It is a sad day for medical marijuana patients, caregivers and businesspersons- and guess who did it to you: some of the very people you talk to on Facebook
photo caption: Sen. Rick Jones holds his “Logic Brick” which is tilted so he can’t see all the holes in it.
by Rick Thompson/September 8, 2016
LANSING- Caregivers and dispensary owners, dust off those resumes and shine up those shoes, because you are probably going back to work in the mainstream business world very soon. Lansing and some of your friends passed a set of bills that will disallow many existing dispensaries, will not allow dispensaries to grow their own cannabis, and will outlaw ALL current transfers of medical marijuana from individual caregivers to the new licensed Centers.
Welcome to the very uncomfortable new world of medical marijuana in Michigan.
The Michigan Senate passed a set of five bills today. HB 4209 create a new dispensary law; several other bills passed, too- alterations to the penalties for selling cannabis in violation of the MMMA, one that creates a seed-to-sale tracking program, and one that says the new dispensary program doesn’t have to follow the same rules as other programs. The Michigan Cannabis Development Association has championed these bills; their spokesman, Willie Rochon, was quoted in MLive today in support of the bills.
READ THE CURRENT LANGUAGE OF HB 4209 HERE
Included in this batch is one bill most patients like- HB 4210, which gives patient protections to users and home producers of concentrates and medibles.
Let’s look at what the situation is across the state right now.
1. There are easily over two hundred dispensaries in operation across Michigan.
Before Detroit passed their ordinance regulating dispensaries, the city had more than 200 documented distribution centers. More than half of those seem to still be in business. Genesee County, including Thetford Township and Flint, has at least thirty. Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti carry about 20, there are approx. 30 in the western Wayne suburbs, the west side of the state has a few dozen and so does the top half of the Lower Peninsula, with maybe a dozen scattered across the Upper Peninsula. If that number is a surprise, you must appreciate how well-behaved those centers must be in order for them to operate without incident. That is a lot of well-behaved, unregulated medical marijuana distribution centers.
2. Some cities license them.
Flint, Detroit, Ypsilanti and others have crafted ordinances allowing these distribution centers to exist. In the absence of state law, these communities acted. In the case of 3rd Coast, in Ypsilanti, they have passed city inspection for five years in a row. In Flint, licenses have been issued for several years, and there are background checks required for employees. Cities know how to regulate the businesses within their own communities.
3. Caregivers and patients who grow transfer their overages to the dispensaries.
When a patient or caregiver’s garden yields more cannabis than their patient requires, a caregiver brings the extra cannabis (the overage) to a dispensary; if it meets their standards, they buy it. This provides multiple benefits to the consumer, it eases the process of supply and it defeats a supply line to the illegal market. This has been a standard of operation for the industry in general since the very first medical marijuana distribution centers opened in 2009. Although not specifically authorized by law, this situation is a hallmark of the self-regulated industry in Michigan.
Now, let’s look at what HB 4209 does.
1. It signals the end of unlicensed dispensaries.
Some of those 200 may- MAY- qualify for inclusion in the new world of medical marijuana, but there are no guarantees. This bill could be a go-ahead signal to law enforcement that raiding dispensaries is okay again. Some dispensary owners, like the members of the Michigan Cannabis Development Authority, have spent thousands and thousands of dollars trying to get this exclusionary program passed. They must be willing to sacrifice their current businesses because they believe- or, perhaps, have been promised- they would get one of the coveted dispensary licenses being issued by the state. Nobody knows for sure, but if it looks like a duck…
2. Dispensaries in cities where licenses already exist will have an easier time.
The decisions on who gets a license will all be made by a state-appointed board made up of cops, sheriffs, lobbyists, lawmakers and one patient/caregiver. In the original version of this bill, introduced in 2011 by Rep Callton and the MACC, all these decisions were done locally and there was no state involvement at all. Now, a local ordinance is necessary before a person can apply for a state license but the final decision is up to the state, not the municipality. The bills are completely flipped around in intent and execution from their original versions.
