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Colorado Passes Bill Allowing Doctors To Recommend Medical Marijuana Instead Of Opioids

Colorado is attempting to help tamper down the opioid crisis by enabling doctors to recommend medical marijuana for any condition meriting a painkiller prescription.

Gov. Jared Polis signed Senate Bill 13 on Thursday, and the new law is scheduled to go into effect on Aug. 2, after passing through Colorado’s General Assembly.

Related:  Will The NFL Soon Be Allowing Marijuana For Pain Treatment?

“This will substitute marijuana for an injectable medicine — something that is unregulated for something that’s highly controlled,” Stephanie Stewart, a doctor in Colorado says.

Under Colorado law, medical marijuana can be advocated for individuals struggling with cancer, glaucoma, HIV and AIDS, PTSD or other chronic ailments that cause severe pain, nausea and seizures. The new law includes all conditions where opioids could be prescribed.

The bipartisan legislation is a triumph for marijuana backers, but it raises issues with some addiction-centric caregivers.

“Our real concern is that a patient could visit a physician with a condition that has a medical treatment with signs behind it, and then instead of that therapy, they would be recommended marijuana instead,” explained Stephanie Stewart, a doctor in Colorado.

Backers of the law say it is a safer form of therapy which will help restrict the opioid craze, which is now at epidemic rates in the U.S. As stated by the National Institute on Drug Abuse, every day more than 130 people die after overdosing on opioids.

“Adding a condition for which a physician could recommend medical marijuana instead of an opioid is a more powerful pain management tool that will be useful for both our physicians and patients,” explained Ashley Weber, executive director of Colorado NORML, a pro-marijuana advocacy group.

Individuals under the age of 18 who take medical marijuana should ingest it in an edible form if using it on school grounds or transportation.

The House voted 47-16 in favor of the bill, with many Democrats and a few Republicans behind it. The Senate voted 33-2, with just conservative Senators. John Cooke, R-Greeley, and Bob Gardner, R-Colorado Springs, in opposition.

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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42 Arrested In Denver In A Massive Black Market Marijuana Bust

Authorities said Friday that they raided hundreds of black market marijuana operations in Colorado that flouted the nation’s cannabis legislation by growing tens of thousands of plants in Denver-area houses and selling it out of state.

Investigators seized more than 80,000 plants and 4,500 pounds of harvested marijuana, state and federal prosecutors said in a news conference. Officers raided 247 houses and eight companies and arrested 42 people in Denver and seven neighboring counties.

State law permits up to 12 marijuana plants per house for individual use, but some of the houses had over 1,000 and many had hundreds, U.S. Attorney Jason Dunn said.

Colorado and other states have broadly legalized marijuana usage but it remains illegal under federal law. That has created tension between some state and federal officials, and a booming black market for marijuana.

However George Brauchler, district attorney for the south and east Denver suburbs, said the investigation was a joint state-federal operation, not the U.S. Department of Justice imposing its will over Colorado.

“Make no mistake, we are equal partners in this,” Brauchler said.

State and federal officials said the almost 3-year investigation showed that prohibited marijuana trafficking mushroomed after voters approved recreational usage in 2012.

Dunn said Colorado has been the epicenter for black market marijuana nationwide.

Brauchler cautioned that Colorado is becoming “the wild wild West of marijuana.” He explained the provision in the law that enables small-scale home marijuana farming opened the door to big, illegal procedures.

Brauchler cautioned that other states considering legalizing marijuana could expect the same but added he was not trying to discourage them from doing so.

“I believe states are eligible to do anything they need,” he explained. “But they need to know the fact of the matter.”

“Did they run a survey of prohibited marijuana cultivators to determine why they chose to function where they did?” He explained. “Are they able to know whether those operations existed before legalization or not?”

Tvert blamed the illegal operations on states that still prohibit marijuana, and said if they legalized and controlled it as Colorado does, there would be small illegal production.

Dunn said researchers plan to use federal forfeiture laws to seize 41 homes, 25 vehicles and $2.2 million in money joined to the marijuana operations.

He explained the 41 houses have an average market value of $400,000.

“These grow operations aren’t occurring in abandoned houses or poor parts of the metro region,” he explained. “All these are happening in middle and upper-class areas where a lot of us live and raise families, and they’re happening all over the metro area.”

Sixteen of these suspects were arrested on federal drug charges and 26 on state charges.

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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Las Vegas Uses Money From Cannabis Taxes To Fight Homelessness

Commissioners in Clark County, Nevada have now passed a resolution allocating nearly $1.8 million collected from local cannabis taxes to help regrow programs specializing in providing assistance to the homeless.

A little more than $930,000 of the money from cannabis taxes is going to be supplied to HELP of Southern Nevada’s rehousing services “for medically fragile, non-chronically homeless households after leaving local hospitals.” A little more than $855,000 will be awarded to HELP “to help the program costs” associated with a homeless youth center.

Related: Las Vegas Cannabis Lounges May Be Opening Soon

Nevada legalized recreational marijuana use in the 2016 election, one of four states to pass such measures during that cycle. Recreational dispensaries opened for business in Nevada in the summer of 2017, allowing adults to purchase up to an ounce of marijuana flower, as well as an eighth of marijuana concentrates.

Before this year, commissioners in Clark County hit pause on efforts to open cannabis lounges in Las Vegas, opting at the time to defer to state lawmakers. But the Las Vegas City Council voted earlier this month to permit dispensaries to apply for licenses to open such establishments, where customers are free to use marijuana products.

Back in December, Clark County commissioners placed a moratorium on recreational dispensary permits, stating that medical patients were snubbed by the industry. However, by the end of 2018, the county had already collected millions of dollars in licensing fees for dispensaries where customers can buy cannabis products.

The end of prohibition has city leaders dreaming about Las Vegas becoming a true mecca for weed tourism; it’s also been regarded as a potentially huge revenue source to relieve a number of the community’s problems.

To that end, the attempt to use funds to support homeless programs began in January, when the Clark County commissioners accepted earmarking the feeds to support the tens of thousands of displaced people in the region. The amount of money directed from the cannabis taxes was capped at $12 million annually.

After the commissioners took up the measure in January, there was debate over where to spend these funds, with some lawmakers favoring a plan that simplifies home. Others advocated a more flexible approach that could avail funds for other providers, such as monetary assistance.

