Judge orders Arizona to allow MMJ sales

[Madjag]

Flagstaff keepin dat fire!

Flagstaff keepin dat fire!

Yesterday on the 2nd day of AZ medical marijuana dispensary applications not much changed: two more apps or so.

Wednesday big changes: Flagstaff West and Flagstaff East both pulled in 5 applications! WTF?



Phoenix and Tucson are still chillin while college town Flag has 12 applications now for 2 dispensaries! Maybe some bright business major college students got their Baby Boozer parents into the show, "Dad, think about it. It's a great investment opportunity. You can put up the money and I can run the place!" Sound familiar?

I'm interested in seeing when Phoenix and Tucson get their deluge of applications. Could be a slaughter. When the state gets to the examination and registration phase (next) it means they made 60K in upfront fees just for Flagstaff.

Smooth...

 

[Madjag]

AZ Dept. of Health Services Director's Blog » Medical Marijuana

Week 1 for Dispensary App’s

Posted: 18 May 2012 08:36 AM PDT

We’ll wrap up our first week of accepting medical marijuana dispensary Registration Certificate applications today. We’ve received about 40 applications so far this week- and our team has been doing an excellent job of reviewing the applications for “Administrative Completeness” this week- so much so that we don’t even have a backlog (yet).

Any applications that are “Administratively Incomplete” (in other words, if they’re missing something) are being returned to the applicants so they can correct whatever is wrong. In June, we’ll be checking for “Substantive Completeness” (which is a more thorough, quality review), and the applicants will have another chance to make corrections. We expect to award all of the Registration Certificates on August 7. If there’s only 1 qualified applicant in a Community Health Analysis Area- that applicant will be awarded a Certificate. We’ll be holding a random drawing on August 7 to award Certificates in the CHAAs with more than 1 qualified applicant.

Prospective applicants can check out our Registration Certificate Application Checklist, Instructions, and the official Application on our Medical Marijuana Dispensary webpage. We’re refreshing our dispensary application page each weekday around the close of business to show how many applications we’ve received by Community Health Analysis Area. Applicants have until next Friday (May 25) to finish and turn in their paperwork.

​

 

[Madjag]

50 dispensary applications covering approximately 40 CHAA areas were received through this monday, the 21st of May.

4 more days to go and unless the state extends the application period the next phase in their examination and approval of applicants will proceed.

Interesting that Tucson and Phoenix have only a small handful of applications. Phoenix has about 5 apps and Tempe has 6. Tucson has only 2! If it stood this way at the outcome of this first app process, folks in the two big cities would be driving to the small, hip towns to get their meds....or going/staying underground.

Contrast that with Flagstaff that has 12, Williams with 3, Prescott with 2, and Sedona with 2. Makes me want to theorize but I'll wait until Friday the 25th to give my take.

Suffice it to say that the big bucks are holding out until Judge Bolton rules on the 25-Mile rule lawsuit sitting on her desk concerning patients being able to grow their own anywhere (if the present rule falls) v.s. not being able to if they live within a 25 mile radius of a dispensary (if the present rule stands).

 

[Madjag]

Tuesday, May 22, 2012 update:

Tuesday, May 22, 2012 update:

Today's new apps bring the total to 89 applications so far in 50 of the 126 or so CHAA (Community Health Analysis Area) that are slated for the initial Medical Marijuana dispensaries.

Today a whopping 39 more applicants came out of the woodwork adding medium and small town areas like Arivaca (hip and remote), Benson (near Tucson), Willcox/Bowie (covers the sticks in southeast AZ), Wickenburg (old cowtown on the back way, 89A, to Prescott from Phoenix), Tubac/Patagonia (hip, in the central drug corridor), Mesa North and East (Mormon land), Apache Junction (retiree land), and the surprise of them all, Cordes Junction.

Imagine you're traveling north on I-17 from Phoenix to Flagstaff or beyond and you have to stop for gas or for McDonalds. Cordes Junction has always been that interstate place where 100's of carloads stop off every 10 minutes for a refill of both kinds. Now you can add cannabis, close encounters of the third kind.

Pull off, tank up, get loaded, and fly on up the highway. What a picturine place to have a high-volume dispensary. Yes, it's possible that it will be in Dewey instead, on the highway to Prescott, however the sheer traffic volume at the Junction will translate into major traffic from those Arizona MM patients that pass this way. That even could be you.

