House Moves Forward on Medical Marijuana

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Known as Amendment 2, the ballot initiative was approved by more than 71 percent of Florida voters in November. It came after the Legislature in 2014 and 2016 passed far-more limited medical marijuana laws, allowing non-euphoric cannabis for some patients and full-strength marijuana for people with terminal illnesses.

The House bill would provide fewer additional licenses for purveyors of medical marijuana than a Senate plan would allow. Currently seven “dispensing organizations” have been approved by state health regulators.

Another point of contention in the House proposal would require health officials to grant medical marijuana licenses to applicants that lost out when vying to become one of the handful of operators authorized to grow, process and distribute non-euphoric cannabis products more than a year ago.

The proposal would require the Department of Health to grant another five licenses once the patient population reaches 200,000, and another three licenses for every additional 100,000 patients registered in a state database.