Leading MMB Attorney, Ron Durbin is urging formation of cooperative associations for growers, processors, & dispensaries. He expressed those sentiments last night at the Oklahoma Legislative Town Hall on Marijuana Policy.
  Durbin says that these business entities are not represented at the capitol and the result is bad laws & rules, which end up costing businesses more than what an effective lobbyist would cost.
 Perhaps a statewide association is more than what could be built in a cooperative format, but county associations are certainly doable in a workable format. Dispensaries may want to also form in a similar manner, especially in the bigger cities.  A series of local developments like this would easily foster better cooperative relationships with county and city officials. Agencies tasked with implementing state policy can then call together the members of the voluntary business associations and discuss what's coming, or inquire what adjustments the industry members want the county commissioners to consider.

  The Oklahoma Medical Marijuana Authority (OMMA) is now solidly under new management of Travis Kirkpatrick. In the fall of 2019, the entire Oklahoma Health Dept. faced yet another change in leadership when Tom Bates left to seek a different appointment from Governor Stitt. 
  SoonerPolitics was at the State Health Dept. when more than 100 cannabis patients held a protest of the intransigent silence of both Bates and his former director of the OMMA.
  But within weeks the new leadership reached out to industry advocates and legal experts seeking to make sense of the hastily-implemented new rules.
  This came at a time when all the licensed medical marijuana businesses (MMBs) were required to comply with rules they had no way of attaining compliance in.
  The new leadership of the OMMA, under the interim directorship of Travis Kirkpatrick; granted grace periods, but the monthly reporting of the OMMA began to show radical decreases in MMB licenses. Those growers, processors, & dispensaries seeking county documents (which didn't exist in most counties), were spending massive funds in legal services just to make their best showing of good faith to comply with the nuttiness at the OMMA.
  But now the new director seems to have nearly all of the MMB application backlog resolved. Only about 600 incompleted applications are in the system.