Two of our lawyers from our Chicago office attended the Illinois Medical Cannabis Pilot Program Town Hall Meeting in Chicago yesterday. This is a report from that Town Hall meeting. More than 500 people were in attendance and many questions were asked of government officials from the Illinois state agencies relevant to Illinois’s pilot
Yesterday, Chicago’s city council enacted a zoning ordinance to regulate medical marijuana dispensaries within the city. That ordinance essentially makes most business and commercial strips fair game for a dispensary, so long as the dispensary also complies with the state law requirement that it be at least 1,000 feet away from a school or day
As we gear up for Illinois’ legalization of medical marijuana we are confronting ambiguities and uncertainties about what Illinois’ medical marijuana regime will look like once it actually starts. Even what will constitute legal medical marijuana is not yet entirely clear. Illinois’ new medical marijuana laws will require medical marijuana patients (1) have a bona-fide physician-patient relationship and
As the Illinois General Assembly’s spring session drew to a close last week, its members passed a small, but not insignificant amendment tolastyear’s HB 0001 (a/k/a the Compassionate Use of Medical Cannabis Pilot Program Act). Senate Bill 2636 makes two important changes: it adds seizure conditions (epilepsy) to the list of “debilitating medical conditions”
Entrepreneurs rejoice. Crain’s Chicago Business reported last week that the state of Illinois is expecting 75,000 to 100,000 applicants for medical marijuana patient permits in the first year of its medical marijuana pilot program. With that many patients spread across only 22 cultivation centers and 60 dispensaries around the state, and the fact that each
A case currently working its way through the Colorado courts could have real implications for all states with legalized medical (or recreational) marijuana. Coats v. Dish Network addresses the complex intersection of anti-discrimination law, privacy rights, and legalized (often medical) marijuana in an employment context. Plaintiff Coats, a licensed medical marijuana user under Colorado’s Medical Marijuana
On the heels of Colorado and Washington legalizing recreational marijuana, several other states, including Alaska and New Hampshire, are starting to consider whether their own laws prohibiting the substance should have an expiration date. There is now reason to hope legalization might not be too far away in Illinois either. The Chicago Tribune reports (see also
The most detailed of the draft rules and regulations released by Illinois state agencies administering the state’s Compassionate Use of Medical Cannabis Pilot Program come from the Department of Agriculture, which oversees cultivation centers. So it is fitting that some of the finer changes in the latest draft of rules and regulations came from Ag.
Newly revised versions of the rules and regulations for implementation of Illinois’ Compassionate Use of Medical Cannabis Pilot Program were released yesterday. You can review them all here. These drafts reflect comments submitted by the public after the rules’ initial release in late January and early February. This post addresses revisions to the Department of
Over the past six months we have fielded dozens of calls (and emails) from people looking to get into Illinois’ MMJ scene, ranging from the mildly curious to the serious, well-heeled entrepreneur complete with an incorporated entity and investors in hand. But no matter who is on the other end of the line, certain questions
