Arkansas Makes Medical Marijuana Cultivation Application Fee $15,000

If you’d like to grow medical marijuana in Arkansas, the state is going to ask you for a $15,000 application fee. This is in addition to the licensing fee that the state is still working on determining. The voters approved the Arkansas Medical Marijuana Amendment and the legislation’s language says that the maximum fee permitted is $15,000.

Rules for the newly approved Arkansas medical marijuana program will be in place by June 2017, according to Arkansas Online. A date as to when growers can begin applying for cultivation licenses, or business owners for dispensary licenses, will be announced by June 2017 as well.

Now, it seems like a big application fee, but if your application is denied, you receive $7,500 back.

What may hold the process up when it comes to growers licensing is that they have to prove that they are financially able to operate the facility. A vote to make the application fee refundable was approved 4-1, approving the return of 50-percent of the application fee if the application is not approved.

Commissioner Dr. Carlos Roman said, “I’d like to see some of it refundable if not all of it. I think it would encourage more people to get involved.”

Commissioner Travis Story said, “There aren’t very many cultivators. The last thing we want is for one of these cultivation facilities to go out of business, and so having somebody who has the wherewithal – who has the ability – to make sure they can fully perform is the important part.”

Commissioner Roman is calling for low licensing fees as well. There is a small possibility that the state legislature may increase the sales tax on medical marijuana.

Questions regarding the definition of “violent felonies” as being offenses that can ban someone from operating a dispensary or growing also arose.

January 9 is the beginning of the new session and it is expected that some of these issues, and clarifications to other pending hurdles, will be discussed at that time.  Cultivation licenses will be granted based upon a “merit system” that is yet to be finalized.