Ron Strider
Well-Known Member
The building nestled between a car dealership and a strip mall would be nondescript if not for the Kermit green trim.
Walk inside and a faint whiff reminiscent of college days tips you off to the real purpose of the facility in Woodbridge Township, N.J. Unlike in a dorm room, there is no smoke or furtive glance when unexpected visitors cut across the lobby.
From that point on, it’s all business, with people in lab coats waiting to assist patients, who are looking to treat their illnesses with medical marijuana.
Tight security takes visitors to a door that requires a retinal scan to open. That’s the first step toward what some might call paradise — a warm, bright room brimming with lush green plants that would be illegal in your backyard.
At the Garden State Dispensary, employees grow, dry and sell state-sanctioned medical marijuana to between 2,500 and 4,000 patients a month. The product, which can be smoked or inhaled as a vapor, is used to treat a range of ailments, from anxiety to pain to seizures. Soon, the dispensary also will extract chemicals from marijuana and use them in other products.
The facility, about 80 miles east of Allentown, opened on a busy commercial section of Route 1 in 2014, four years after New Jersey made medical marijuana legal. Principals with Franklin Labs — a Reading company that last month was awarded one of 12 Pennsylvania permits for medical marijuana growers and producers — operate the nonprofit that runs Garden State, according to Franklin’s website. While Franklin Labs, which will be in a former Pepsi distribution center, will only grow the plants, Garden State Dispensary is more of a one-stop-shop that serves as both a dispensary and growing operation.
Unlike in New Jersey, Pennsylvania won’t dispense medical marijuana where it is grown and it won’t produce it in smokable form — the chemicals will be extracted and turned into pills or topical solutions. A product that can be inhaled also may be produced, though not with the leaves or plant.
Despite the differences between the two states, to stroll through the New Jersey facility is to glimpse the potential for Pennsylvania’s future.
“When people see a large-scale commercial cannabis facility for first time, no matter what state it is located in, it gives them insight to how scientific and complicated the process is,” said Aaron Epstein, Garden State Dispensary’s general manager and general counsel, who will also serve as counsel to Franklin Labs. “Growing cannabis is not complicated. Growing at a pharmaceutical grade level of quality and consistency for thousands of patients is a different story.”
New patients at Garden State can tour the part of the facility where the plants are grown in about 10,000 square feet devoted to cultivation. Growers care for different strains of the plant, which carry names such as “Death Star,” “Bubba Berry,” “Sour Willie” and “Nigerian Haze,” each with varying levels of marijuana chemicals that affect the body differently.
Before entering any of the growing rooms, visitors are sprayed with a solution of tea tree oil, alcohol and water to kill any mold they might bring in.
A couple of weeks ago, they watched as workers trimmed the stalks and tied them to stakes and as they cut the dried plants, carefully setting aside the stems and leaves.
The plants aren’t grown from seeds, but rather from clippings of mother plants that are kept for six months to a year.
Grow manager Nick Vota plucked leaves that were blocking light from reaching buds and explained that a grower wants as much light to hit the plant as possible. That’s because the plants produce crystalline resins as a defense to harmful UV light, he said, and those resins or trichomes contain chemicals such as as THC and CBD that growers want in the plant.
In one room, young plants are kept under light 24/7 to prevent them from creating the hormone that leads to budding and flowering. After growing to the right size, they are moved to the flower room, where they spend half the day in darkness and half under the yellow light of high-pressure sodium bulbs that create a surreal golden glow. There, they blossom.
While a canopy of bushy greenery sprouts flowers and leaves, the bottoms of the stalks are kept trim and clean to allow air to flow through and prevent mildew from forming.
Plants are then dried for 10 to 14 days. Then, buds are carefully removed by hand and cured for a few weeks until they are ready to be sold.
The process will be a little different in the Reading facility, Pohlhaus said. It will have about four times more cultivation space than the one in New Jersey and more tasks, like irrigation, will be automated instead of performed by hand. Many of the details about the Reading facility, which has yet to be approved by the city, haven’t been finalized, but Polhaus said it will have only one entrance and employ a former state trooper for security.
