Cannabis growers face hurdle

Growing medical marijuana in New Mexico could get more expensive.
Proposed changes to the Department of Health program could raise the nonprofit cannabis producer application fee from $100 to $1,000 and impose an annual fee that increases $10,000 with each year of operation.

Len Goodman, NewMexiCann executive director, said high dues would cripple New Mexico producers. He estimates 50 percent of licensed producers will likely be unable to pay fees in two years.

“There are two problems with the fee: One is that it is fixed, and the other is that it is high,” he said. “You put those two things together you have a problem. Most producers in the state do not have that kind of capital and can’t expand to be able to handle it.”

Chris Minnick, NMDOH spokesman, said the medical marijuana program is housed and funded through Infectious Disease Bureau and is looking to improve the state’s medical marijuana program by increasing fees.  

“For the program to continue to grow as it has, the cost of operating the program will go up,” he said. “This is a really critical program for the Department of Health, so these fees were looked at based on what the nonprofits could conceivably be able to pay for the operations for the facility.”

NMDOH Cabinet Secretary Dr. Alfredo Vigil hasn’t announced a decision about proposed changes, but public comments are welcomed.

Goodman said the DOH is understaffed, but it does not need the $7,000-$8,000 of revenue it will gain from proposed fees.
“Nobody has seen a proposed budget,” he said. “All we know is it is going to be used for staffing, but we have not seen a complete breakdown.”

Minnick said running the program effectively requires staff regulation.
“When it comes to managing the nonprofit system, the department is responsible for ensuring that the nonprofits are following the letter of the law,” he said.

David White, of Southwest Organic Producers, said the smaller-scale producers are necessary to serve the state. He said the DOH looked at several proposal drafts, and there are other ways to secure funding.
“New Mexico has a very interesting psychographic makeup,” he said. “We’ve got small pockets of people all over the place, so a small producer in northeast New Mexico that only has 12 patients but serves a whole community area doesn’t need to have that a large-scale operation to serve those people. They can’t afford to pay that much if that’s all the patients they are serving.”

Geoff St. John, member of UNM’s Students for Sensible Drug Policy chapter, said the Department of Health needs more funding and staff to make sure policies are followed.

“There are pretty strict regulations they set up for medical cannabis programs already as far as how you are housing your plants, how many you can have — and you can’t be visible from the street or anything,” he said. “The reason behind having so many barriers behind getting a license is they don’t want to set people up to fail.”

White said there are not enough producers to meet state demands, and imposing the fee would eliminate more.

“It’s either allow the producers that we have to grow more plants or approve a lot more producers immediately,” he said. “All we can do is just sit and wait and see what the director says.”