Washington’s Marijuana Regulators Pick Retail License Finalists

Today the Washington State Liquor Control
Board (LCB), which has received more than 2,100 applications for
the 334 marijuana retailer licenses it plans to award, posted
the results of the lotteries it conducted to winnow down the list
for each locality. The applicants with the lowest lottery numbers
will be first in line for licenses, assuming they pass muster with
the state. In Seattle, for instance, the LCB ranked 58 applicants
(out of more than 400) by lottery. Since it plans to license 21
stores in Seattle, the 21 applicants with the lowest numbers will
receive licenses if they meet the state’s requirements. If any of
them don’t, applicants further down the list
will have a chance.

Licensees will also need local approval before they can open
stores. Nearly 100 cities and counties have imposed
temporary or permanent bans on marijuana businesses. Washington
Attorney General Bob Ferguson
says those bans are permitted by I-502, the state’s
legalization measure. The jurisdictions with bans include Yakima,
where the LCB nevertheless picked seven finalists for five
licenses, and Walla Walla, where three finalists are vying for two
licenses that won’t be worth much. Fifty or so local governments,
including Seattle, Spokane, and Tacoma, have approved
interim or permanent zoning rules for cannabusinesses.

One of the retail license finalists is Scott O’Neill, manager of
Pacific Northwest Medical, a dispensary in Spokane owned by Sean
Green, who
received Washington’s first marijuana cultivation license in
March. O’Neill ranks eighth on the lottery list for Spokane, which
had been allotted eight cannabis outlets. He hopes to open a store
at at 1919 East Francis Avenue, which is also the home of
Green’s Kouchlock Productions. The Spokane Spokesman
Review reports
that O’Neil “hopes to open the store by July if he can secure
marijuana from growers who are slowly being licensed.” So far the
LCB, which received more than 2,800 applications for cultivation
licenses, has awarded 25. The LCB
plans to “begin issuing retail licenses no later than the first
week of July.” As O’Neill tells The Spokesman Review, “The
big question in the beginning is going to be getting product on the
shelves.”