Kentucky announces recipient of its 1st medical marijuana license

[[“value”:”

Next an update on the medical cannabis program since taking office, my administration has been committed to provide access to health care and create safe communities for all Kentuckians. Over *** year ago, I signed Senate Bill 47 which legalizes medical cannabis in the commonwealth beginning January of 2025. That’s coming really soon knowing that patients need access to life changing medication sooner rather than later. Uh our administration, um we wanted to make sure we were capable of issuing licenses this year. So we worked with the General Assembly primarily uh Senator West who has worked really hard on this, worked really well. Uh With us was not able to make it today but was certainly invited and I signed House Bill 829 in April. They didn’t fix all the challenges but fixed as many as Senator West could, could get fixed and get through the General Assembly. The bill took the important step of moving up the timeline for cannabis business licensing by *** full six months. As *** result, uh the program can begin issuing business license in 2024 instead of 2025. And after an incredible interest from the business community. That’s exactly what we are doing today. After receiving almost 5000 applications, I’m proud to announce that today, Kentucky will be issuing its first medical cannabis business license. This license will go to *** lab, uh which is *** category that doesn’t have *** limit and thus does not have *** lottery. The very first license for this program, it goes to KC *** labs, *** hemp testing lab currently operating in Nicholasville. It’ll be the Commonwealth’s first medical cannabis business licensee KC *** Labs is *** safety compliance facility. These facilities are responsible for testing every medical cannabis product before it gets to *** Kentucky cardholder. Our mission is to ensure Kentuckians with serious medical conditions, have access to safe and high quality tested medical cannabis products as the Commonwealth’s first licensed medical cannabis business and laboratory. That’s exactly what KC *** is gonna help us do. I, I love that the first license is going to an entity that, that helps us do this safely. Our office of medical cannabis has established strict regulations and the safety compliance facilities like KC *** will guarantee all Kentucky cannabis is held to the highest medical standards. So now I’d like to invite Office of Medical cannabis Executive Director Sam Flynn and Jonathan Thompson CEO of KC *** labs up for the presentation of the first medical cannabis license. Gentlemen, congratulations on this milestone. Would you like to say *** few words? Yes, sir. Thank you. Thank you governor. We are so excited about the opportunity to be part of Kentucky’s Medical cannabis program. And we are thrilled to accept the first license. I want to thank you and the Office of Medical Cannabis for your hard work and leadership in this program, in particular. I want to thank you for setting up this licensing process which has been seamless. I also want to thank the Office of Medical Cannabis um for working with businesses like businesses like ours step by step as we navigated through this process, Kentucky owned KC *** labs has been performing regulatory and safety testing in the hemp industry since 2019. As of September 2024 KC *** had over 2000 customers and clients across almost every state and including 30 other countries with more than 100 years of combined experience in analytic analytical testing in USDA FDA and DEA regulated industries. KC, A’s vast knowledge and experience with testing hemp products will transfer over neatly into Kentucky’s new medical cannabis program with many of the same testable substances. KC *** is poised to bring its industrywide reputation, expertise, quality and impartiality to give the program’s licenses, reliable and dependable um compliance data while also confirming that the businesses are meeting the state’s important safety requirements for medical cannabis products. Again, we are thrilled to be part of the program and we look forward to working with the Governor and the Office of Medical Cannabis to ensure the program provides the highest quality products to Kentucky’s card holders. Thank you, Governor. Congratulations. Thank you. Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you in. So, thank you to KC *** labs. We are excited uh about how you’re gonna be *** big part of this program and we wish you success moving forward next. I’m excited to share some news about Kentucky’s medical cannabis lottery for cultivators and processors. We have set *** date of Monday October 28th 2024 for those license lotteries that’s cultivators and processors. So applicants for cultivator tiers 12 and three and applications for processors will be informed the week prior whether they are approved for the license lottery for the license lottery. If approved, those applications will be included in the appropriate license lottery on October 28th, those lotteries will be held by the Kentucky Lottery Corporation in Louisville. There will be live stream so Kentuckians can tune in and follow along but there won’t be any ping pong balls. I want to make sure everybody knows that ahead of time. When we launched the program, our mission was to ensure that Kentuckians suffering from cancer, multiple sclerosis, veterans suffering from PTSD and so many others had access to safe and affordable medical cannabis. Today, we’re taking another big step towards it. The last group, uh, dispensaries we’re gonna announce the date of that lottery, uh at *** later date, it will be uh likely in November. Uh The reason we’re holding off on naming *** date is I’m hoping I can beat or we can beat or Sam Flynn can beat uh the projected uh date that we’re looking at. They’re making great progress. And I was, we talked about earlier, we had so many dispensary applications that we brought on new people uh to help get through them and we’ve got to do it right. And we’ve got to do it well and you only do something the first time once. Uh And so in an effort to ensure that we have the full confidence of Kentuckians knowing that we promised them ***, *** safe uh medical cannabis operation and also *** fair process of who is in it when it starts. Um We’re going to wait to announce that date, but again, likely in November, I hope it’s earlier in November than some of the projected dates. But Sam’s working really hard on it.

“]] The first medical marijuana license for Kentucky has been issued, and Gov. Beshear announced which company is getting it.  Read More