June 17, 2022Friends & Allies, I am writing because House Bill 2050 is in danger. This bill would strengthen our testing program, waive the state licensing fee for many veterans to receive medical marijuana cards, quickly expand rural access to medical marijuana, and give legitimate social equity licensees like Alicia Deals a fair chance to compete and help their communities. More specifically, the bill would create a secret shopper program to hold labs and dispensaries accountable, provide whistleblower protections to dispensary employees, require laboratories to send lab reports to the Department of Health Services within five days, and mandate that QR codes linked to lab reports are available on product packaging. It would also even the playing field for social equity licensees by giving them a medical marijuana license. This will smooth licensees’ path to zoning approval, in addition to evening the playing field with established dispensaries, who receive roughly half of their revenue from medical marijuana sales. On Tuesday, this bill sailed through the Senate with broad bipartisan support and 25/30 senators voting YES. However, in the time since, some multi-state-operators like Trulieve have launched a concerted effort to spread lies about the bill in a desperate attempt to thwart legitimate social equity licensees and gobble up more licenses for themselves. We cannot let this stand. Veterans, patients, and adult-use consumers need help, and they need help now. Please take (literally) one minute to send a pre-written letter to Democrats in the AZ House of Representatives so they know patients and consumers are watching. With Appreciation, Arizona NORML