Several Mid-Missouri applicants were included when the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services issued licenses for medical marijuana cultivation facilities Thursday afternoon.
The state is required to issue 60 licenses. Three Mid-Missouri applicants were approved for licenses. Four applications with sites tied to Jefferson City were denied, while 24 other Mid-Missouri applications were denied.
DHSS used a blind scoring system to rank the applicants. Holistic Missouri LLC, out of Sunrise Beach, was fourth-ranked in the process. The company intends to place a cultivation facility at 14541 N. Missouri 5.
Also scoring high was BTMD Holdings LLC, of Gravois Mills, which applied to license a facility at 28744 Missouri 5.
Hippos LLC, in Vienna, will create a facility at 247 Route V. Two more Hippos LLC site in Vienna, at the same address, were denied.
Among the 500 applications that were denied where three from Columbia Care MO LLC, which applied to create three facilities in Jefferson City, at 207 Militia Drive, on property owned by Leon G. Vanderfeltz Dairy Farm LLC, near Jefferson City Correctional Center.
Another applicant for Jefferson City that was denied was from 7 Point Farms LLC, which hoped to install three cultivation facilities in the 6600 block of Julia Drive.
Other area applicants who were denied cultivation licenses were:
Show-Me Relief Inc., of Mexico, which intended to place a cultivation facility at 25498 Audrain Road.
Como Health applied for a site on Lindberg Drive in Columbia.
MOAZ Industries LLC applied for a site at 24 Putt N Bay Drive Sunrise Beach.
MoCanCure II LLC applied for several locations, including one in Ashland, at Ashland Industrial Park.
KKFC LLC applied for a site at 1530 County Road 256 in Columbia.
Canvas Medical Dispensary LLC applied for a site at 3491 Lahmeyer Road in Bland.
Missouri Grown ReLeaf LLC applied for a site at 25 Castlewood Road in Eldon.
Kind Enterprises LLC applied for three sites in the 3100 block of Wright Road in Owensville.
Missouri Cann Crush, LLC applied for a site at 5301 Paris Road in Columbia.
Northern Roots LLC applied for a site at 14 Allen Road in Eldon.
Seven Points Agro-Therapeutics Mo applied for a site at 30894 in Gravois Mills.
Seven Points Agro-Therapeutics Mo applied for a site at 2416 Route J in Osage Beach.
Seven Points Agro-Therapeutics Mo applied for a site at 8645 County Road 349 in New Bloomfield.
Missouri Delta Cannabis Company LLC applied for a site at 877 State Road TT in Sunrise Beach.
Western Edge Productions 1 LLC applied for a site at 1175 Industrial Drive in Eldon.
Robust Missouri Cultivation 1 LLC applied for a site in Columbia.
MO Green LLC and Elemental MOC LLC each applied for sites at at 5151 State Road J in Fulton.
Tranquil Acres, Inc. applied for a site at 22461 Maries County Road 417 in Belle.
MediMO LLC applied for a site on County Road 101 in Callaway County.
ACME Farms, LLC applied for a site at 705 E. Fifth St., in Eldon.
Fees for the applications were $10,000 each and nonrefundable. By Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services rules, those entities who receive their cultivation facility licenses must pay their annual fees within 30 days of issuance of their license. For each of those 60 applicants, that's $25,000 ($1.5 million total).
DHSS increased the response window for notifications from a proposed period of 48 hours to five days to accommodate recipients who may not immediately be available, according to Lisa Cox, the agency's public information officer.
The DHSS has received 554 applications (and $6,367,901.02 in fees for cultivation facilities applications). The explanation for the odd count on fees received, Cox said, is a number of people sent in incomplete applications and partial payments.
The 60 facilities being licensed are the top-scoring facilities that meet all eligibility requirements. DHSS used a scorer with no access to applicants' identifying information, who scored the applications using a process in which the evaluator rated the applications without knowing to whom the applications were attached.
Cultivation facilities may cultivate medical marijuana indoors, outdoors or in greenhouses.
Any indoor facility using artificial lighting is limited to no more than 30,000 square feet of flowering plant canopy space.
Outdoor facilities using natural light are limited to 2,800 flowering plants.
Greenhouses that use natural and artificial lighting are limited to either no more than 2,800 flowering plants or no more than 30,000 square feet of flowering plant canopy.
Facilities must record all pesticides, herbicides, fertilizers and other agricultural chemicals applied to the plants or soil and retain the records for at least five years.
Facilities, except those in rural, unincorporated agricultural areas, must develop and maintain an odor control plan.
Cultivation facilities may not transfer medical marijuana, except to a testing facility, until the crop has been tested by a testing facility.
Once approval notifications have been sent, notifications of application denials will be issued as well, according to the release.
The department expects to have all the approval and denial notifications issued by the end of the week. DHSS was to post the final rank/score of all medical marijuana cultivation facility applicants to its website this week, after all the notifications were issued.