PANAMA CITY BEACH — If voters approve an amendment this fall to legalize medical marijuana for qualified patients, Bay County business owner Bob Brown believes he could be a “good fit” for the budding industry.
Brown is one of many Florida entrepreneurs to register a new company with the state this spring in anticipation of the November election. However, when asked about future business plans for his “Marijuana Dispensary and Wellness Center of Northwest Florida,” Brown said he’s not holding his breath.
“It’s so early now; it’s so speculative,” said Brown, the owner of Panama City Beach electronic cigarette shop Dr. Vape It. “At this point, other than getting educated on it, I can’t see anyone putting money behind this.”
Even if the amendment does become state law, which requires 60 percent of voters to approve, how the drug would be regulated is not decided. Of the 23 U.S. states, including the District of Columbia, that have legalized medical marijuana, each regulates it differently.
“For me, it’s such a big question mark, because you don’t know yet,” Brown said. “If you look at the states that have already passed medical marijuana legislation, they’re all over the place.”
Florida’s amendment also leaves things open-ended.
The ballot text states the amendment would allow for medical use of marijuana for those with “debilitating diseases as determined by a licensed Florida physician,” and it tasks the state Department of Health (DOH) with issuing patient and caregiver identification cards and regulating distribution centers.
The DOH already has gotten somewhat of a jump-start, as officials work to craft rules for regulating the noneuphoric “Charlotte’s Web” strain of marijuana, made legal to families with sick children through a bill Gov. Rick Scott signed earlier this year.
But the Charlotte’s Web legislation opens up just a tiny slice of the medical marijuana market.
Approval of Amendment 2 this November would create a much broader business opportunity in the state, but Brown does not expect many to get rich from it.
“Depending on how the regulations are set up, I don’t think people are going to get rich from medical marijuana,” he said. “If you look at what the other states have done, if it’s regulated property, you can run a decent business, but you’re not going to become wealthy doing it.”
For Brown and his wife, a nurse, the goal is to help people.
“My wife and I feel like we’re a good fit for something like this,” he said. “I’ve got a lot of long-term business experience, I’ve been a CPA, I’ve been in corporate America for a long time, and my wife’s a nurse.”
“I think it’s an opportunity to help people; it’s an opportunity to be involved with giving an alternative form of medicine, if you will. For medical marijuana, I don’t see the harm quite honestly, as long as you regulate it well.”