VERMILLION – A Rapid City medical marijuana dispensary wants help from the state Supreme Court in obtaining a license for another location.
The state Department of Health wants the business to pay another $5,000 fee and complete another application. The department also says the business should have taken the dispute to an administrative hearing before making its case in a courtroom.
The state’s high court heard arguments on the issue Tuesday in Vermillion at the University of South Dakota Knudson School of Law.
The health department appealed a circuit court’s ruling in favor of Puffy’s , which operates two dispensaries in Rapid City but would like to open six more. Puffy’s also has a dispensary in Sturgis.
Rapid City’s medical pot rules allow for 15 dispensaries. But the city got 47 applications for those slots in 2021.
The health department stepped in to help the city decide which business would get licenses through a lottery system. That’s the framework written into state law for situations when dispensary applications exceed the number of dispensaries a local government allows.