The application window for Nevada consumption Lounges opens on the 14th of October, 2022. The state will then start accepting applications for businesses seeking licenses to open and operate marijuana consumption lounges.
The Nevada Cannabis Compliance Board stated that the application window – the 14th of October to the 27th of October 2022 – will be the only opportunity businesses will have to apply for the licenses.
Nevada expects to issue as many as 45 licenses to the owners of cannabis retail stores and up to 20 permits for stand-alone lounges.
Half of the stand-alone licenses are reserved for current social equity applicants, negatively affected by the war on drugs before the state legalized the drug in 2017. This means new businesses will have to fight for the remaining ten licenses.
Every dispensary which meets the current requirements for a cannabis lounge is expected to get a state license. The independent licenses are limited, and applicants who apply for these licenses will be placed into a random-number generator that will function as a randomized lottery system.
“This is the first open application period for marijuana licenses in Nevada since 2018, and will provide an opportunity for new business models and an increase in diverse ownership within Nevada’s legal cannabis industry,” the Nevada compliance board spokeswoman Tiana Bohner, wrote in her statement. “This will be the first time licenses will be awarded to social equity applicants, furthering the state of Nevada’s commitment to ensuring an equitable and inclusive cannabis marketplace.”
Once the application period has been closed, the state of Nevada will be one step closer to allowing legal, public consumption of marijuana since the state lawmakers legalized the lounges during the 2021 legislative session. Cannabis is currently legal, but the general public’s use of cannabis was not allowed until state lawmakers legalized lounges.
The next step for the state of Nevada is licensing at the local and municipal levels. This will allow municipalities to strengthen their state policies and economies.
The regulations for the upcoming licensing were agreed to after 15 public meetings. They aimed to develop policies on new business types.
Much of the conversation around lounges in 2021 centered on the ideological value that the new licenses could somehow compensate for historically harsh laws against cannabis and help to lower the barriers of entry into the cannabis industry currently marketed for the wealthy. The executive director of the Cannabis Compliance Board, Tyler Klimas, had the following.
“The current licenses have to be viewed as the first step forward. If we are trying to address the errors of drug policies over the last ten years, then all of that trauma and wrong is to satisfy the trauma with just 10 consumption lounge licenses set aside for social equity applicants.”
A’Esha Goins, the executive director of the Cannabis Equity and Inclusion Community, stated that she didn’t believe that the licenses provide real ownership opportunities for the social equity applicants, “It would seem that the Cannabis Compliance Board is very intentional about inclusion, yet the policy and licensing continues to handicap and block a large number of people.”
Nye County Commission voted to allow the creation and implementation of cannabis lounges in October 2021, with county commissioner Donna Cox’s only dissenting vote. Pahrump County currently has two legal cannabis dispensaries, and another dispensary opened this summer in Esmeralda County near Tonopah. The area could see as many as three additional cannabis lounges depending on the pending regulations.
Commissioner Leo Blundo explained in October 2021 at a commission meeting, “We’ll have to see what the Cannabis Control Board is going to allow us to have begun with. The way I understood it was, businesses would be eligible for one of these licenses per dispensary. We are looking at two, and we’ve already requested a third license in an area outside of Pahrump.”
The application fees set out by Nevada state are nonrefundable and are set at $100,000 for dispensaries, $10,000 for independent applicants, and $2,500 for social equity applicants.
This licensing round is the only round currently planned by the state of Nevada. Issuing additional licenses would be dependent on changes to state law.
Enjoyed that first hit? Come chill with us every week at the Friday Sesh for a freshly packed bowl of the week’s best cannabis news!
