State regulators on Friday gave final approval to Arkansas' first medical-marijuana dispensary to open for business, but the drug's debut is still weeks away.
Doctors Orders RX, a Hot Springs dispensary, was cleared by the Arkansas Alcoholic Beverage Control agency to open its doors once medical cannabis is available. The company is the first marijuana retailer to receive the final OK, but another Hot Springs dispensary -- Green Springs Medical -- scheduled its final inspection for next Thursday.
State officials and licensed growers expect the first batch of medical marijuana to be ready for dispensary shelves sometime during the week of May 13, though it's not expected to be enough to serve the growing patient population of more than 11,200 with state-approved registry cards.
"I am pleased that Doctors Orders RX received official approval to open Arkansas' first licensed medical cannabis dispensary," said owner Don Sears. "We will announce our opening date in the coming days, and we fully expect the initial demand for our products to exceed availability. Until cultivation capacity can keep up with demand, we will operate on a first-come, first-serve basis with the limited products currently available. We look forward to finally being able to provide relief to ailing Arkansans across our state."
Arkansans voted to legalize medical marijuana in 2016, approving Amendment 98 to the Arkansas Constitution. However, the implementation of the program has been plagued with legal and bureaucratic delays.
[RELATED: Complete Democrat-Gazette coverage of medical marijuana in Arkansas]
It took the state longer than expected to evaluate the more than 200 applications for the lucrative 32 dispensary and five cultivation licenses. The program then stalled for four months while the cultivation permitting process was challenged in court.
The dispensary application evaluation process also dragged on longer than officials projected, and most of those companies that did win licenses have taken longer than promised to become operable.
To date, three of the five licensed growers have begun cultivating the drug, but only one of them, Bold Team, has harvested and begun processing it. The other two companies are still constructing their grow houses.
Robert Lercher, a Bold Team spokesman, said the first harvested plants were in their final drying stages Friday, and they'll soon be chemically tested for final approval.
Lercher still expects the first medical cannabis to be available by the week of May 13 if not sooner.
"It's all coming together," he said.
Lercher added that the first harvest yielded more than 900 pounds of "wet" marijuana. The company will soon see exactly how much "dry" cannabis that produced; it initially estimated that the first harvest would yield about 200 pounds of usable medical cannabis.
Patients, under Amendment 98, may purchase up to 2.5 ounces of medical marijuana every two weeks.
Doctors Orders RX, located at 4893/4897 Malvern Ave. in Hot Springs, is expected to be ready to open soon after product is available, said Scott Hardin, an Alcoholic Beverage Control agency spokesman.
Still looming over Doctors Orders is an investigation into Sears' relationship with the owners of two other dispensary license holders -- Mary Sears and Todd Sears. Alcoholic Beverage Control investigators began investigating the ties between the three companies after a competing dispensary applicant complained that the family relationship between Don, Todd and Mary Sears disqualified them from holding multiple dispensary permits.
Hardin said Friday that a final conclusion on the complaint hadn't been reached.
Green Springs Medical, located at 309 Seneca St. in Hot Springs, also hopes to be open when the first product is ready for the market, CEO Dragan Vicentic has said.
Both state and industry officials expect a rush of patients and registered caregivers once the first dispensaries open for business later this month.
The Arkansas Department of Health will qualify patients for a medical-marijuana registry ID card if a doctor certifies that they suffer from one of 18 qualifying conditions. The cards are also available to registered caregivers.
Metro on 05/04/2019