In 2016, the vast majority of respondents in Nevada (54%) approved Question 2, also referred to as the Nevada Marijuana Legalization Initiative, which legalized the drug for people aged 21 and above. California, Massachusetts and Maine passed similar measures that same year.

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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Gun-Related Suicides Fell After Medical Marijuana Was Legalized

The number of suicides in California per year, such as those committed with firearms, diminished following the state legalizing marijuana use for medical purposes, according to a study.

“Findings show that rates of total gun deaths and suicide dropped significantly in the wake of Proposition 215,” the investigators concluded, referring to the California law legalizing medical cannabis that voters approved in 1996.

“The systematic evidence linking this tendency to the availability of medical marijuana is relatively unclear, however,” the team behind the new study wrote.

Related: Patients May Be Able To Use Medical Cannabis In Hospitals Under New Bill

For the paper, published this month in Archives of Suicide Research, researchers at the University of California Irvine looked at the total amount of suicides, the number of gun-related suicides and also the amount of non-gun-related suicides listed from the state for those years between 1970 and 2004. They also looked at data in the 41 states which didn’t legalize marijuana during precisely the same time period to obtain a notion of what might have occurred if California hadn’t legalized access to medical cannabis.

Ultimately, the authors observed a noteworthy decrease in untoward deaths in the years after Prop 215 was accepted. “In particular, for many suicides, our results reveal that California’s 1996 intervention resulted in an average reduction of 398.9 suicides per year plus a cumulative decrease of approximately 3,191 suicides through 1997-2004,” the analysis states. “Likewise, legalization led to a decrease in gun suicides of 208 per year on a cumulative decrease of roughly 1,668 fewer gun suicides throughout 1997-2004.”

The question, naturally, is that what could explain these overall findings?

The study provides a couple of distinct theories. One concentrates on how marijuana use may help eliminate the actual motivation for suicide. Individuals with psychological conditions like depression, for instance, may realize that marijuana alleviates their symptoms.

“If marijuana alleviates the severe strain related to these disorders, we expect suicide threat to reduce after legalization of medical marijuana,” the writers said. “The evidence for this is mixed, however.”

The same goes for individuals with alcohol use disorder, which is associated with an elevated risk of suicide: In case individuals are using marijuana in place of alcohol, then that threat may be reduced.

“If alcohol and marijuana usage are combined, an individual may experience no difference in suicide risk or even an increase in suicide following legalization,” the newspaper reports. “If weed replaces alcohol, on the other hand, an individual might expect a drop in suicide danger following legalization.”

But most information on marijuana as an alcoholic substitute relies on self-reports, which is unreliable.

There’s also the dilemma of gun accessibility for medical marijuana patients; U.S. law prohibits anyone who utilizes federally prohibited controlled substances, such as cannabis, from obtaining firearms. As a vast majority of suicides involve guns, researchers suggest that access to medical marijuana might have precluded some people from buying firearms, thus resulting in the decline in suicide rates. (For what it is worth, California also has some of the strongest gun laws in the country.)

The study’s authors point out that testing these various theories “may reveal insight into the reason why we don’t find the expected reduction in non-gun suicides following legalization.”

Last month, a Republican congressman filed a bill that would allow medical marijuana patients the ability to purchase and own guns.

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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Will The NFL Soon Be Allowing Marijuana For Pain Treatment?

In striking an agreement with the NFL Players Association this week which calls for further study of other therapies for pain control, the NFL is sending signals that it has an open mind on an issue that gamers have advocated for decades: allowing for marijuana for pain treatment.

That’s just one potential impact which could flow from the health, safety and health agreement, which bolsters commitment to establishing criteria for prescription drug monitoring and raises support for mental health programs.

Related: Why Kansas Doesn’t Want To Legalize Marijuana

Yet the extra acknowledgment that marijuana might be considered is important enough, considering how the NFL has not budged to the stage on removing marijuana from the list of prohibited chemicals as part of this medication coverage — even as an increasing number of nations have legalized the use of marijuana for medicinal and in a number of instances recreational usage.

It is possible that a newly-formed joint pain control committee, with medical specialists appointed by the group and the union, could supply research that supports marijuana and products containing THC for healing support — and progress the ball on the NFL’s drug policy.

“We’ve asked the committee to look at any and all treatments,” Allen Sills, the NFL’s chief medical officer said while attending league meetings. “We will go where the medication takes us.”

We are going to see. With marijuana still not legalized in many states with NFL franchises, a potential sticking point could exist in establishing a new policy that applies uniformly for all 32 teams, allowing marijuana for pain treatment.

Can that be accomplished if the medicine supports it?

Said Sills, “I’m a doctor, not an attorney.”

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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CBD May Reduce Impairment Caused By THC

The more cannabidiol (CBD) in a strain of cannabis with THC, the lower the impairment to brain function, finds a fresh UCL-led brain imaging analysis.

“Over the last two decades, rates of addiction and psychosis linked to cannabis have been on the upswing, while at precisely the same time stronger strains of cannabis with more THC and less CBD have become increasingly prevalent,” said the study’s lead author, Dr. Matt Wall (UCL Clinical Psychopharmacology Unit and Invicro).

Related: Marijuana Tax Revenue Is Not As High As California Hoped For

“We have found that CBD appears to buffer the consumer against a number of the severe effects of THC on the mind.”

There’s growing evidence that THC is implicated in addiction and cannabis-induced psychosis. CBD, on the other hand, is being researched for a range of therapeutic purposes, but the interplay between THC and CBD is not yet well-known.

In the current study, the researchers monitored brain activity at rest in 17 individuals after taking distinct strains of cannabis.

Both breeds have equal levels of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), but among these also has elevated levels of CBD whereas another breed, a high-strength cannabis commonly known as skunk, contained negligible levels of CBD. Both strains are similar to the various strains of cannabis in common use.

The researchers discovered that the low-CBD strain diminished functional connectivity in the brain’s default style (particularly from the anterior cingulate area) and salience networks, whereas the high-CBD strain caused only a minimal disturbance to  these regions, suggesting the CBD counteracts a number of THC’s damaging effects.

The salience network supports other brain networks and determines what sensory or emotional inputs we listen to, and disruptions of the network have previously been implicated in dependence and psychosis.

