Alabama Awards New Medical Cannabis Licenses

The Alabama Medical Cannabis Commission (AMMC) on Thursday voided all previously awarded licenses and awarded new ones, WPMI reports. The commission also outlined the errors in the scoring and evaluation of first round licensees which led to the awarding of new permits. 

The AMMC awarded five integrated facility licenses, seven cultivator licenses, four processor licenses, four dispensary licenses, and five secure transporter licenses.  

Applicants who were awarded a license now have 14 days to submit the appropriate license fee and any applicant who has been denied a license may seek an investigative hearing before the AMCC to seek reconsideration of the denial. 

The University of South Alabama was responsible for scoring the medical cannabis license applications but in June the AMCC paused issuing the licenses due to inconsistencies in scoring data tabulation. On Thursday, the AMCC outlined the errors which, according to a WBRC report, included:  

• A scorer hitting the “submit” button twice for one integrated license, which doubled their score and created errors in the average scores. 
• Evaluators incorrectly applying the wrong weight to every applicant score in all categories. 
• Scores in the processor category were sorted/averaged by the evaluator, not the applicant. 
• Quantitative and qualitative scores were inconsistent in all categories, forcing some scoring changes. 
• Data-entry errors: some evaluators mis-keyed the numbers and had to be contacted by email to give the correct data, and some of the data they gave was applied to the wrong applicant or not at all. 

The University of South Alabama says it fixed all of the errors and had independent accounting firm KMPG verify the new scoring data, and now is confident in the numbers it’s given the AMCC.