Despite a proposition (64, the Adult Use of Marijuana Act) passed in November 2016 and legislation (The Medicinal and Adult-Use Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act) passed in June 2017, the governor and Legislature continue to find a need to ensure these laws are appropriately and safely implemented.
The latest fix, Assembly Bill 106, was passed and signed just two weeks ago. This bill assures that the Bureau of Cannabis Control, the Department of Food and Agriculture, and the Department of Public Health may obtain and receive, at their discretion, criminal history information for an applicant for any state license under MAUCRSA.
These three agencies are charged with issuing licenses for any commercial action involving cannabis, not only sales and growing, but distribution and testing.
Sources for this information are the California Department of Justice and the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation.
The state Department of Justice will compile the requests and forward them to the FBI and review the returned information and submit it to the requesting agency.
The bill also provides $10.7 million to the CDFA to supply proprietary plant and package radio-frequency identification tags to be used by licensees to track cannabis and cannabis-related products.