The researchers also discovered that the THC-induced disturbance of functional connectivity in the posterior cingulate was strongly correlated with participants’ reports of subjective experiences, like feeling more ‘stoned’ or ‘high’, implying that the mind area may be fundamental to driving cannabis’ subjective effects. This association involving the anterior cingulate and subjective effects was blocked by CBD.

The researchers say their findings add to evidence that cannabis breeds with greater CBD content may be less harmful, suggesting that CBD content of cannabis should maybe be regulated in authorities where it’s legal.

“As cannabis is becoming lawful in more areas of the world, people purchasing cannabis ought to be able to generate an educated decision about their choice of cannabis breed and be aware of the relative risks,” said Dr. Wall.

“In case CBD can restore disturbance to the salience system, this could be a neuroprotective mechanism to describe its capability to treat disorders of salience like psychosis and addiction,” added senior writer Professor Val Curran (UCL Clinical Psychopharmacology Unit).

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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Temporary Cannabis Tax Cut Shut Down By California Law Makers

An attempt to jump-start California’s accredited marijuana retailers failed to clear a key legislative committee on Thursday, likely dooming its prospects for the year since the country’s largest legal cannabis industry continues to flounder in the shadow of the illegal — and tax free — black sector.

Costs for legal marijuana goods are inflated in California by the 15% cannabis tax consumers need to pay at the register and a cultivation tax on growers of $148 per pound for flowers and $44 per pound for the leaves.

A group of state lawmakers, led by Democrat Assemblyman Rob Bonta, had hoped to temporarily reduce the sales tax to 11% and suspend the cultivation taxation for two and a half years to help retailers compete with prices on the black market.

A Bonta spokesman said he’d agreed to eliminate the sales tax portion of the bill in the hopes it would bring in enough votes to get it from committee and have an opportunity to pass. But the bill failed to clear the Assembly Appropriations Committee on Thursday, meaning it won’t progress to the Assembly Floor and is likely dead for the year.

Related:  Attorney Generals Ask Congress To Allow Banks To Handle Marijuana Money

“I am really disappointed,” stated Tiffany Devitt, Chief Compliance Officer for Santa Rosa-based CannaCraft, a cannabis producer and distributor. “We are being crushed by the black market.”

It is possible lawmakers could reestablish it using legislative maneuvers later this year, but it is unclear if they want to do that. California’s bud tax collections are not at all what lawmakers had expected after voters agreed to legalize the drug in a state with nearly 40 million people.

State officials estimate that if bud tax collections continue in their current rate — which is hard to predict since the business is so new — that the state will collect $270 million annually. That’s $85 million less than initial estimates.

Just recently, Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration lowered cannabis tax revenue estimates for the budget year that begins July 1 by $223 million.

“The taxes are so high that there is a big incentive to avoid them,” said Dale Gieringer, director of pro-marijuana group California NORML. “”The black economy is currently at least as big or larger as the authorized market.”

State taxes aren’t the sole barrier to California’s emerging marijuana market. Industry advocates say local taxation and requirements on licensing and laboratory testing add up to make a legal bud company more costly. Additionally, retailers often don’t have somewhere to put their money because most banks will not accept it because selling marijuana remains a federal crime.

Efforts to address the banking issue did survive the statute. The Senate Appropriations Committee innovative Senate Bill 51, which will make cannabis-limited charter banks and cannabis-limited charter credit unions. The law would enable individuals financial institutions to cash special-purpose checks.

“We can’t sit by while the security of legal business owners, their employees, and the general public are put at risk. SB 51 represents an initial step in getting cannabis cash off the street and integrating these authorized firms into our economy,” Sen. Bob Hertzberg, D-Van Nuys, stated in a news release.

Bonta’s bill was one of several proposals from the Legislature that stalled out Thursday after they didn’t make it out of committee.

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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Cannabis and Exercise – Surprising Study Shows Stoners Love To Workout While High!

Stereotypes can’t always be a reliable source of information. As from the recent findings by University of Colorado at Boulder researchers that those who consume cannabis are really into exercising.

“The usual stereotype is of someone lying on his sofa for hours, blissed out and eating Doritos,” Angela Bryan, a professor of psychology and neuroscience, told the New York Times. “Our concern going in was that cannabis use would be detrimental to physical activity,” said Bryan, who led the research team. “Our evidence does not support that notion.”

Really. A whopping 81.7% of the 605 study participants endorsed using cannabis either before or after exercising.

The investigators sought out marijuana users in five states with legal recreational weed–California, Colorado, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington. Individuals who admitted using the medication while working out reported higher weekly averages of aerobic exercise than users who didn’t imbibe around exercise: 159.7 minutes per week vs.103.5 minutes. In addition they had a lower BMI: 25.6 vs. 27.

The study, published recently in Frontiers in Public Health, also found those who used the drug before or after exercising were on average younger and tended to be male compared with those who didn’t mix marijuana with exercise. It must be noted that four of those five states where research participants lived rank one of the top six to get physical action in the U.S.

Not that the study features anything definitive on the issue. As always, more research (and workout?) May be required.

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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Las Vegas Cannabis Lounges May Be Opening Soon

For a couple of decades, tourists in Las Vegas have dealt with a cannabis conundrum: All over the glittering town, there are shops selling marijuana — and nowhere to smoke .

The Las Vegas City Council this month voted to permit existing dispensaries to apply for licenses to open eating lounges where tourists may utilize marijuana products in a cozy setting, perhaps with a meal and some live entertainment.

While the whiff of legal marijuana smoke floating around Las Vegas has entrepreneurs optimistic about the business’s future, it’s the gaming sector wondering and worrying about this query: Will Las Vegas become the next Amsterdam?

A legal path to pot lounges in Las Vegas marks a success for cannabis investors wishing to capitalize on a unique brand of marijuana tourism using a Sin City spin. But this new genre reflects a potential threat to gambling firms worried the recreational weed trade could siphon tourists — and their money — from a casino corridor struggling to increase profits.

Considered Nevada’s bud ambassador, Clark County Commissioner and former state senator Tick Segerblom is putting his money on Las Vegas becoming the next sacred land of marijuana tourism.

“We’re the newest Amsterdam,” he explained.

That ought to be an issue to gambling businesses, Segerblom advised the USA TODAY Network.

