Cannabis Business in a Pandemic

At Loney Law Group our clients remain our priority and most important resource. Amid this current coronavirus pandemic, our goal, to you our clients, is to provide as much flexibility and safety as possible when working with us. As you are doing, we are making sure our employees stay safe and can continue to serve our clients. We continue to take extra cleaning measures in an effort to maintain a safe office for our staff.

If you have questions as to how the coronavirus affects your business and employees, we are here to help.

We continue to be a full-service law firm. Our offices remain open and we are scheduling appointments and client meetings by phone or virtually via Zoom or Skype.  Virtual meetings enable us to reach out and still personally connect, review your unique circumstances and evaluate your needs without delaying your planning objectives.

For those of our clients in the cannabis industry, we will continue to advocate with our state officials that the cannabis industry not be left behind when it comes governmental rules for businesses during this time.

The Oregon Liquor Control Commission (OLCC) has published a web page for updates on the Corona pandemic titled COVID-19 Business Continuity Information on their website at : https://www.oregon.gov/olcc/Pages/COVID19.aspx

One change announced by the OLCC to help during this time are less strict Marijuana Worker Permit requirements. If a person does not have an active Worker Permit, they can still work at a Licensee if they have taken the marijuana worker permit test and submitted their marijuana worker permit application in the NIC/OLCC system prior to working for an OLCC recreational marijuana licensed business.  This change is effective immediately and is set to expire April 30, 2020.

The second change allows licensed marijuana retailers to conduct limited transactions outside their licensed premises. The action will permit retail licensees to take orders and deliver product from the retail store to a person who is outside of the store and within 150 feet of the retailer’s licensed premises.

The third change increases the amount of flower that OMMP cardholders and caregivers can purchase to 24 ounces per day and no more than 32 ounces per month. This change temporarily increases the daily purchase limit for OMMP cardholders to match their personal possession limit. This rule does not change the total monthly amount a cardholder or caregiver is currently permitted to purchase from an OLCC-licensed retailer.

We will continue to monitor the impact of COVID-19 and adjust our safety measures as needed to ensure that we continue to offer you, our client, the best legal services.  We will continue to monitor guidance from State and Federal officials to ensure the safety of our employees, customers and community.  In the meantime, you can access these links to find the latest updates and tips including social distancing and smart sanitation /disinfection practices at:

https://www.cdc.gov or  https://www.oregon.gov/oha/Pages/index.aspx.

Sincerely,
Loney Law Group