House, Senate moving closer on pot plan
TALLAHASSEE — E l i g i b l e patients would not have to wait 90 days to get medical marijuana if doctors recommend the treatment, under a compromise measure ready for a House vote just days before next Friday’s end of the annual legislative session.
The measure, proposed by House Majority Leader Ray Rodrigues, brings the House closer in line with the Senate’s approach to carrying out a November constitutional amendment that legalized marijuana for patients with a broad swath of debilitating medical conditions.
The House modifified the bi l l , HB 1 3 97, on Fr i day, doing away with the 90-day requirement and allowing vaporizing and edibles as methods of consuming pot products, something proponents of the constitutional amendment had pushed. A House vote could come as soon as Tuesday.
Rodrigues said he made the changes based on testimony provided during committee hearings.
“We have listened, and we have worked hard to create a patient-centered process,” said Rodrigues, R-Estero.
The House also dropped requiring doctors to re-cert i f y pati ents ever y t hree months, and instead would a l l ow pat i e nt s t o o b t a i n 30-week supplies of marijuana products. The Senate would only require patients to get re-certifified annually.
In addition, the House plan would allow the Department of Health to contract with a vendor to provide patient identifification cards. Rodrigues said he included the option after hearing that patients were encountering delays in getting the cards, which will be required to obtain medical marijuana products later this year.
“Our goal is that it’s ... as easy as it is to get your hunting or your fifishing license,” Rodrigues said during a discussion of the bill Friday on the House flfloor.
The House and Senate remain divided on how many medical marijuana operators should be added to the state’s seven “dispensing organizations” now licensed to grow, process and dispense cannabis products throughout Florida.
The Senate bill (SB 406) wou l d r e q u i r e f i v e n e w l i c e n s e s b y N o v e m b e r, including one for a member of the Florida Black Farmers and Agriculturalists Association, and increase the number of licenses as the number of patients registered for the treatment in a statewide database increases.
The House proposal would only add one license this year, going to a black farmer. Black farmers have been singled out because none were eligible to apply for a license when the state legalized noneuphoric marijuana in 2014.
Under the proposals, black farmers would need to have been part of class-action lawsuits focused on discriminatory lending practices by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to be eligible.