“They are concerned about (lounges) earning money outside the hotels,” Segerblom said. “They’re worried the more this goes outside resorts, the more established they will get. As a business person, I would be concerned too.”

A nervous gambling industry — and a cannabis industry waiting to pounce

As president of the National Resort Association, Virginia Valentine’s task is to guard the interests of the lobbying group’s fundamental clientele: gambling businesses.

Lately, she has been the shield between casinos and cannabis.

“As long as it’s federally illegal, we can’t get it on the property,” Valentine told the USA TODAY Network. “We are attempting to create that separation.”

Because the federal government admits cannabis as an illegal substance, gaming giants remain reluctant to join hands with the weed market.

On May 1, less than a month after a bill to legalize weed lounges in Nevada expired in the state Legislature, Valentine advocated the Las Vegas City Council to halt the push for pot lounges to allow state legislators to plot a forward route.

“We can not wait for the state to cooperate,” said Councilman Bob Coffin, the city bill’s sponsor.

Valentine asked to get a 1,500-foot buffer between gaming establishments and cannabis lounges, and also the city jeopardized at 1,000 feet. The city passed the ordinance, 4-1, making Las Vegas the first city in the country to legalize “social usage places.”

After the town builds a program, 20 dispensaries — already open or forthcoming in Las Vegas this season — can apply for permits to open lounges prohibited from purchasing alcohol.

“What they are really trying to aim for are the tourists coming to Las Vegas.”

The cannabis industry, he said, is following the most important ingredient in the Vegas profit recipe.

“What they are really trying to target would be the tourists coming to Las Vegas,” Anthony told the USA TODAY Network. “That is where the money is. That’s always where it’s been. These ingestion lounges are the first effort to assemble from the tourists that want to smoke bud here in Nevada.”

If Las Vegas is an amusement park, cannabis is the latest ride, however gaming operators aren’t ready to get a ticket and buckle up.

“It’s a fascinating chapter that will be interesting to check whether (bud lounges are) something that attracts people — and, of course, there are worries it will draw people away from the hotels.”

Ask John Mueller, CEO of Las Vegas-based Acres Cannabis, whether the city will become the new Amsterdam, and it becomes apparent he has a different goal in mind: Helping Sin City overshadow the charming European city of vice and cannabis-friendly coffeehouses.

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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Joe Biden Supports Decriminalizing Marijuana

Joe Biden supports decriminalizing marijuana, a Biden effort spokesman says, however the former vice president isn’t going as far as calling for it to be legalized on the federal level.

“Nobody needs to be in jail for smoking marijuana,” Biden told Republicans in a Tuesday house party in Nashua, New Hampshire.

Asked when the former president supports legalizing marijuana, Andrew Bates, a Biden campaign spokesman, said Biden believes the medication should be decriminalized and decisions on legalization should remain to the condition level.

Related: Some U.S Representatives Want To Legalize Marijuana Nationwide

“As he said [Tuesday], Vice President Biden doesn’t believe anyone should be in jail simply for smoking or possessing marijuana. He supports decriminalizing marijuana and mechanically expunging prior criminal records for marijuana possession, therefore people affected don’t have to figure out how to petition for it or purchase a lawyer,” Bates said. “He would allow states to continue to create their own decisions regarding legalization and might seek to make it much easier to conduct research on marijuana’s negative and positive health impacts by rescheduling it as a schedule two drug,” he said.

Schedule 2 drugs, including cocaine and meth, have “high potential for abuse which may lead to severe psychological or physical dependence.” Schedule 2 drugs don’t have accepted medical uses.

Biden’s stance comes as many in the 2020 Democratic area have voiced their support for legalizing marijuana on the national level.

His decriminalization place marks a bit of a shift for Biden, who served as vice president in the Obama government, which didn’t move to decriminalize marijuana, reschedule the medication or openly encourage mechanically expunging of criminal records of marijuana offenses. The government did issue guidelines to not enforce federal anti-marijuana law in states where marijuana was legalized. “I feel that the idea of focusing significant resources on interdicting or convicting people for smoking marijuana is a waste of our funds,” Biden said in conjunction with TIME in 2014. “That’s different than [legalization]. Our policy for our Administration remains not legalization, and that is [and] has been our policy.”

While in the Senate, Biden, who over the years expressed opposition to legalizing marijuana, was an architect or supporter of tough-on-crime laws, for example, creation of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, also known as the “drug czar,” and establishing mandatory minimum sentences for marijuana. Biden has expressed sorrow for the sentencing disparity between crack and powder cocaine which stemmed from one of those steps, noting that he and former President Barack Obama worked to reduce that disparity.

Legalizing marijuana is a matter that has seen a steady uptick in service over recent years. A Gallup survey published in 2018 found 66% of Americans support legalizing the use of marijuana, up 22% from nearly a decade back. Fifteen states have decriminalized marijuana while 10 others and the District of Columbia have legalized the drug, according to the Marijuana Policy Project.

Many in the Democratic Party primary field have issued full-throated aid for legalizing the medication on the federal level. Earlier this season, New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker reintroduced the Marijuana Justice Act, which will legalize marijuana on the national level and expunge the records of people who’ve been charged with a crime for owning or using the drug.

Several Democratic presidential contenders have signed on as cosponsors of the step: Sens. Michael Bennet of Colorado, Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, Kamala Harris of California, Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts.

South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg and Former HUD Secretary Julián Castro are one of the candidates that also have signaled support for legalization efforts.

In March, former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper said while he would not pursue legalization to a national level, but he believes the countries should be allowed to move forward. “I wouldn’t ask the federal government to legalize it for everybody,” Hickenlooper said. “But I think where states do legalize marijuana with the voters or through their general meeting, the federal government must get out of the way and allow them to get banking, allow them to look at systems through which you can get this experiment go on successfully.”

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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Michigan’s First Medical Marijuana Delivery Service Hits The Streets

Detroit medical marijuana dispensary Utopia Gardens began delivering marijuana this week.

The medical marijuana provisioning center, on East Lafayette Street near Belle Isle, became the very first legal medical marijuana delivery service in the state. It applied for state acceptance at the beginning of the year.

Utopia Garden requires delivery orders on its own website or by phone-ins with a minimal $45 purchase for delivery. Donnell Cravens, general manager in the dispensary, told Crain’s earlier this week. The store doesn’t charge a shipping fee, but mostly will restrict delivery to the larger downtown area, at least at first.

