Experience
Assisted Client with Business Development
As medical marijuana is a relatively new and evolving health care modality, clinical resources and data remains scarce. We advised a cannabis start-up company focused on developing knowledge and aggregating the best data and information to provide patient education services, therapeutic product selection, and guidance regarding dispensary offerings. This company’s goal is to help medical marijuana patients find the best product to treat their individual and unique health conditions. We assisted the company with everything from business plan development, corporate governance, regulatory implications, and telehealth compliance.
Counseled Client through Licensure Process
After securing a provisional license to cultivate medicinal cannabis, our client sought to amend its original application plans after a local industrial park association retracted prior structural approval for facility plans. The Ohio Department of Commerce rejected proposed amendments to the applicant’s facility plans and moved to revoke the client’s provisional license. We negotiated with the association and the department and resolved the matter through revised structural plans that satisfied association bylaws, as well as other corrective actions and remedies approved by the department by way of a consent agreement and dismissal of the proposed revocation action. The client has since been granted a full license to cultivate and is successfully operating in northeast Ohio.
Counseled Treatment Center through Investigation
On behalf of a multi-office Ohio addiction treatment center, we handled the fraud and abuse investigation and subsequent negotiations with federal authorities who were reviewing the client’s receipt of free drug screening equipment from one of the largest laboratories in the country. We successfully persuaded the United States Department of Justice to decline bringing criminal or civil charges, and the matter was eventually resolved with minor civil penalties paid to the United States Department of Health and Human Services / Office of Inspector General and avoidance of any administrative sanctions, including exclusion from participation in public health programs.
Counseled Health Care System on Medical Marijuana Guidelines
On behalf of a hospital system and its employed physicians, we prepared various informed consent forms, internal policies, and procedural manuals for use by licensed providers who have obtained a Certificate to Recommend Medical Marijuana from the State Medical Board of Ohio and are seeking to utilize medical marijuana as a potential treatment modality. We also advised the hospital system on navigating state and federal guidelines and avoidance of potential compliance issues and violations.
Counseled Cultivator with Application
Our client, a marijuana cultivator applicant, submitted an application to the Ohio Department of Commerce seeking a provisional license to cultivate medicinal cannabis. The application process is extensive and applicants are graded against one another, with the top 12 companies selected for licensure. Despite scoring higher than six of the 12 companies granted licensure, the department notified our client it was proposing denying its application due to alleged deficiencies in its proposed security plan – one of five operational plans each applicant must satisfy. Through the administrative hearing process, we were able to demonstrate that a higher, corrected score for the security plan section was warranted, leading the department to reverse the proposed denial and instead grant our client’s application. This case represented the first successful administrative appeal by an applicant seeking a provisional cultivator’s license as a result of challenging its original score issued by the department.