ATLANTA — Protest hearings have caused the Georgia Access to Medical Cannabis Commission to surpass its approved budget, according to the commission’s executive director.

Andrew Turnage, who became executive director in May 2020, appeared before the House Appropriations General Government Subcommittee Jan. 20 to present an amended budget request for the current fiscal year.

Gov. Brian Kemp had authorized $150,000 in emergency funding to the commission in the previous budget year which ended in June.

“Our protest proceedings continued on into the current fiscal year,” Turnage said. “Our projections is that we will be in excess of $115,000 over budget. We did request $1.2 million in our budget submission but we were funded at $908,000. So this makes our budget for amended Fiscal Year 2023 whole again to cover those administrative hearing costs.”

The hearing costs are the result of 69 applications received by??? the commission to operate in the medical cannabis industry in Georgia, but by statute, the commission was only allowed to award six licenses to produce, sell and/or transport low-THC products.  

“I think you can surmise that there are a lot more unhappy parties than happy parties in that equation,” Turnage said. “There were a number of entities that protested in that process and we conducted pre-hearings for those.”

Two of the six licenses have officially been issued amid lawsuits for some of the unsuccessful candidates: one to Botanical Sciences LLC in Glennville and Trulieve in Adel— both in South Georgia. Trulieve has announced plans to initially operate medical cannabis dispensaries in Macon, Marietta, Newnan and Pooler.

As part of the request for proposals process, Turnage said all applicants have the right to due process built into the RFP to protest the awarding of any contract.

“Since these licenses are treated as a contract by the language of the law, we were required to conduct a post award protest process,” he said. “In this case, the hearings were all conducted and Judge (Stephanie Howells) ruled in favor of the commission’s evaluation results as the final decisions for all of the protests that were conducted.”

With pending lawsuits alleging the commission’s decision-making process may have been unfair and inconsistent in scoring, a Fulton County judge is expected to make a decision on whether to side with the Georgia First Amendment Foundation’s request to unseal documents related to applications for medical cannabis licenses. 

“Our interest is in preserving the integrity of the judicial process and the public’s ability to access those records,” said Joy Ramsingh, an attorney for GFAF during a Jan. 6 hearing. “… We’re talking about the production and licensing of a controlled substance that’s going to affect tens of thousands of Georgia patients, that affects the taxpayers, billions of dollars of lucrative government contracts.”

The commission conducted a proposed rules hearing this week and intends to vote to adopt them at a public meeting Jan. 25. The rules address requirements and policies for medical marijuana facilities and operations. The proposed rules and meeting information can be found at www.gmcc.ga.gov/rules-georgia-law/commission-rules.