The state didn’t provide tax revenue, but it gets about 30 percent of total sales; municipalities get an extra 3 percent.

Lines were long at dispensaries in the Chicago area, stretching several blocks at some of the busiest locations in the city, and meandering around buildings and across parking lots in the suburbs.

Cresco Labs said it had about 400 people in line this morning at its Sunnyside shop in Wrigleyville.

“The lines (of customers) show demand, which means there’s an incredible opportunity for this industry to grow for new people to come in,” Hutchinson said during a press conference at the Thompson Center, where applicants for 75 new dispensary licenses were still filing in.

The deadline to apply for 75 licenses, which will be issued in May, was extended from noon to 4 p.m. today to handle demand. Hundreds of people streamed into the Thompson Center, filling a basement auditorium where they waited before being led upstairs to file their paperwork with the Department of Financial & Professional Regulation.