MONTGOMERY, Ala. — A court hearing over medical cannabis production licenses in the state originally scheduled for Monday has been pushed back about a month.
The Alabama Court of Civil Appeals will hear arguments on February 11 at 10 a.m. over Montgomery Circuit Court Judge James Anderson’s temporary restraining order against the Alabama Medical Cannabis Commission (AMCC), according to the Alabama Court of Civil Appeals Clerk’s office. The hearing was initially scheduled for January 13.
The Clerk of Courts office did not provide a reason for the delay.
The Alabama Legislature approved a state medical cannabis program in 2021, allowing individuals with 15 qualifying medical conditions — such as cancer, depression, Parkinson’s disease, PTSD, sickle-cell anemia, chronic pain, and terminal illnesses — to apply for medical cannabis.
The law restricts medical cannabis to forms like tablets, capsules, gelatins, oils, gels, creams, suppositories, transdermal patches, and inhalable oils or liquids. Smoking marijuana and consuming it in edibles are prohibited, while gummies are allowed but limited to peach flavor.
But the program has been stalled due to controversies surrounding the licensing process.
The Alabama Legislature in 2021 approved the creation of a state medical cannabis program to allow people with 15 different medical conditions, including cancer, depression, Parkinson’s Disease, PTSD, sickle-cell anemia, chronic pain, and terminal illness to apply for medical cannabis.
The law limits medical cannabis to tablets, capsules, gelatins, oils, gels, creams, suppositories, transdermal patches, and inhalable oils or liquids. Smoking marijuana or consuming it in edibles is forbidden. Gummies are allowed but are restricted to peach flavor.
An initial grant of licenses in 2023 was overturned amid concerns about scoring inconsistencies on applications. The commission voided a second round of applications later that year after a lawsuit alleging violations of the Open Meetings Act by the AMCC. Anderson blocked a third round of licenses last January, citing ongoing litigation from the first two rounds of awards.
This article originally appeared in the Alabama Reflector, an independent, nonprofit news outlet and part of the States Newsroom network. It appears on FOX54.com under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
