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By Caroline Cummings
/ CBS Minnesota
MINNEAPOLIS — After a judge halted a planned lottery for cannabis license “preapproval” last month, the Minnesota Office of Cannabis Management — the regulatory agency tasked with oversight of the budding industry — on Wednesday said it was skipping past that process entirely and focusing on a standard licensing period in late spring and early summer.
Charlene Briner, the interim cannabis chief, told reporters that after the agency reviewed its options, it identified a “path forward” to ensure there were no other delays to market launch next year.
“The decision to end the license preapproval process and move forward with standard licensing shortly after the new year has two primary benefits. It preserves, at least in part, some of the early mover advantages for social equity applicants that were envisioned by the legislature in that preapproval process. And secondly, it also keeps us moving forward towards a timely market launch in 2025,” Briner said.
Individuals who meet the criteria as a social equity applicant — the only ones authorized to apply for the early licenses — will now submit applications with all other applicants during a one-month period beginning in mid-February.
License “preapproval” was designed to give some social equity applicants a head start before others could apply for a license next year after the agency’s rules are finalized. But the office dismissed two-thirds of applications for failing to provide proper documentation or running afoul of the law, prompting some prospective business owners to sue. A Ramsey County District judge then issued a stay so plaintiffs could file a challenge to the Court of Appeals.
The 648 individuals approved to participate in the initial lottery, originally scheduled for Nov. 26, will automatically move forward during the standard licensing period, Briner said, and will not have to re-apply or pay additional fees associated with an application.
“While this announcement today does not fully address the disappointment of the 648 qualified applicants who expected to be entered into a lottery on Nov. 26, our commitments to the principles of social equity are undiminished, and those principles are central to this new path forward,” Briner said.
State law caps the number of licenses for four different types: cultivators, manufacturers, retailers and mezzobusinesses. The latter will allow operators to control multiple parts of the supply chain on a smaller scale.
If there are more applications for those four categories than actual licenses available, lotteries will be launched for each.
Social equity applicants will be picked for the first half of those licenses, while everyone else will be picked for the other half of those four categories of licenses that have limits. Those two lotteries would begin in May or June of next year, according to Briner.
This story is developing and will be updated.
Caroline Cummings is an Emmy-winning reporter with a passion for covering politics, public policy and government. She is thrilled to join the WCCO team.
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