The Michigan Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs dictates that stores such as Utopia can simply provide medical marijuana and marijuana products to some card-carrying medical marijuana individual in the address recorded in their driver’s license. Customers wanting delivery have to send the shop a photograph of their state-issued ID and medical marijuana license, Donnell said.

The condition also dictates that motorists can only provide 2.5 ounces of marijuana each patient to no more than 10 patients each delivery. Patients are also restricted to a purchasing limit or 10 ounce delivered each month.

Utopia Gardens is accepting only debit cards for delivery in an effort to limit the risk of drivers carrying around sums of cash.

Detroit’s BotaniQ on Rosa Parks Boulevard at Corktown is also anticipated to begin deliveries in the next week.

The medical marijuana delivery principles have been accepted by the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules in November.

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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Why Kansas Doesn’t Want To Legalize Marijuana

Despite many other states legalizing marijuana, Kansas is still hesitant to jump on the band wagon.

Three of its neighbors — Colorado, Oklahoma and Missouri — have legalized some form of marijuana recently. Nevertheless Kansas remains among four states in the country without a comprehensive medical or recreational marijuana program.

That’s not for lack of trying. This spring, the Legislature passed a bill enabling caregivers and patients to possess CBD — one compound in marijuana — comprising modest amounts of THC, a psychoactive component of the plant. The Kansas Health Institute reports that lawmakers have introduced 18 medical marijuana statements since 2006. This year, one got a hearing at the Capitol.

But law enforcement officers representing a few of the nation’s agencies and professional organizations testified against it. The bill never made it to a vote.

“I just ask that you give deference to the expertise, to the remarks of the law enforcement community,” said Kirk Thompson, manager of the Kansas Bureau of Investigation, the top law enforcement agency in the state. “We have seen the negative side of this matter.”

The agency refused requests for an interview with Thompson and didn’t answer emailed questions regarding its marijuana enforcement plan. However, Thompson’s statement echoes the standing of lots of the states law enforcement bureaus and organizations.

They argue that even legalization of medical marijuana would increase automobile accidents and violent offense and make it easier for foreign drug cartels to maneuver marijuana on the black market.

Law enforcement officers say marijuana is tied to violence, particularly from Mexican cartels. And they report a gain in marijuana-related traffic stops in Kansas, particularly since Colorado legalized recreational earnings of the medication in 2014.

“In every way, marijuana is pushing up public health and public security concerns,” said Jeffrey Stamm, executive director of the Kansas City-based Midwest High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area, under the Office of National Drug Control Policy. “In terms of the psychopharmacology, the economical, the criminal, the social costs of marijuana usage, cops, in reality, are the experts.”

But ultimately, it is hard to know what impact marijuana has on public security in Kansas because the state does not collect much of that information.

Anecdotes and Data

The federal Drug Enforcement Administration publishes information on its Cannabis Eradication Program, including arrests, number of plants seized as well as the value of assets seized in each state.

However, the Kansas Bureau of Investigation does not do exactly the same.

KBI states in 2018, over 45% of its crime lab’s blood drug tests came back positive for THC. In 2013, only 29 percent of these blood tests indicated the presence of THC. But the agency does not track the entire number of marijuana seizures in the state, nor does it track the entire amount of marijuana arrests.

In an email, a spokeswoman said the agency’s statewide crime reporting program had been “extremely outdated,” deriving data from police reports that don’t differentiate which particular drugs were involved in an episode.

The agency also doesn’t track the origin of marijuana seizures in Kansas — whether the medication came from inside the country, from the other U.S. country such as Colorado or California, or by a global source such as a Mexican cartel.

A 2016 survey of law enforcement agencies conducted by the Kansas Attorney General’s office discovered that it’s difficult for police to conclusively find out where medications are from. They rely upon statements from suspects, receipts, labels on packages, or ceases near Kansas’ western boundary to determine whether marijuana stems from pot-friendly Colorado.

Some survey respondents stated they’d produced an increasing number of arrests for DUIs and individuals carrying marijuana products, especially edibles, since 2014. Others, however, noted no growth or said sample sizes were too little to tell.

Kansas Highway Patrol Lt. Chris Bauer, who instructs officers to understand whether drivers have been using medication, said the patrol has seen a rise in drivers being impaired by marijuana. The Highway Patrol says 62% of lab tests of impaired drivers in 2018 came back positive for THC. Two years earlier, 54% of labs found traces of this drug. Yet those evaluations aren’t always a trusted index of just how recently someone used cannabis.

In a telephone interview, ‘Bauer said he “considers the increase is a consequence of society’s changing attitude toward cannabis, and the fact that we are surrounded by states who now have legalized it.”

In 2018, the Kansas Highway Patrol confiscated 13,029 pounds of marijuana in 322 seizures. In 2017, the bureau created 399 seizures and confiscated 7,488 lbs.

Bauer said many troopers have started getting rid of small quantities of marijuana by the side of the street during traffic stops, instead of arresting and charging everyone for ownership. Those ceases do not get recorded.

“Maybe we don’t wish to take everybody to jail for a tiny quantity of marijuana,” Bauer explained. “Jails are full. We sort of need to triage what we are doing.”

Kansas Department of Transportation data demonstrates that drug-related traffic collisions have stayed at roughly 0.5% of all accidents within the last ten years, but the agency doesn’t collect information on particular drugs.

State Sen. David Haley, a former prosecutor who co-sponsored the medical marijuana bill in the Kansas Senate this year,” said the nation has a strong law enforcement lobby.

“I think law enforcement wants to keep as many arrows, if you will, in their quiver,” he explained. “I can’t think of some other motive their reception was so adamant.”

Brian Leininger, yet another former prosecutor who now works as a defense attorney in DUI cases, agrees.

“Authorities and other government officials have a lot of social funds,” he said. “They want the status quo. They make their living enforcing the drug laws.”

For about five decades, Leininger served as the general counsel for the Kansas Highway Patrol. As a private defense attorney, he speaks with police frequently and states officials frequently tell him they oppose the state’s marijuana laws but don’t believe that they can speak out publicly.

“All of the time, officers tell me and other people that it’s really foolish this is prohibited. I wish they’d just make it legal. It’d make my job easier,”’ Leininger said. “Alcoholics are dangerous and violent and bad drivers. People under the influence of marijuana are usually calm.”

