Marijuana dispensary considers lawsuit over delayed opening
Frustrated by what they call arbitrary actions by Clark County officials that have delayed their opening, the owners of a medical marijuana dispensary are considering legal action.
Euphoria Wellness has been ready to open its doors since February. But due in part to repeated clashes with the county, it has not been able to get enough marijuana to sell.
"All we're seeing from the county now are delays and delays and delays," said Maggie McLetchie, a lawyer for Euphoria.
The county issued the dispensary a temporary business license that says it "will only acquire product from cultivation or production facilities that have obtained" state registration and a local business license.
The clause conflicts with state law, which allows a dispensary to buy marijuana from patients, then re-sell it. Euphoria long planned to use patient-grown medicine when it first opened, switching to commercially grown crops once they were ready.
The county would not make anyone from the Department of Business License available for an interview despite nearly two weeks’ worth of requests. In a prepared statement, county spokesman Dan Kulin said the clause was included in the license because Euphoria officials had said they would only buy plants from commercial growers.
But McLetchie said the county would not issue the business license until Euphoria made that promise. She said the dispensary has repeatedly told the county it wants to buy from patients.
Euphoria even offered to have patients donate marijuana rather than sell it, McLetchie said, but the county would not allow that, either.
The county's reasoning: Euphoria can't buy from patients because its business license doesn't allow it. McLetchie called the reasoning "circular" and said it amounts to "Because we said so."
Other issues, including the state’s pesticide rules, also have contributed to delays in getting the legal marijuana industry off the ground.
But McLetchie, who also represents the Review-Journal in public records issues, said the county's overstepping its bounds has become the major hurdle. The state oversees medical marijuana and decided which dispensaries to allow, while counties and cities are supposed to make sure the businesses comply with local zoning rules.
Euphoria also has argued with the county over interpretation of a law limiting home-growers to possessing 2.5 ounces at a time.
The county has said the clause means a dispensary can only buy 2.5 ounces from a patient. People in the marijuana industry say that limit would make marijuana prohibitively expensive to test and would make it impossible for shops to gather enough to open.
State Sen. Tick Segerblom, D-Las Vegas, who sponsored the law that allowed dispensaries, said legislators' intent was that a home-grower could sell up to a pound to a dispensary. Segerblom said such gray areas in the law have been interpreted overly strictly, with regulators seeming to lose sight of the purpose of the law.
Euphoria has long planned to be the first dispensary in Nevada to open, for reasons both competitive and symbolic. It hired workers and held a public tour in March.
But those workers were laid off weeks ago as the opening date remained in limbo, dispensary spokesman Jim Ferrence said.
McLetchie said the county's unfair treatment was highlighted when county officials came along during the final inspection before Euphoria got its state registration. While a state inspector went down a checklist of objective criteria, McLetchie said, the county officials were "making things up, frankly."
For example, McLetchie said, the dispensary was told to only put out two of each type of pipe or similar device because a county commissioner didn’t like how a display looked.
Now Euphoria is considering going to court to ask a judge to rule some of the county’s actions illegal. But McLetchie said she hopes the county will change its mind first.
She added: "The delays and litigation, they don't serve anybody."
Contact Eric Hartley at ehartley@reviewjournal.com or 702-550-9229. Find him on Twitter: @ethartley
