David Y. Ige

HONOLULU — The Hawaii State Department of Health (DOH) today released the scores and ranking of the applicants for Medical Marijuana Dispensary Licenses. The list of applicants and their respective scores and ranking are posted at https://health.hawaii.gov/medicalmarijuanadispensary/latest-updates-and-news/.

A total of 66 applications for eight dispensary licenses were reviewed, evaluated, and scored (based on 13 merit criteria) by four members of a selection panel. Each application could receive a maximum of 530 points (10 points maximum could be awarded for each merit criterion by each of four individual panelists). All applicants were required to submit documentation to prove compliance with the statutory and administrative requirements for both individual applicants and applying entities.

“To meet the ambitious and expedited time schedule for the selection process and given the large number of applications to review, the vetting process was conducted concurrently with the scoring of the applications,” said Keith Ridley, Chief of the DOH Office of Health Care Assurance.  While all applications were scored, 12 applicants who did not submit the requisite documentation or whose documentation did not establish compliance with the requirements were not ranked in the final compilation of scores. DOH notified all unselected applicants by certified mail this week prior to the posting of the applicants’ scores.

To help ensure the medical marijuana dispensary program can be available for patients, DOH has been working on other requirements for the programs implementation.

• The department is continuing work with Bio Track THC to establish the web-based seed-to-sale computer tracking system for dispensaries.
• The DOH State Laboratories Division has established a certification process for medical marijuana testing facilities and applications are available at https://health.hawaii.gov/statelab/.

“It’s an exciting time, launching this new industry in Hawaii,” said Margaret Leong, supervisor of the Medical Marijuana Dispensary Licensing Program. “So far, the licensing staff have met in person with seven of the licensees and the discussions have been really productive and beneficial to all of us. The licensees have generously shared their knowledge of the industry gained through the application process, and we’ve been able to provide more specific guidance to ensure that their facilities conduct operations in compliance with all state requirements to be able to open their dispensaries in a timely manner.”

Additional information about the medical marijuana dispensary program and the registry program is available at health.hawaii.gov/medicalmarijuana.

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