3. Licensed dispensaries can only take marijuana delivered to them in an armored truck
No more caregivers with backpacks. Those who have made a living growing and selling marijuana to dispensaries, get ready to go back to selling shoes or performing IRS audits. HB 4209 is filled with ways to push the regular people out of the medical marijuana industry. Want to work at a dispensary? You can’t be a caregiver. You have to give up your caregiver card even to apply for a position! No caregivers in the medibles, or cultivation, or testing, or dispensary industry. No caregivers allowed in the new medical marijuana world. Thanks, MCDA attorney Denise Pollicella. You helped create and pass this document that eliminates from employment the people with the most valid knowledge of the field.
Yes, I said armored truck. They are required to transport every gram. Under the Michigan medical Marihuana Act, you and I can carry up to 15 ounces in our car trunk, safely, with zero concern and under sanction of law, provided you are fully carded. Under the new Medical Marihuana Facilities Licensing Act, carrying even 1.5 grams of cannabis out of a grow house is a felony. The secure transport portion of this bill seems to be a gift from the Senate to Michigan Department of Transportation rich guy Ron Boji and others of his ilk; men with vast automotive distribution empires already established who can sweep in and make bank on every gram of marijuana sold.
The Lansing players who got the secure transport part of the bill inserted into HB 4209 are the smartest men in the game. Others make profit only once: a grower sells to a processor who sells to a dispensary, each making money only on the sale. The secure transport industry makes money taking cannabis from garden to oilman, then again to a medible manufacturer, then to a dispensary. Potentially three times or more the transport industry could be paid hauling around marijuana products- oops, I mean, three times the patient has to pony up extra cost to pay the transport industry to haul around what we normally carry in our car trunks. Thank you very much, MCDA, for advocating passage of a bill that creates advantage for millionaires and pain for sick people. All that extra expense is going to hurt patients. Hope the ill and injured forgive you when they are shopping in your dispensaries. I bet they will NOT.
What? You want to grow your own marijuana and use it to make something salable? Nope. Dispensaries cannot grow their own. Dispensary owners, partners and managers have strict rules about what they can and cannot have a financial interest in. So do medibles producers. if it doesn’t come from the armored truck, you can’t use it. And they will find out. Because…
4. The state is creating a HUGE PROGRAM (insert Trump voice)
Just like The Donald says, this program is HUGE. Huge, I tell you, and it’s gonna make Michigan law enforcement agencies great again.
Consider the opening statement of the bill where it says this will create a “statewide monitoring system for commercial marihuana transactions” which seeks to give police a way to verify registry identification cards, to track marihuana transfers and transportation by armored car, including date of purchase, price paid, quantity purchased. It tracks how much marijuana you have purchased, and will deny you the opportunity to buy more than the state decides you are allowed.
Soooo, each armored car is tracked as it makes its way around town? Who monitors all those signals? Then, every marijuana buy is entered into a computer? Each patient could make multiple purchases of different items. That makes for potentially dozens- hundreds- of data entries each day, for every center. That is thousands of data entries each and every day. Only a big government program can handle this amount of date adequately.
But it gets bigger and more cumbersome than that.
Growers have to track all marijuana plants, batches of dried cannabis, waste, transfers, sales, returns and more- all using unique transaction IDs. Sounds like a huge system with plenty of opportunities for failure? You bet! Thanks, Republicans, the party of small government. It was Rep. Kesto who introduced the seed-to-sale tracking bill and invited all this extra government reporting. More costs occur in the administration of the program.
At the end of the day, the bill for all of this is carried on the price of the end product, and that price comes out of the pocket of people deemed to be among the most ill in the entire state. Thank you, Senator Rick Jones, for turning a functional marijuana system into a thing people will bail out of. The very uncomfortable new world of medical marijuana in Michigan is a lot meaner now. It is not a welcome change.
Look for more analysis of HB 4209 from The Compassion Chronicles soon.
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