To: The Florida State Senate
Monopoly on medical marijuana licenses in Florida~Number 18 is mine!
We are petitioning the Florida Legislature and Department of Health to amend the license requirements to stop the current discriminatory monopoly.
Why is this important?
The Florida Department of Health Office of Medical Marijuana Use rules to become a medical marijuana license holder in the State of Florida are discriminatory and have created a monopoly with the citrus growers.
Thanks to 71% of the voters last year, we now have Medical Marijuana in Florida, but not under reasonable terms that everyone knows about. Currently, there are 17 "lucky" license holders and below is the reason why this system is so very wrong.
There's all this talk about Medical Marijuana in the newspapers and on TV, but if you speak to your average person on the street they have no clue how this is playing out! I, like many other talented and Marijuana University certified individuals in the art of growing, dispensing, and extracting cannabis, have been denied access to a license in my own state due to a small group of people holding all the cards which is why I deem it discriminatory and illegal.
Florida has decided that only citrus growers of "more than 400,00 plants" which "have been operated as a registered nursery in this state for at least 30 continuous years" are eligible to apply for a license to grow, extract and distribute medical marijuana. So, tell me, what do oranges have to do with marijuana? Remember folks, the licenses include not only the cultivation of plants but also the dispensing and extraction of low THC cannabis. Now I, along with many others, have experience in this field while these fine orange growers may or may not.
I feel the statute is discriminatory and takes away my right to open a cannabis business in my home state by not allowing me to apply for a license. I have the talent; I have the knowledge; and if the voters were aware of this monopoly, I am sure I'd have supporters!
I am calling for the Florida Legislature to enact the state's constitutional amendment by re-opening and expanding the application process for myself and other similarly knowledgeable persons to be able to apply for a license in the state of Florida.