​

 

[Friend]

so just to clarify, there will be a maximum of 1 dispensary in each CHAA?

my area has 2 applications so far... local law enforcement is pretty harsh when it comes to anything involving cannabis, so it'll be interesting to see how this plays out in the future

 

[Madjag]

CHAA Dispensaries

CHAA Dispensaries

so just to clarify, there will be a maximum of 1 dispensary in each CHAA?

my area has 2 applications so far... local law enforcement is pretty harsh when it comes to anything involving cannabis, so it'll be interesting to see how this plays out in the future

Yes, each of the 126 CHAA will have one dispensary initially. Key word - see if it stays that way.

Flagstaff has 12 applications now in three CHAA. Only 3 will get selected out of the bunch.

The LEOs in each area will have quite a learning curve, eh?

 

[paper thorn]

I say boycott all dispensaries, once they're open, till they shut down for lack of sales. May be the small growers only hope. If i could grow for one I might not feel this way, but you know... they all already have their own friends and family.

 

[Madjag]

May 23 - Wednesday - Update

May 23 - Wednesday - Update

Wow...the total applications number more than doubled since yesterday from 89 to 193.

The number of CHAAs that received apps went from yesterday's 50 to Wednesday's total of 72, an almost 50% increase.

The gold rush is on.

New: Fountain Hills blasts in with 4 apps
Alhambra with 4
Apache Junction got 4 more

Weird: Cordes Junction received 3 more apps (4 total)

 

[Madjag]

Strategy, Strategy, Strategy

Strategy, Strategy, Strategy

Big day on Friday the 26th: More applications came in (about 290) than on all the previous days combined, bringing the total to 484 Arizona Dispensary Applications!

Here's the view from the Director of the Arizona Department of Health Services, Will Humble's personal blog:

“It’s been a busy week for our medical marijuana team. Our 2-week dispensary application period ended a couple of hours ago…as did the hearing regarding adding new debilitating medical conditions.

We received 484 dispensary applications over the last 2 weeks. As you know, we have 126 Community Health Analysis Areas (CHAAs) and a maximum of 126 possible dispensaries (one per CHAA). Some of our CHAA’s received multiple applications- for example, the Estrella CHAA had 16 applicants and the Flagstaff E CHAA 13 had applicants. Many other CHAAs had only 1 applicant. 27 areas didn’t receive any applications. You can see the number of applications by CHAA on our website.

Our team just finished logging all of the applications that we received and has already started reviewing some of the applications for “Administrative Completeness”. Any applications that are “Administratively Incomplete” (in other words, if they’re missing something) will be returned to the applicants so they can correct whatever is wrong. In June, we’ll be checking for “Substantive Completeness” (which is a more thorough, quality review), and the applicants will have another chance to make corrections. We expect to award all of the Registration Certificates on August 7.

Registration Certificates will be awarded to applicants in CHAAs with only 1 applicant on August 7 as long as their application is Administratively and Substantively complete. We’ll be holding a random drawing on August 7 to award Certificates in the CHAAs with more than 1 qualified applicant. Of course, some CHAAs will not have a dispensary this year because we didn’t have an applicant.

We also had our hearing regarding adding debilitating medical conditions this afternoon at our Laboratory. We heard from dozens of folks – some urged us to add the conditions and some that urged us not to. We have also received hundreds of comments on-line. We have several more weeks before we need to make a decision. If you’d like to view the public comment session, we have a link on our website.”

Interesting results:

- 484 total apps
- Almost 300 apps received on the last day
- Over 2.5 million dollars in app fees were collected (5k per app)
- 24 CHAAs had only one application meaning they have that area nailed as long as their permit is complete and in line with the app process rules
- 27 CHAA areas were not applied for, mostly Native American CHAAs

• Surprising:
  - CHAA with greatest number of apps: 16-Estrella (SW Phoenix valley)
  - Small town or area with greatest # of apps: 29-Flagstaff (across 3 CHAAs)
  - Other areas with lots of applications: 10-Catalina (Northern end of Tucson area), 10-Apache Junction (far western end of Phoenix valley), 10-Payson (primary Zane Gey/Mogollon Rim hub), 10-Maryvale (western side of Phoenix area), and 5 for Cordes Junction, the north/south travel gas station stop and turnoff to Prescott.
• Most distant, remote, or isolated:
  1-Arivaca (almost to the Mexico-USA border SW of Tucson)
  1-Bisbee (old mining town, now a hip art town as well as the county seat, 6 miles from Mexico in the SE corner of state)
  4-Holbrook (east-west travel stop on Interstate to New Mexico)

According to the state of Arizona the first registration decisions will be made around the beginning of August, thus opening the door to the dispensary proliferation around the state.

