Could be located in Hanging Rock

The state of Ohio announced its second round of provisional Level I medical marijuana cultivation licenses, and Lawrence County is one of 13 places listed that might get a 25,000 square foot facility.

The Ohio Department of Commerce’s Medical Marijuana grants the licenses Control Program, and it announced on Thursday that 13 provisional licenses had been issued to 12 companies.

Harvest Grows LLC was granted two provisional licenses, one for Lawrence County and one for Cuyahoga County. But the company can only use of one of the licenses and has 10 days to decide where to locate their facility.

In June, Harvest Grows LLC signed a deal with the Lawrence County Economic Development Corp. to lease two parcels of land on County Road 1A in Hanging Rock. If the company decides to put a facility there, they would purchase a building.

The rural location may have been chosen because of state law that requires cultivation facilities cannot be located within 500 feet of a school, church, public library, playground or park.

In the application process, the company had to file extensive background information with the state, including the background of the people involved, security information and how they would grow the marijuana plants and disposal of plants.

Harvest Grows LLC filed articles of organization in Ohio in June 2017 by a Stephen White of Tempe, Arizona. The Ohio company is based in Cleveland. The company had to submit a $20,000 non-refundable application fee to be considered for a Level I license.

In all, 109 companies applied for the 12 Level I licenses.

In 2016, the Ohio Legislature passed a bill that would allow doctors to prescribe medical marijuana for qualifying medical conditions and for the Department of Commerce to issue licenses to medical marijuana cultivators, processors, and testing laboratories. It still prohibits people to raise marijuana for personal use.