Bob's Blog

We filed our official rules for regulating medical marijuana with the Secretary of State last week.  The official rules include a few clarifications that weren’t in the set of unofficial rules that we posted on March 28.  The clarifications are reflected in the Arizona Medical Marijuana Rules, Medical Marijuana Act AZ Statutes and the Frequently Asked Questions. Here’s a summary of the clarifications:

·         R9-17-302(A)(5) and R9-17-304(D)(1)(f)(ii)
The 03/28/11 rules allowed applicants for a dispensary registration certificate to submit documentation of $ 150,000 available to begin operating. The rule was clarified by requiring the documentation to be dated within 30 days before submitting the application that the monies have been under the control of the entity submitting the application or a principal officer of the entity including the documentation demonstrating that the monies had been under the control of the entity or principal officer for at least 30 days before the application was submitted.

·         R9-17-304(D)(1)
The Arizona Medical Marijuana Act requires an applicant for a dispensary registration certificate to provide a sworn statement that the dispensary is in compliance with any local zoning restrictions.  The final and official version of the rules clarifies that requirement by asking dispensary registration certificate applicants to submit documentation from the local jurisdiction that the proposed dispensary location complies with the zoning restrictions or that the local jurisdiction doesn’t have any zoning restrictions.  We won’t be requiring an applicant to submit a special use permit or a conditional use permit in the initial application for a registration certificate (if that jurisdiction has such a requirement).  However, these permits, if applicable, will be required when a dispensary that has been allocated a registration certificate applies for approval to operate.  We’ll be posting a sample template letter that cities can use on the dispensary portion of our website shortly to make this documentation easier.

Another clarification in this subsection requires an applicant for a dispensary registration certificate to submit documentation that the applicant owns the location of the proposed dispensary or has permission from the owner of the location to operate a dispensary at the location.

·         R9-17-313(E)
The 03/28/11 rules prohibited a medical director from providing a written certification for medical marijuana for a qualifying patient obtaining marijuana from the dispensary associated with the medical director. The final and official rule makes it clear that medical directors are prohibited from providing written certifications for medical marijuana to any qualifying patient (once they become a medical director of a dispensary).

We’ll be accepting dispensary registration certificate applications through the month of June. After that, we’ll review the applications and allocate one dispensary registration certificate for each CHAA to qualified, selected applicants. To learn more about the registration certificate allocation process and how to submit a registration certificate application, check out our Registration Certificate Application Checklist; Registration Certificate Application Instructions; and our Registration Certificate Allocation Flowchart.

Finally, we’ve posted our first weekly Patient Application Summary Report- which provides basic demographic data and a summary of the number of patient applications by Community Health Analysis Area.  Updated reports will be available on our website every Thursday evening.

AZ Dept. of Health Services Director’s Blog » medical marijuana