Page 6 - ARUBA TODAY

A6 U.S. NEWS
Monday 24 deceMber 2018

Oklahoma quickly becoming

medical marijuana hotbed

By SEAN MURPHY bis in June. than 1,200 licensed com-
Associated Press The ballot question re- mercial growers. Owner
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — ceived 57 percent support Ben Neal has been using
The rollout of statewide and established one of the high-tech growing tech-
medical and recreational nation’s most liberal medi- niques for years to produce
marijuana programs typi- cal pot laws in one of the tomatoes, lettuce, peppers
cally is a grindingly slow most conservative states. and other vegetables at
In this Nov. 30, 2018 photo, medical marijuana dispensary owner process that can take Six months later, the can- his six greenhouses in ru-
Chance Gilbert displays some of the marijuana he’s grown at years. Not so in Oklahoma, nabis industry is booming. ral Tulsa County. He’s now
the Oklahoma Roots dispensary in the bedroom community of which moved with light- Farmers and entrepreneurs converted a third of his op-
Shawnee, about 40 miles east of Oklahoma City. ning speed once voters are racing to start commer- eration to growing marijua-
Associated Press approved medical canna- cial grow operations, and na, hired three new work-
the state is issuing licenses ers and just harvested 200
to new patients, growers pounds of various strains
and dispensary operators that will be auctioned next
at a frantic pace. Retail month.
outlets opened just four Neal said he has been of-
months after legalization. fered $2,800 per pound for
By contrast, voters in North the entire crop, a total of
Dakota, Ohio and neigh- $560,000. He’s shocked at
boring Arkansas approved how quickly Oklahoma has
medical pot in 2016 but embraced the industry.
have yet to see sales begin “Nine months ago, I was
amid legal wrangling and saying that Oklahoma
legislative meddling. would be the last state that
“I think we really are the ever does it, and then all of
wild, wild West in many a sudden this happened,”
respects,” said attorney Neal said.
Sarah Lee Gossett Parrish, In the bedroom commu-
whose firm in Norman rep- nity of Shawnee, east of
resents several cannabis Oklahoma City, business is
businesses. “Here in Okla- steady at the Oklahoma
homa, we’re a pretty inde- Roots dispensary. Chance
pendent constituency. We Gilbert grows, processes
are primarily a red state, and sells marijuana inside
but we don’t like a lot of what once was a metal
government controls.” fabrication shop.
Indeed, unlike virtually ev- “It’s kind of radical how fast
ery other state, Oklahoma it’s gotten going,” said Gil-
officials created no list of bert, who expects to pro-
qualifying medical condi- duce about 50 pounds of
tions for people to get me- marijuana a month once
dicinal marijuana. That has at full capacity. “We as-
prompted a flood of appli- sumed it would be an Ar-
cations for personal licens- kansas model, that it would
es to purchase pot. be years before it was im-
Since August more than plemented and rolled out.”
22,000 have been ap- The primary driver behind
proved and thousands Oklahoma’s quick rollout
more are in the pipeline. was a broadly written, citi-
There are now 785 licensed zen-led ballot question that
dispensaries. Some small included quick deadlines
Oklahoma towns have and required regulators
as many as a half-dozen. to grant a license to every
Norman and Stillwater, the qualified applicant. But
state’s two largest college several political ingredients
towns, have 45 combined. combined to push the ef-
Sage Farms is among more fort along.q