He believes attitudes will change as old officials begin retiring and social attitudes continue to change.

“As the officers get older, a higher and higher percentage of them grew up with marijuana,” he explained. “Eventually, when 45 of those other states have legalized it completely, possibly Kansas will come around.”

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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Marijuana Smuggling Arrests At LAX Have Increased 166% Since Legalization

Marijuana smuggling arrests at LAX have become increasingly popular. Michael Vechell had already drawn the attention of an airline worker and two passengers in Los Angeles International Airport by the time he had been confronted by authorities.

Waiting to board his Philadelphia-bound plane together with his dog Odie, Vechell had sparked concern when he sidled up to another passenger and asked if she wished to join his “drug smuggling ring,” authorities say.

Although Vechell told LAX authorities it was a misunderstanding, officers demanded to see his checked bags. Inside, they found almost 70 pounds of vacuum-sealed marijuana bundled into packages labeled “T-shirts,” “cold weather” and “sexy pants”

More than a year after California legalized the recreational use of cannabis, trafficking arrests like Vechell’s have soared 166% at LAX, according to arrest documents acquired from the Los Angeles Times.

Emboldened by legalization and facing only light punishment if caught, more and more smugglers are carrying to the friendly skies in an effort to escape California’s glutted cannabis market, according to authorities, marijuana industry experts and a lawyer who represents accused smugglers. As a result, the world’s fourth-busiest airport is now an expanding hub at the illegal export of marijuana, they say.

“That is normal process for all these guys, and I’d say 29 out of 30 times they make it through with no problem,” explained Bill Kroger Jr., a 20-year criminal defense lawyer who specializes in marijuana cases and that represented Vechell.

Authorities in LAX say they’re encountering more and more airline passengers that are carrying small amounts of marijuana for personal use, but the amount of checked bags stuffed entirely full of marijuana has soared also. Police in Oakland and Sacramento state they are seeing exactly the same thing.

“We intercept massive amounts of marijuana regularly,” said Sgt. Ray Kelly of the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office, which has jurisdiction over Oakland International Airport. “We find it in roughly 50-pound quantities… the carry-on rate for luggage. I’d imagine we are just intercepting some of it, maybe not all of it.”

The abrupt increase in airport smuggling is mainly the result of legalization and a saturated industry. California grows far more marijuana than its residents consume — up to five times more by some accounts — and cannabis consumers in different states will pay a much higher price.

“Since pot’s been legalized in California, there’s no money to be left because everybody got involved in it,” Kroger said. “They’ve got these large 50,000-square-foot [grow] houses, and they’re flooding the marketplace. The money is outside of California.”

In 2018 — the nation’s first year of legalized recreational pot use — LAX police made 101 trafficking arrests, compared with 38 trafficking arrests in 2017 and 20 in 2016, based on Los Angeles Airport Police records.

“I think we anticipated it,” said Los Angeles World Airports police spokesman Rob Pedregon. “If you just look at the sheer numbers for us — 87 million passengers a year … I wouldn’t be surprised if in a couple months we do what the other airports do in a year.”

Although the recreational and medical use of cannabis is legal in California, it remains illegal in the opinion of the national government, which believes it a Schedule 1 drug on par with heroin, LSD and ecstasy.

Hoping to prevent a confrontation with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, the California Bureau of Cannabis Control has prohibited the export of marijuana to several other states.

Experts, however, state prohibition will do little to stop California from exporting the majority of its marijuana harvest.

In a 2017 paper about the financial ramifications of marijuana’s legalization, researchers at the University of California Agricultural Issues Center estimate that around 80% of the marijuana grown in California is sent out of state — to not be taxed or regulated here.

“Projections from all sources indicate that illegal cannabis will remain significant,” the study stated, “given that it is a market with long-established manufacturers and consumers.”

As a consequence of this ongoing black market — and other factors — the state has been disappointed by the quantity of tax earnings that legal pot generates.

The bulk of illegally exported pot leaves the state by car or truck. In 2018, the California Highway Patrol captured more than 8 tons of marijuana in 63 incidents. The year before that, officers captured just over 2 tons in 76 stops. “The events are fewer,” said CHP Capt. Jason Daughrity, “however, the weight is heavier.”

Nevertheless, the number of traffickers using commercial airlines appears to be growing. Popular airport destinations include Chicago, Atlanta, Indianapolis and Dallas, according to LAX arrest documents.

Kroger said the consequences for getting stopped at a California airport using just two checked bags of marijuana were relatively modest: a misdemeanor fee for someone with no history of drug or violent offenses.

In the eyes of the national authorities, the spike in smuggling is a clear case of “I told you so.”

Related: Some U.S. Representatives Want To Legalize Marijuana Nationwide

“I don’t think we’re surprised by the amounts. These are things we foresaw and we’ve warned people about,” explained Kyle Mori of the DEA’s Los Angeles office. “When conditions legalize it, you provide folks a false sense of safety that they can come through TSA checkpoints…. They believe what they are doing is legal.”

Last year in LAX, there were 503 reports of marijuana discovered in luggage, and just one-fifth of them involved trafficking suspects. In comparison, there were 400 reports of bud in 2017 and 282 reports in 2016.

A lot of the marijuana discovered is a consequence of passengers being confused over state and national jurisdictions, and where those lines are drawn. In fact, people are allowed to have up to 28.5 grams of marijuana approximately 8 g of concentrated marijuana at LAX, according to the airport website.

“Although it’s still illegal and they would be in violation of national legislation, we as airport authorities cannot enforce federal legislation,” Pedregon said. “As long as it’s a usable, private quantity under an ounce, they’re free to go.”

Hundreds of passengers today regularly pack personal amounts of marijuana, cannabis oil or edibles in their carry-on or checked luggage assuming it is legal to fly with, denying that the federal government has dominion over the skies.

From Nov. 16 to Nov. 26 — when a estimated 2.52 million vacation season passengers normally pass through LAX — Transportation Security Administration representatives called police 27 days after discovering marijuana in carry-on or checked luggage, even though just six arrests were made.

One of those ceased was a UCLA student-athlete on scholarship who had been carrying 34 grams of marijuana — almost 6g more than the state allows one person to take — and a pipe in her bag. The girl “spontaneously said the marijuana was hers and she was sorry for having it.” Officers let her off with a warning, and she continued on her flight with no bud.

