Ohio awards new license to grow medical marijuana as a result of state's application scoring error

The state of Ohio has awarded a 25th provisional license to a medical marijuana grower whose application was initially rejected because of a scoring error.

PharmaCann Ohio, a medical marijuana grower and retailer, was awarded a provisional license for a proposed grow operation in the Village of Buckeye Lake, near Columbus, Ohio.

PharmaCann was one of more than 100 growers who submitted applications to the Ohio Department of Commerce for one of 12 provisional licences issued late last year to large-scale growers.

Under the state's new Medical Marijuana Control Program, the number of cultivator licenses issued was limited to 24 - 12 for large growers and 12 for small growers - before the program's official launch on Sept. 8.

But the commerce department acknowledged that an inadvertent scoring error prevented PharmaCann from qualifying for one of the large grower's licenses.

The new license was allowed under the law to remedy the error, commerce officials said.

PharmaCann was the only failed applicant knocked out of the running for a Level 1 license for operations with up to 25,000 square feet of growing space as a result of the scoring error, according to the commerce department.

The state's licensing process has been called into question in lawsuits brought by several unsuccessful applicants, including Ohio Releaf, whose Level 1 application was disqualified because it failed to meet minimum requirements, according to commerce department officials.

But Ohio Releaf alleges state regulators didn't score applications fairly and is seeking an injunction to prevent companies that already have provisional licenses from launching their operations until it can appeal its score.

Judge Richard Frye, a Franklin County Common Pleas judge, is expected to make a decision Ohio Releaf's lawsuit sometime this week.