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Brent Batten: County report on medical pot offers insights but little chance for change

Brent Batten

Medical marijuana will get another hearing before Collier County commissioners Tuesday, but it doesn’t necessarily have a future beyond that.

In May, the five commissioners agreed to put off a decision on whether to allow dispensaries in Collier and see how the nascent industry took shape.

In the meantime, there has been confusion and litigation elsewhere as the state and providers feud over what is allowed and where it is allowed.

County Attorney Jeff Klatzkow and zoning director Mike Bosi have put together a report on the status of the medical marijuana movement statewide and regionally.

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They’ll present their findings Tuesday in a presentation that offers new information but doesn’t make a compelling case for a change.

It would take four votes to amend Collier County’s Land Development Code to allow dispensaries and two commissioners, Penny Taylor and Donna Fiala, have consistently opposed the idea. Both point out that patients can have medical marijuana delivered to their doors from a Lee County dispensary.

The staff’s report backs that up, with data collected from Trulieve, the North Fort Myers dispensary that serves Southwest Florida. Other dispensaries nearest to Collier County are in Broward and Dade counties. Another, Vidacann, is listed in the report as “coming soon” to Bonita Springs.

Trulieve cooperated with Klatzkow and Bosi, providing numbers and details about the operation.

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The dispensary makes about 15 deliveries per day to Collier County, with the average order costing about $235. Trulieve charges $25 for a delivery anywhere in Collier County.

Collier County residents account for about 70 percent of all the deliveries the dispensary makes and about 40 percent of its walk-in patients. In total, the dispensary sees about 270 patients per day, including 15 new patients.

Visiting the site on Sept. 18, the county employees found it to be unassuming and secure, with armed guards and cameras. Inventory is kept in locked cabinets.

Neighbors have not complained and there have been no traffic impacts to the area, the staff concluded.

They talked to Capt. John Reddington of the Lee County Sheriff’s Office about the dispensary. “The (sheriff’s office) has never had any criminal incident related to the dispensary operations or its location. Additionally, they have not received any complaints or finding of loitering near the site. They are satisfied with the security systems and current operations of the dispensary,” their report states.

If approved by commissioners, dispensaries could locate in any spot where pharmacies are currently allowed.

But Klatzkow said the dispensary had a different atmosphere.

Products for sale included inhalables with names like Stardawg, Green Crack and Sunset Sherbet.  “It’s not like you’re walking into a pharmacy. The feel I got was more of a vape shop than anything else. There was a tip jar,” he said.

Klatzkow lists five lawsuits pending over the medical marijuana issue.

One challenges the fact that the state guidelines don’t allow smoking as a means of administering the medication.

Another seeks to allow individuals to grow marijuana for their own medicinal use.

Others challenge the limitations the state has put on who can open a dispensary.

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All point to a poorly worded set of laws and guidelines that came after voters approved medical marijuana through an amendment to the state constitution in 2016, Klatzkow said. “The Legislature just made a mess of this whole thing.”

None of the lawsuits has a direct bearing on Collier County’s decision whether to allow dispensaries, he noted.

Statewide, there are about 163,000 patients registered to receive medical marijuana and 55 approved dispensaries. As many as 70 dispensaries could locate in a 10-county region that includes Southwest Florida under the present rules.

The way the law now stands, a county can ban dispensaries but, if it allows them, must allow them wherever a pharmacy could go until that maximum number of dispensaries is reached.

There are no bills pending to change that, Klatzkow notes, and that presents a problem for Taylor. “Unless the Legislature gives us more free rein to determine where we’re going to place dispensaries in Collier County, then, no,” she said.

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Fiala has expressed that concern too. "Once you approve them, then you can have as many dispensaries as you have pharmacies," she said. "And we have a pharmacy on every street corner, so I have great concern about that," she said in March.

Fiala also cites the potential for medical marijuana to be a precursor for greater legalization.

“You understand the people in pain and they should be able to get it. But it quickly changes to recreational and it gets worse and worse. That scares me. That’s why I’m so cautious,” she said.

Connect with Brent Batten at brent.batten@naplesnews.com, on Twitter @NDN_BrentBatten and at facebook.com/ndnbrentbatten.