County approves cannabis licensing process
EL CENTRO — After establishing the first pieces of the framework regarding the regulations on the cannabis industry last month, the county Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to approve a fee structure and licensing procedure in addition to adopting a lottery process to award licenses for businesses wishing to cultivate marijuana in the county.
With the Board’s approval, a fee structure has been set for commercial cannabis activities. The first application fee for any of the previously approved activities such as cultivation, manufacturing, retail, medicinal and distribution will cost $4,000.
If an applicant submits more than one application encompassing multiple operations within the same site, those additional applications would be $1,000 each — the first application will remain at $4,000.
Also, the cost for a review of a security plan for a proposed site will cost $1,000 and the annual fee for each license will be $1,500.
Director of Planning and Development Services Jim Minnick said the fees were to offset the internal costs the review of the applications will incur on the department.
“The goal of the county is to be cost-recoverable. The fees we are proposing here are based on the amount of time we really, truly think we’re going to use on these permits,” Minnick said. “We’re not trying to gouge. We’re not trying to charge anybody anything more than what we’re expecting to do.”
With the adoption of the new rules and regulations approved, the board will set a three-step procedure for cannabis developers to follow in order to acquire the necessary license or licenses to operate within the unincorporated areas of the county.
Minnick said his department looked at what other counties have been doing to get some direction and tried to simplify the process as much as possible.
Under the newly established process, the first step to complete by any interested party would be to submit an application for a Commercial Cannabis Activity license, the application will then be reviewed and if in compliance, an authorization letter will be provided to the applicant in order to initiate the process to acquire a state license.
The second step for applicants to complete would be to obtain any additional permits they would need to secure prior to a cannabis license, including any agricultural, building or any other applicable permits required.
If the applicants meet all the required conditions of the license and a state CCA license has been obtained, then the applicant would be eligible to secure the required license for unlimited activities such as manufacturing, cultivation, and testing; and would be eligible to enter into a lottery process to obtain a license for medicinal dispensary with delivery service, virtual retail with delivery and wholesale distribution.
The third component of Tuesday’s vote by the supervisors includes the approval of a public lottery process in order to obtain a license related to one of the limited activities in the county.
Earlier this year the board approved to issue up to five licenses for virtual retail of cannabis with delivery service, up to five licenses for wholesale distribution operations and a single physical medicinal establishment with a delivery operation.
The county will begin the submission period for cannabis licenses Jan. 2 and will remain open for 45 days until the deadline Feb. 16.
In order to take part in the lottery process, an application needs to be found to be complete and consistent with county and state regulations pertaining to zoning, site control and financial ability.
Those selected in the lottery will move forward in the application process but still need to meet all established requirements before the issuance of a license.
Applicants who are found to be eligible for the lottery will be notified 10 days prior to the date the lottery takes place.
The lottery is expected to be open to the public and is tentatively expected to take place 30 days after the closing of the application submittal process.
The board is expected to reevaluate the process in March after staff has gone through the first round of applications and when there are more defined regulations set by the state.