 

[Madjag]

Friend,
I guess you saw that the Payson area CHAA totalled 10 dispensary applications.

Seems that many applicants were holding back until the end of the app period. Strategy, Strategy, Strategy. I think that there will be an interesting outcome for that area. My thought is that some Colorado dispensary owners viewed it as a nice place to expand to, not too far of a drive from Colorado as well as a nice place to have a second (third? fourth?) home based on the inevitable profits they'd pull in from such a crossroads place, a summer-deluge-of-travelers place.

 

[Madjag]

8 Hours Bottle-To-Throttle

8 Hours Bottle-To-Throttle

My daughter is a helicopter pilot and in aviation they have a simple jingle that summarizes how long a pilot must wait before flying after the consumption of alcohol:

"8 Hours Bottle-To-Throttle"​

What is the equivalent for weed? I read more frequently about people pulled over that catch a blood test and the results show "metabolites" of marijuana, thus leading to a DUI or such.

Fortunately, if only metabolites show up in your bloodstream, as a registered Arizona Medical Marijuana patient, you're in the clear:

A person shall not be:
D. Operating, navigating or being in actual physical control of any motor vehicle, aircraft or motorboat while under the influence of marijuana, except that a registered qualifying patient shall not be considered to be under the influence of marijuana solely because of the presence of metabolites or components of marijuana that appear in insufficient concentration to cause impairment.

What separates mere metabolites showing v.s. full-on marijuana impairment remains to be seen and might actually be a fine, sticky (no pun) point for an expert witness to defend in a DUI courtroom.

Still, it's refreshing that AZ included this in their MM laws. If a qualified patient gets pulled over and isn't laughing hysterically in the face of the officer, doesn't have any alcohol smell on their person, and acts cool, they'll probably be able to move on down the road.

MJ

 

[Madjag]

Here's the answer, somewhat, again on attorney Richard Keyt's great MM website:

"http://www.keytlaw.com/arizonamedicalmarijuanalaw/2011/01/arizona-medical-marijuana-dui/"]http://www.keytlaw.com/arizonamedicalmarijuanalaw/2011/01/arizona-medical-marijuana-dui/[/COLOR]

The key is to avoid having a Law Enforcement officer thinking you are impaired in the slightest degree from weed.

Basically: no paraphenalia, no residual smoke in your vehicle, no outrageous laughing in his face, and no smoke on your body emanating heavily.

 

[Madjag]

Gustin Reichbach - New York Supreme Court justice

Gustin Reichbach - New York Supreme Court justice

Gustin Reichbach is a sitting New York Supreme Court justice and.....a medical marijuana advocate!

Check out my friend M.J. Smith's column in the Tucson Weekly:

"New Yorker Gustin Reichbach went through hell when his doctor diagnosed his Stage III pancreatic cancer three years ago.

Aggressive chemotherapy left him battered almost as badly as the cancer itself. He couldn't eat. He couldn't sleep. He was in pain and nauseous. He lost weight. He tried various prescription drugs, but they left him with an even broader array of ailments - constipation, more appetite loss, dangerous glucose levels. Nothing worked as well as marijuana, so he drew the curtains on his well-appointed home and smoked. He was in the same shoes as any patient in a state that doesn't have MMJ on the books. Almost."

http://www.tucsonweekly.com/TheRang...stin-reichbach-is-like-any-mmj-patient-almost

 

[paper thorn]

seems that there will be no dispensaries on the 26? CHAAs on Arizona Indian Reservations. Zero apps. Next year the state will take apps for 26 more dispensaries to get to the 126 allowed by law.

 

[Arthritis_sucks]

I think the attempt to shut down LA will send some your way to AZ.