allow 210 days for harvesting the plant and processing oil was adopted, he was sold on the panel’s work.
“It was not rational before, (150 days) was really, really tight – hard to do. That had me frightened, that really had me frighten,” said Herndon. “They made fantastic progress in a very short time; I’m way more optimistic about this now than I was Tuesday.”
The rule could be implemented by late April and given its timeline cannabis-based medicinal oil would be available in December. If the process is delayed by an unsucessful rule challenge the oil could be on the market by this time next year. If a challenge is successful then it is anyone’s guess when the oil would be available.
Gov. Rick Scott signed the Compassionate Medical Cannabis Act of 2014 in June. It authorized physicians to treat severe cases of epilepsy with cannabis oil. The Department of Health was to have implemented the law by Jan. 1. Delays in awarding the licenses and planting the first crop have frustrated patient advocates.
Holley Moseley lobbied lawmakers to approve the Charlotte Web bill for her young daughter Rayann. Moseley was the patient advocate on the 12-member panel Nelson assembled with the hope of writing a challenge proof rule.
If the panel did not find a clear path to implementation then advocates like Moseley intend to return to the state Capitol and lobby for a glitch bill – clarifying intent and the language in the 2014 law which enables nurseries and business interests to hold it hostage in court and other legal proceedings.
“We’ll absolutely need the legislature to come to the table here and fix this, said Ryan Wiggins, Moseley’s spokeswoman. “We’ve shown that this rule is going to continue to run around in circles if this rule is challenged again.”
An unsuccessful challenge could be settled before lawmakers leave Tallahassee in May. Nelson’s remarks indicate a challenge would not surprise her. It’s a Tallahassee cottage industry. Millions of dollars are at stake as Florida repeals marijuana prohibitions and a corps of lawyers and consultants work to help clients get a share of it.
But as Herndon noted, “Anyone can challenge anything at any time but can you be successful? I mean at a certain point are you spitting into the wind.”
There are two clocks ticking on that million dollar question.
A 21-day comment period ends Feb. 27. If no challenge is filed then there will be a 21-day application period with licenses being awarded in April – which opens a window for a losing applicant to challenge the scoring used to select the winners.
That would stop the clock – freezing the process and preventing the planting of Florida’s first legal medicinal marijuana crop.