He’s also hopeful that the facility will grow plants using aeroponics, a soil-free process in which water and nutrients are continuously sprayed on the roots, making the plant grow quicker and in higher yields.
Workers in Reading won’t need to be as careful about trimming leaves and other material from dried buds because Pennsylvania’s medical marijuana law, which was passed last year, requires cannabis to be more processed.
Polhaus said the plants will be chopped finely — like cinnamon — and put into an extraction machine that uses pressure to pull out the cannabinoids, elements with medicinal properties. The substance will come out as a brownish oil that will be refined further before it’s sold in a product at a dispensary.
Getting started
At Garden State Dispensary, new patients with prescriptions for marijuana sit down with a counselor for at least an hour to review the rules and talk about their lifestyles and conditions. That information is important because two patients with the same condition might use different strains of marijuana depending on whether, for example, one has to drive their children to school and the other stays home all day. Someone who’s not active might take a strain that has high amounts of THC, the psychoactive chemical in marijuana, while the parent who chauffeurs children might take a strain with high amounts of CBD, or cannabidiol, and little to no THC, getting an anti-anxiety quality
After the counseling session, patients are ready to buy from a sort of pharmacy counter. There, they can examine samples of different marijuana varieties before going home with a quarter or eighth of an ounce of the drug. New Jersey patients can take home up to 2 ounces per month. Reminiscent of a head shop, there’s also a selection of colorful glass pipes, vaporizers and other memorabilia for sale.
In southeastern Pennsylvania, which includes Philadelphia, Franklin Labs and Prime Wellness of Pennsylvania, also in Berks County, received the two growing and processing permits for the region. Franklin also applied for a dispensary permit, but was not among the 27 companies in the state that were awarded one last week.
In the 10-county region that includes the Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania Medical Solutions expects to open a facility in Scranton and Standard Farms plans to operate a warehouse in White Haven, Luzerne County.
On Thursday, the state Department of Health announced the first 27 companies to receive dispensary permits, including two in the Lehigh Valley: Mission Pennsylvania II, which will open a dispensary in Allentown; and GuadCo, which plans to open one in Bethlehem Township.
It is expected to take until 2018 before the first patient is able to walk out of a Pennsylvania dispensary with medical marijuana. To date, 29 states have approved the plant’s use to treat various conditions, contributing to an industry that, according to published reports, generated $6.7 billion in sales in North America last year and is projected to top $20 billion by 2021.
News Moderator: Ron Strider 420 MAGAZINE ®
Full Article: Breaking news around The Lehigh Valley - The Morning Call
Author: Michelle Merlin
Contact: Morning Call Staff Contact List - The Morning Call
Photo Credit: Harry Fisher
Website: Allentown, Lehigh Valley & Pennsylvania News - The Morning Call
Walk inside and a faint whiff reminiscent of college days tips you off to the real purpose of the facility in Woodbridge Township, N.J. Unlike in a dorm room, there is no smoke or furtive glance when unexpected visitors cut across the lobby.
From that point on, it’s all business, with people in lab coats waiting to assist patients, who are looking to treat their illnesses with medical marijuana.
Tight security takes visitors to a door that requires a retinal scan to open. That’s the first step toward what some might call paradise — a warm, bright room brimming with lush green plants that would be illegal in your backyard.
At the Garden State Dispensary, employees grow, dry and sell state-sanctioned medical marijuana to between 2,500 and 4,000 patients a month. The product, which can be smoked or inhaled as a vapor, is used to treat a range of ailments, from anxiety to pain to seizures. Soon, the dispensary also will extract chemicals from marijuana and use them in other products.
The facility, about 80 miles east of Allentown, opened on a busy commercial section of Route 1 in 2014, four years after New Jersey made medical marijuana legal. Principals with Franklin Labs — a Reading company that last month was awarded one of 12 Pennsylvania permits for medical marijuana growers and producers — operate the nonprofit that runs Garden State, according to Franklin’s website. While Franklin Labs, which will be in a former Pepsi distribution center, will only grow the plants, Garden State Dispensary is more of a one-stop-shop that serves as both a dispensary and growing operation.
