Investors aim at $40M pot facility

Medical marijuana site proposal envisions 5 harvests a year.

The investors behind a plan to build a marijuana cultivation facility in Wilmington envision five harvests of medical cannabis each year, employing an initial 50 to 60 people and driven by what in time will be a $40 million investment.

“I don’t think anyone else in Ohio comes close to what we bring to the table,” said Ohio financier Jimmy Gould, a partner in Cann-Ascend Ohio.

Gould, with financier partner Ian James and former United Nation’s Children’s Emergency Fund Ambassador Bill Brisben, believe the “campus”-type facility can employ more than 220 workers when fully operational, Gould said.

“My hope for Wilmington is continued revitalization of the community, anywhere from 220 to 300 jobs over the next six years,” Gould said on Wednesday in an

interview with the Dayton Daily News.

In 2015, James and Gould campaigned for a plan that would have legalized medical and recreational marijuana in Ohio, but that issue was soundly beaten at the polls that year.

Gould on Wednesday said he “has learned a lot” from that experience. He said the jobs “will make a great difference” to Wilmington, citing a recent decision by online retail giant Amazon, which decided to build a air hub at the Cincinnati-Northern Kentucky Inter- national Airport, costing Wilmington Air Park more than 300 jobs.

Dr. Suzanne Sisley has been hired to be the partner- ship’s Ohio medical director, the first time the organization has made that announce- ment, Gould said.

Sisley is a familiar name in marijuana research circles. The University of Arizona “abruptly” fired her in 2014 from a position as a clinical assistant professor of psychiatry, according to the Los Angeles Times and other media.

“Sisley charges she was fired after her research — and her personal political crusading — created unwanted attention for the university from legislative Republicans who control its purse strings,” the Times wrote in 2014.

The Wilmington Community Improvement Corp. has a land contract with CannA- scend Ohio, said David Raizk, executive director of the cor- poration and a former Wilm- ington mayor.

If the group receives state licensing, the facility would be built on a 19-acre lot on Davids Drive near the Wilmington Air Park.

“We’re going to be a state- of-the-art facility,” he said.

Cann-Ascend said it will apply for one of 12 Ohio’s Level I cultivation facility licenses, which would allow the company to build a 25,000 square-foot marijuana cultivation facility. Over time, the facility

will be expanded to 50,000 square feet, then 75,000 square feet, “as state law allows,” the organization pledged.

“I think a lot of this will be a learning curve for the industry, because I think the industry is changing constantly,” Gould told the Dayton Daily News. “The goal is to get a better plant, a better yield and one that is free from contamination. That’s probably the most important thing I can say, because a lot of the market does have contaminated product.”

Wilmington Mayor John Stanforth did not return a call seeking comment Wednesday, but he was quoted in a Cann-Ascend release last week as being supportive.

Ohio legalized pot for medical uses last year, and Gov. John Kasich created a regimen giving three govern

ment agencies control over aspects of its use. The law still forbids smoking marijuana or home growth.

Cultivator r ules are expected to be adopted by the state before May 6. The formal application process for licenses is expected to follow.

That will be key, Gould said.

The facility would use a hydroponic approach, growing plants without soil and using a “unique” lighting process developed in Florida, Gould said.

He hopes to have a building started in September, with six months to build. Cannabis growing cycles will take about 10 weeks with five harvests a year.

The facility will not include a dispensary on site, he said.