Collier County to decide whether to allow medical pot dispensaries

NAPLES, Fla. A vote Tuesday could soon make medical marijuana available in Collier County.

Collier County commissioners will decide whether to lift a ban on medical marijuana dispensaries. That temporary moratorium was enacted shortly after the November passage of a Florida constitutional amendment legalizing broad medical use of the drug statewide.

The county was one of several municipalities that instituted bans awaiting a set of regulations from the state. Gov. Rick Scott signed a bill last month outlining how patients can qualify and receive medical marijuana.

Still, the manager of a website that links qualifying medical marijuana patients with licensed physicians around the state is skeptical commissioners will end the ban Tuesday.

The county is slow to change, My Florida Green Manager Nick Garulay believes, though he’d like to see commissioners prove him wrong.

“There’s no reason why the sick or debilitated patients that live here shouldn’t have access to medicine,” Garulay said. “We’re talking about a plant that grows out of the ground. A plant.”

If the ban is lifted, the county will have to treat medical marijuana dispensaries as pharmacies, meaning they can’t put any restrictions on them, aside from limiting them from opening within 500 feet of schools.