M elissa Fults and David Couch, outspoken marijuana advocates who fought a recreational marijuana proposal in 2022, are lending their support to a constitutional amendment this year that would expand the medical marijuana law voters passed in 2016.
So, what’s different this time? “They gave me everything I asked for,” Fults said.
Items on Fults’ laundry list included a longer lifespan for patient cards, elimination of the fee for obtaining or renewing a card, additional qualifying conditions and a provision to allow patients to grow their own plants. All of those changes are in the Arkansas Medical Marijuana Amendment of 2024, proposed by a group called Arkansans for Patient Access. The group submitted a ballot title for the proposed amendment to the state attorney general in January. It was rejected; an amended version was submitted Feb. 5 and was approved 15 days later, clearing the way for organizers to gather the signatures needed to put the measure on the November ballot.
Couch, who authored the successful 2016 amendment, and Fults were unlikely opponents of the 2022 Arkansas Adult Use Cannabis Amendment, which would have legalized recreational marijuana for adults 21 and older. Pushed by a group called Responsible Growth Arkansas and supported by the state cannabis industry, the proposed amendment would have increased the number of dispensaries and changed some of the rules regarding cannabis business ownership.
Fults said the proposal would have hurt the state medical marijuana program. Incentivized to serve the state’s recreational customers, Fults said, cultivators would not grow strains with lower amounts of the psychoactive compound THC that might be more beneficial to patients.
Couch said the amendment was too favorable to the existing marijuana industry and campaigned against it with arch-conservative Jerry Cox of the Arkansas Family Council.
“Favorable is a nice way of saying it,” Couch said. The 2022 amendment, he and others believed, would have created a monopoly in an already narrow pool of cultivators and dispensaries, keeping profits in the hands of an elite few.
Voters rejected the 2022 recreational amendment with 56.25% voting against it and 43.75% in favor.
Fults and Couch contributed to the creation of the new proposal. Fults said she met with Robert McLarty and Nate Steele, two politically active Arkansans who also have ownership interest in Arkansas cannabis businesses, and was “ecstatic” to hear of their interest in making changes to the medical marijuana program. Fults provided them with a list of what she believed were the program’s biggest problems and what she would like to see changed.
Bill Paschall, executive director of the Arkansas Cannabis Industry Association, said he consulted with Fults and Couch to get their input on suggested language for the amendment, which was included in the final product.
The proposal is backed by the state cannabis industry, with cultivator Abraham Carpenter of Carpenter Medical Group serving as the chair of the group’s ballot question committee. Lynn Parker, owner of Purspirit Cannabis Co. in Fayetteville, and Paschall are also on the committee along with accountant T.J. Boyle and patient advocate Roger Dean of Benton.
The amendment language obtained the attorney general’s sign-off to start gathering signatures on Feb. 20. Constitutional amendments this year will need 90,704 verified signatures by July 5, according to the Arkansas secretary of state.
The amendment would eliminate the $50 fee the state charges for patient cards and would extend the life of patient cards from one to three years. The state Department of Health reported 97,253 active patient cards in early February.
The measure would also allow pharmacists, nurse practitioners and physicians’ assistants to certify patients for the program in addition to medical doctors. Paschall noted this would benefit rural Arkansans who may not live near a doctor.
The measure would also allow health care professionals to certify patients based on any “debilitating” condition that “may be alleviated” by the use of marijuana. The 18 qualifying conditions listed in the 2016 amendment will remain legal. Couch said he included those 18 conditions when writing the 2016 measure because they had been accepted in medical programs in other states. Couch said he believes there are other conditions, such as migraines and insomnia, for which patients could use marijuana.
Oklahoma, which approved medical marijuana in 2018, does not have qualifying conditions and allows doctors to certify patients based on the same standards they would follow when recommending or approving any medication.
The measure would also allow patients to grow their own marijuana plants, something the 2016 law does not allow. The proposed measure would let cardholders grow up to seven mature plants and seven immature plants, and calls for the state Alcoholic Beverage Control Division, which already regulates the state cannabis industry, to come up with any other necessary regulations.
Since the plants are difficult to grow, Couch predicted that the only people who will grow their own when it’s legal are the people who are already doing so illegally. The amendment will also pave the way for dispensaries to sell pre-rolls by eliminating the state prohibition on dispensaries’ sale of paraphernalia requiring combustion.
The measure does not expunge past marijuana convictions, something that Fults complained was not included in the 2022 recreational amendment. Fults said she and others agreed not to include expungements in the 2024 amendment because it is focused on medical marijuana, and expunging past convictions didn’t fit the mission.
“We all decided that this was strictly going to be about making it more accessible,” she said.
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