Traffickers, though, will put more effort into hiding large amounts of cannabis and its derivatives, by simply wrapping the contraband in matters like wax paper, tinfoil or present wrapping or disguising their goods as candies or other foods.

Such was the case Nov. 14 of TSA employees scanning checked bag opened five suitcases that had failed to make a scanned image in their monitors.

The bag belonged to two guys on a Newark-bound flight and contained over 100 pounds of cannabis products, according to reports.

In December, police arrested a man carrying three lbs of edibles and cannabis oil in his bag. The suspect said he was struck by how low the prices were in the Inglewood dispensary he had been seeing compared with prices he found at home at Hagerstown, Md..

In numerous arrest reports reviewed by the Los Angeles Times, trafficking suspects told authorities they flew to California to purchase cheaper and better cannabis products to sell for a gain back home.

When some states legalize marijuana but others do not, providers will move in to fill that void even if it’s through black market channels, stated California Cannabis Industry Assn. spokesman Josh Drayton. A pound of marijuana flower that costs $600 to $800 at California could be resold for $4,000 in the Midwest, he said.

Regardless of the increase in commercial aviation trafficking events, marijuana stays a low enforcement priority, police state. The DEA’s stance is that the drug has no medical benefit and that legalizing it raises DUI-related arrests, crashes and helps fund Mexican cartels. But beyond that, their immediate attention is elsewhere.

“Heroin trafficking,” Mori said, “and the diversion of substances and pharmaceuticals to the hands of gang members and violent offenders — those are certainly our priority.”

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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In Arkansas, Medical Marijuana Is Sold Legally For The First Time Ever

After more than two decades of litigation and flaws, marijuana was sold legally on Friday in Arkansas for the first time since it was criminalized back in 1923.

Doctors Orders RX, a Hot Spring dispensary, had a soft opening on Friday. Expecting long lines and limited solution, the dispensary intends to open its doors to patients Saturday (today) from 8a. to 7p., a company spokesman said Friday afternoon.

Because of glitches with the state-mandated monitoring applications, timing of the opening was in question, but the dispensary served a patient on Friday once the issues were resolved.

The cost of cannabis will range from $395 to $420 per ounce, depending on the merchant. Smaller quantities will be available.

Another dispensary intends to open at 10 a.m. Monday.  Green Springs Medical received final approval to open from state regulators on Friday. It’s located at 309 Seneca St. in Hot Springs.

The medication will probably be in short supply at the beginning, but cultivators anticipate additional harvests in the forthcoming weeks. Prices are also high initially, but business leaders expect them to decrease over time as they have in other states once markets grow.

A company spokesman said Doctors Orders will initially charge $420 per ounce of dry flower, which is typically purchased in smaller increments such as an eighth of an ounce ($52.50). Green Springs Medical will cost $395 per ounce or $15 per gram, according to CEO Dragan Vicentic.

Both dispensaries cautioned patients to expect long lines and waits for the first few weeks that marijuana can be obtained.

Arkansans voted to legalize cannabis for medical use in 2016, approving Amendment 98 into the Arkansas Constitution, but legal and bureaucratic roadblocks have slowed the rollout of this program.

In total, the state has issued 32 dispensary licenses, and five growing licenses. Aside from both Hot Springs dispensaries, the other 30 are in varying phases of construction or preparation to open.

Arkansas is the 33rd state with a medical marijuana program.

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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Marijuana Tax Revenue Is Not As High As California Hoped For

California is paying a cost for its shaky rollout of its legal marijuana marketplace.

State budget documents released Thursday show the Newsom government is aggressively scaling back that which it expects to accumulate from marijuana tax revenue through June 2020 — a 223-million cut from projections only four months ago.

The low income for the state treasury means that slower-than-expected marijuana sales are hitting a hole in California’s budget.

Illegal pot marketplace still thriving due to low prices

The reduced optimism for retail bud sales comes as shops continue to be undercut by a thriving illegal marketplace, where consumers can avoid taxes which could approach 50% in certain communities.

Related: Cannabis Taxes Explained

Meanwhile, the state regulators have struggled to satisfy with the demand for licensing, and many communities have either banned commercial sales or not set up rules for the legal marketplace to function.

Gov. Gavin Newsom said it was likely to take five to seven years for the legal marketplace to achieve its potential, a point he has made repeatedly.

Local communities need to adapt to new changes

However, he also pointed a finger in local communities that have been immune to legal growing and sales.

“It takes time to go from something old to something new,” Newsom said in Sacramento.

“We understood [some cities and counties] are stubborn in providing access and providing retail locations and that would take even longer than a few other nations, and that’s precisely what’s happening,” he added.

Josh Drayton of the California Cannabis Industry Assn. credited Newsom with carrying a clear-eyed perspective of the slow-emerging marketplace and climbing back tax forecasts accordingly.

“I think this government has been more realistic about the challenges faced by the regulated marketplace,” he said.

A projected windfall of marijuana tax revenue was a significant selling point for legal cannabis in California. Proposition 64, the legislation approved by voters in 2016 that opened the way for legalizing recreational marijuana for adults, outlined a long list of programs that would profit from tax dollars collected from pot sales.

State taxes include a 15% levy on purchases of all cannabis and cannabis products, including medical pot. Local governments are free to include taxes on sales and growing, which has made a confusing patchwork of prices around the state.

The market is growing, just not as fast as once expected

The state projects the 15% cannabis excise tax will pull in $288 million for the year that ends in June, and $359 million the next year. That’s a reduction of $67 million and $156 million, respectively, by the governor’s January budget forecast.

It now seems certain that the state will fall short of earlier projections, even as it expected to collect $1 billion in new tax revenue a year from marijuana within a couple of decades.

According to the state Finance Department, the excise tax projection has been reduced after seeing no increase in the last quarter of 2018. Additionally, the number of places where one can buy legal pot remains restricted.

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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Attorney Generals Ask Congress To Allow Banks To Handle Marijuana Money

The attorneys general of 38 states and territories sent a letter to congressional leaders Wednesday, urging them: Please, let us bank the money generated by the country’s booming cannabis business.

