After approving an increased number of medical cannabis dispensary licenses earlier this year, the State of Ohio Board of Pharmacy will launch its licensing process to issue 73 new retail licenses, bringing the total number of dispensaries in the state to 130, according to a local News 5 Cleveland report.
The Board of Pharmacy will release its official Request for Applications (RFA) on Sept. 20, according to the news outlet, and the licensing process will be different than when Ohio regulators issued their initial 57 retail licenses.
State officials have split Ohio into 31 dispensary districts and have charted where the state’s 56 medical cannabis retailers are located, News 5 Cleveland reported. (The remaining licensees have not yet received final approval to open their doors to patients, according to the news outlet).
Using a new allocation method, the Board of Pharmacy is trying to ensure that there will be roughly 1,200 registered medical cannabis patients per retailer in each dispensary district.
The state will hold two Question and Answer sessions between when the new RFA is released on Sept. 20 and the end of October, and will accept applications from Nov. 4 through Nov. 18, according to News 5 Cleveland.
The winning applications will be selected through a drawing process with applications randomly ordered in each dispensary district, the news outlet reported. Only the selected applications will undergo a vetting process to ensure they meet all the state’s criteria in an effort to expedite the licensing process.
If all application requirements are met, winning applicants will receive provisional dispensary licenses and can then begin building out their facilities, News 5 Cleveland reported.
