Hopes that Hawaii would this year become the 11th state to legalize the adult use of cannabis were dashed last week, as lawmakers in Honolulu allowed the bill to fizzle.<\/p>\n
Half the Democrats in the state Senate signed on to the\u00a0legalization measure<\/a>\u00a0drafted by Senate Majority Leader J. Kalani English. But other leaders in the chamber raised concerns about conflicting with federal law.<\/p>\n The bill stalled in the Senate Health Committee and Ways & Means Committee before a March 1 deadline. It needed to clear both committees before it could go before the full Senate. When the Health Committee failed to schedule a meeting that day to consider any bills, the measure effectively died.<\/p>\n House Majority Leader Della Au Belatti summed up the fears of lawmakers. She told the\u00a0Associated Press<\/a>\u00a0that while she considers legalization an eventuality, \u201cI also think that we have enough folks who are sitting around the table who are saying \u2018Let\u2019s do it right. Let\u2019s not just rush into things and let\u2019s do it right.’\u201d<\/p>\n Belatti said she wanted to have abuse prevention, treatment and education programs in place before legalization (a linkage that seems rooted in the\u00a0discredited<\/a>\u00a0\u201cgateway drug\u201d theory). For now, Belatti said she\u2019ll just consider decriminalizing cannabis \u2014 something Hawaii still hasn\u2019t done. Even possession of under an ounce can\u00a0land you 30 days in jail<\/a>, as well as a $1,000 fine, in the Aloha State.<\/p>\n However, the late and lamented legalization bill would have created an adult-use market by\u00a0building on the dispensary system established by Hawaii\u2019s medical marijuana program. And this, following years of agonizing delay, is growing fast.<\/p>\n Just four days after the legalization measure died, Hawaii\u2019s\u00a0Health Department<\/a>\u00a0announced that it will allow visitors to the state who are approved to purchase medical marijuana elsewhere in the U.S. to buy from local dispensaries.\u00a0AP<\/a>\u00a0reported that an online registration system is to be established and opened to non-residents of the state. In Hawaii, with its tourism economy and large transient population, this is especially significant.\u00a0<\/p>\n Under the new system, out-of-state patients will be able to register within 60 days before arriving in Hawaii. Registered patients are allowed to purchase up to four ounces for each 15-day period. There is a yearly $49.50 application fee.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s the number one frequently asked question for each dispensary,\u201d\u00a0Pono Life Sciences<\/a>\u00a0CEO Michael Takano said to\u00a0Hawaii News Now<\/a>. \u201cEach and every day, every dispensary gets inquiries from out-of-state patients [t]hat want access to safe, legal products. How does it work? How do I get it?\u201d<\/p>\n Hawaii dispensaries sold 1,569 pounds of medical marijuana totaling $12.6 million in sales in 2018, according to state Health Department stats. Some 25,000 people are already registered in the program statewide. State health director Bruce Anderson believes this number will grow by some 10,000 with the new system, the\u00a0Honolulu Star Advertiser\u00a0<\/a>reports.\u00a0<\/p>\n The medical program allows registered state residents to grow up to seven plants. Visitors will not be allowed to cultivate.<\/p>\n Hawaii\u2019s statehouse legalized medical marijuana in 2000, but patients had no legal place to purchase cannabis until\u00a0Maui Grown Therapies<\/a>\u00a0opened in August 2017, followed by\u00a0Aloha Green Apothecary<\/a>\u00a0in Honolulu.<\/p>\n Other retailers have opened since then, including\u00a0Pono Life Maui<\/a>, and\u00a0Noa Botanicals<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Cure Oahu<\/a>\u00a0in Honolulu. Last May,\u00a0Green Aloha Ltd<\/a>\u00a0opened its\u00a0Have a Heart<\/a>\u00a0outlet on Kauai. In August,\u00a0Hawaiian Ethos<\/a>,\u00a0in Waimea on the Big Island, received approval to start cultivating, although it still awaits the go-ahead on retail sales.\u00a0Lua Ola<\/a>\u00a0company, operating as\u00a0Big Island Grown Dispensaries, this year opened a store in Hilo, and plans for two more, in Waimea and Kona.<\/p>\n That makes for a total of eight dispensaries operating statewide as of now. And for what it\u2019s worth, the vast majority of the 20,426 registered patients say they are using cannabis for \u201csevere pain,\u201d according to\u00a0Hawaii News Now<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n TELL US<\/strong>, would you register as an out-of-state medical marijuana patient before a trip to Hawaii?<\/p>\n The post Hawaii\u2019s Legalization Measure Fails as Medical Program Liberalizes<\/a> appeared first on Cannabis Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Hopes that Hawaii would this year become the 11th state to legalize the adult use of cannabis were dashed last week, as lawmakers in Honolulu allowed the bill to fizzle. Half the Democrats in the state Senate signed on to the\u00a0legalization measure\u00a0drafted by Senate Majority Leader J. Kalani English. ButContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":190,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[159,50,954,4552,4318,81,362],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33399"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/190"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33399"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33399\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33400,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33399\/revisions\/33400"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33399"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33399"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33399"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Hawaii\u2019s Medicinal Cannabis Program Expands<\/strong><\/h4>\n
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\nRead More: Hawaii\u2019s Legalization Measure Fails as Medical Program Liberalizes<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"