“This is simple: Not incorporating an $8.3 billion business into our accounting system is damaging our public safety and market,” California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, one of the signatories, said in a statement. “The SAFE Banking Act would benefit taxpayers and small and neighborhood licensed businesses who play by the rules. We urge Congress to pass legislation to satisfy the demands of the growing economy.”

The attorneys general say they would like to move the bud business from a financial grey area and into the regulated banking industry. Many bud businesses wind up dealing in money, and a lot of it making earnings monitoring and taxation harder for states and creating targets for crime.

Finance in the bud business means armed guards and armored vehicles. And a cannabis company may pay thousands in monthly fees just to get a bank account.

The letter calls on Congress to advance the SAFE Banking Act or similar legislation, expanding financial services to legitimate cannabis-related companies and service suppliers and reduce the quantity of cash they hold.

“Our banking platform has to be flexible enough to tackle the requirements of businesses in the respective nations and territories, with territorial and state entered , while protecting the interests of the national government,” the attorneys general wrote. “This consists of a banking system for marijuana-related companies that is both responsive and effective in fulfilling the demands of the economy.”

In late March, the House Financial Services Committee advanced the invoice, and it has attracted 175 co-sponsors from both parties up to now.

Among the bill’s sponsors, Rep. Ed Perlmutter, D-Colo., composed that support from state officials “underscores the necessity to respect states’ rights on this problem and make our communities safer by permitting the marijuana business and associated companies access to the banking system.”

The AGs’ letter earned praise from the banking market. “The commonsense bill provides much needed clarity for banks in nations where cannabis is legal,” composed the American Bankers Association.

American Banker magazine notes that the important obstacle to the legislation is not gathering enough votes but getting Senate leadership to prioritize the matter. That may account for the public safety framing of the issue.

Don Childears, president and chief executive officer of the Colorado Bankers Association, told the magazine that the purpose is to get cash off the streets: “We’ve had people killed in robberies of bud shops here in Colorado. I can not say that would not happen if you had banking solutions, but you would not have the temptation of large amounts of cash.”

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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Cannabis Laws In Colorado Are About To Change Big Time

Coloradans voted for major change in November 2012, when they accepted Amendment 64 and legalized recreational cannabis. Now Colorado lawmakers have approved changes that will prove nearly as momentous.

Steps opening the state to societal pot use and cannabis delivery, in addition to approving new health conditions for medical marijuana, all passed on the Colorado General Assembly this session. But more modifications could come through less sexy bills that tackle sunsetting legislation from the nation’s medical marijuana program and pot market. These bills would create new business licenses, together with new opportunities for medical marijuana access; regulations could be eased for cannabis business owners and workers alike.

Now that the smoke of this 2019 legislative session has cleared, we have highlighted a few of the most expected changes to effect cannabis in Colorado..

Legal social consumption could finally arrive

Locating places to lawfully consume cannabis outside of a private home is tough in Colorado, in which public pot usage is banned by the state constitution. But as a result of the passing of House Bill 1230, companies such as dispensaries, restaurants, hotels, music venues and much more could soon make an application for social marijuana use permits. There are nonetheless a few catches, though: Governor Jared Polis hasn’t signed the bill yet (although proponents expect him ), also if/when that he does, local authorities must still opt in to the program. And one nation rule won’t alter: No establishment allowing bud use will be able to sell alcohol, also.

Delivery will likely be legal shortly

We will not find the very first stages of this before 2020, when just medical marijuana delivery is going to be allowed. Polis still wants to sign this bill, and if/when he can, municipalities will have to opt into this program, too.

Related: Marijuana Delivery Bill Waiting To Be Approved By Colorado Governor

Medical bud could soon be recommend as an opioid alternative

In a move that may open the state’s medical marijuana program to thousands, that the legislature passed Senate Bill 13, also referred to as the MMJ for opiods bill. The MMJ prescription length would be determined by the recommending doctor instead of the conventional one-year that individuals with different conditions now get.

Autism is now a medical marijuana condition

A similar bill passed through the legislature with relative ease in 2018, but then-Governor John Hickenlooper vetoed the measure.But, proponents and parents of autistic children could acquire more expansive language approved in 2019, and House Bill 1028 has already been signed by Polis, making it law and adding disabilities into the state’s record of medical marijuana requirements.

The marijuana industry will be open to outside investors and publicly traded companies

Following another Hickenlooper Founded in 2018, House Bill 1090 proposed opening the nation’s cannabis industry to out-of-state capital and investors, such as publicly held firms and large venture funds. The bill would also permit investors to own smaller shares (less than 10 percent) in a cannabis enterprise.

More physicians, dentists (and some nurses) will be able to recommend medical cannabis in Colorado

A change added to the sunsetting medical marijuana bill would allow MMJ recommendations by people having a “valid license to practice within his or her scope of practice.” Currently, only licensed physicians can recommend medical marijuana, but this move would allow dentists, advanced nurse practitioners and other specialized doctors and advanced healthcare professionals to recommend medical marijuana if it falls within their scopes of practice.

  Cannabis inhalers are set up for easier regulation

A popular apparatus for medical patients and recreational users searching for rapid results, CBD and THC inhalers were below regulatory scrutiny in 2018 after the MED termed them a “non-conforming product”: a cannabis product which could not be smoked, consumed or vaporized orally. The status meant that companies producing inhalers were subject to FDA-like regulations, which demand long, costly stages of research and development, as well as product testing. Under the rewritten recreational marijuana bill, inhalers will now be regulated and analyzed in exactly the same manner as vaporizers.

Sales incentives for workers

Believe it or not, most cannabis workers in Colorado can not lawfully receive sales-based incentive bonuses at work, out of fear that it would peddling federally illegal substances. (There are ways around it, but companies have to be smart.) The recreational sunset bill would enable companies to perform this in the clear, and give the industry more protection from unnecessary state enforcement.

Lab testing of cannabis products will likely change

A sore subject for most cannabis producers, laboratory testing results for potency and containments can fluctuate from lab to lab. Even though the amendment is short and leaves a lot of rule-making to the MED, talk at the recreational sunset bill would require the MED to “prevent outdated testing” of medical and recreational products. What will that look like? We’ll see.

Kushfly is a legal delivery company, and operates under all mandatory licenses required in the state of California.  If you are in LA and looking to legally purchase marijuana flower, CBD, edibles, or concentrates for delivery, register with Kushfly here.

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