Medical marijuana cultivation license revoked for Arkansas grower

Arkansas Medical Marijuana Fee Director Doralee Changer has revoked the cultivation license of Fort Smith-based River Valley Aid. Her motion was procedural and adopted a Nov. 3 courtroom ruling to revoke the license. RVR has appealed the courtroom ruling.

The formal order will seemingly be issued no later than the tip of the week, in keeping with Scott Hardin, spokesman for the Arkansas Division of Finance and Administration (DFA), the MMC oversight company.

Pulaski County Circuit Courtroom Decide Herb Wright dominated on Nov. 3 for a declare by 2600 Holdings that the MMC erred in granting RVR the license in July 2020. 2600 Holdings filed a lawsuit in January 2021, asking the courtroom to disqualify RVR and grant the license to 2600 or present different aid by the Arkansas Administrative Procedures Act.

2600 attorneys allege that MMC illegally granted RVR proprietor Storm Nolan a license throughout a second spherical of awarding cultivation licenses. The motion was unlawful as a result of the incorporation in Nolan’s first software was now not legitimate, and the proposed heart was too near the Sebastian County Juvenile Detention Heart, in keeping with the criticism filed by 2600. The regulation regulating Arkansas’ medical marijuana requires facilities to be at the least 3,000 ft away from a college, church or daycare.

The DFA rebutted 2600’s criticism with a 36-page submitting. Nolan and his attorneys had been blocked by Pulaski County Circuit Courtroom Decide Herb Wright from collaborating within the courtroom case.

In his ruling, Decide Wright mentioned 2600 has confirmed it must be given aid, and the MMC acted outdoors its authority – extremely vires – in granting the license to RVR,

“Plaintiff has, due to this fact, met its burden in displaying that the undisputed info of the case, seen in a light-weight most favorable to Defendants, show that the plaintiff is entitled to aid. Defendants have acted unreasonably, unlawfully, and capriciously by awarding Nolan a license,” Wright famous, including later within the Nov. 3 ruling: “An effort was clearly made by the MMC to offer Nolan thread to sew up the holes within the RVRC software. Whether or not that was truthful or unfair to any of the candidates, it was at minimal an unconstitutional and extremely vires act.”

At Monday’s listening to wherein Chandler issued the revocation, Nolan and his lawyer Matthew Horan rebutted what they declare are three key misguided findings in Wright’s order. One was that the unique RVR software was inside 3,000 ft of a college, which might violate MMC guidelines for a cultivation heart. The unique location was inside 2,400 ft of the Sebastian County Juvenile Detention Heart.

“There isn’t a proof wherever that the detention heart is operated by a public college facility,” Horan famous, including that the Arkansas Division of Training issued a letter saying the juvenile facility was not a college.

Chandler pushed again a couple of instances throughout Monday’s listening to, reminding Horan and Nolan that the listening to was solely about their license and never a venue to rehear the courtroom case.

Hardin mentioned Nolan might enchantment Chandler’s administrative choice, which might halt the license revocation and ship the matter to a listening to earlier than the complete board of the Arkansas Alcoholic Beverage Management. The following listening to for that board is Dec. 21.

Nolan and his attorneys have appealed the Pulaski County Circuit Courtroom ruling to the Arkansas Supreme Courtroom.

‘River Valley Aid Cultivation has appealed the Pulaski Circuit Courtroom choice to the Arkansas Supreme Courtroom. RVRC has requested that proceedings be stayed till the enchantment is heard. We await the choice of the Supreme Courtroom,” Nolan mentioned in an announcement to Speak Enterprise & Politics.

RVR has about 75 workers, and firm homeowners have invested “greater than $8 million” into the licensing and operation of the cultivation heart. It stays unclear the standing of product processed by RVR previous to the formal license revocation.