Unlike in New Jersey, Pennsylvania won’t dispense medical marijuana where it is grown and it won’t produce it in smokable form — the chemicals will be extracted and turned into pills or topical solutions. A product that can be inhaled also may be produced, though not with the leaves or plant.
Despite the differences between the two states, to stroll through the New Jersey facility is to glimpse the potential for Pennsylvania’s future.
“When people see a large-scale commercial cannabis facility for first time, no matter what state it is located in, it gives them insight to how scientific and complicated the process is,” said Aaron Epstein, Garden State Dispensary’s general manager and general counsel, who will also serve as counsel to Franklin Labs. “Growing cannabis is not complicated. Growing at a pharmaceutical grade level of quality and consistency for thousands of patients is a different story.”
“Growing cannabis is not complicated. Growing at a pharmaceutical grade level of quality and consistency for thousands of patients is a different story.
— Aaron Epstein, Garden State Dispensary
The plant with the telltale green leaves is grown in neat rows in sterile rooms with regulated humidity and light. Once the plant is dried, the buds are painstakingly removed and trimmed by hand. Only patients who have been recommended by a physician can take the drug home.— Aaron Epstein, Garden State Dispensary
New patients at Garden State can tour the part of the facility where the plants are grown in about 10,000 square feet devoted to cultivation. Growers care for different strains of the plant, which carry names such as “Death Star,” “Bubba Berry,” “Sour Willie” and “Nigerian Haze,” each with varying levels of marijuana chemicals that affect the body differently.
Before entering any of the growing rooms, visitors are sprayed with a solution of tea tree oil, alcohol and water to kill any mold they might bring in.
A couple of weeks ago, they watched as workers trimmed the stalks and tied them to stakes and as they cut the dried plants, carefully setting aside the stems and leaves.
The plants aren’t grown from seeds, but rather from clippings of mother plants that are kept for six months to a year.
Grow manager Nick Vota plucked leaves that were blocking light from reaching buds and explained that a grower wants as much light to hit the plant as possible. That’s because the plants produce crystalline resins as a defense to harmful UV light, he said, and those resins or trichomes contain chemicals such as as THC and CBD that growers want in the plant.
In one room, young plants are kept under light 24/7 to prevent them from creating the hormone that leads to budding and flowering. After growing to the right size, they are moved to the flower room, where they spend half the day in darkness and half under the yellow light of high-pressure sodium bulbs that create a surreal golden glow. There, they blossom.
While a canopy of bushy greenery sprouts flowers and leaves, the bottoms of the stalks are kept trim and clean to allow air to flow through and prevent mildew from forming.
Plants are then dried for 10 to 14 days. Then, buds are carefully removed by hand and cured for a few weeks until they are ready to be sold.
The process will be a little different in the Reading facility, Pohlhaus said. It will have about four times more cultivation space than the one in New Jersey and more tasks, like irrigation, will be automated instead of performed by hand. Many of the details about the Reading facility, which has yet to be approved by the city, haven’t been finalized, but Polhaus said it will have only one entrance and employ a former state trooper for security.
He’s also hopeful that the facility will grow plants using aeroponics, a soil-free process in which water and nutrients are continuously sprayed on the roots, making the plant grow quicker and in higher yields.
Workers in Reading won’t need to be as careful about trimming leaves and other material from dried buds because Pennsylvania’s medical marijuana law, which was passed last year, requires cannabis to be more processed.
Polhaus said the plants will be chopped finely — like cinnamon — and put into an extraction machine that uses pressure to pull out the cannabinoids, elements with medicinal properties. The substance will come out as a brownish oil that will be refined further before it’s sold in a product at a dispensary.
Getting started
At Garden State Dispensary, new patients with prescriptions for marijuana sit down with a counselor for at least an hour to review the rules and talk about their lifestyles and conditions. That information is important because two patients with the same condition might use different strains of marijuana depending on whether, for example, one has to drive their children to school and the other stays home all day. Someone who’s not active might take a strain that has high amounts of THC, the psychoactive chemical in marijuana, while the parent who chauffeurs children might take a strain with high amounts of CBD, or cannabidiol, and little to no THC, getting an anti-anxiety quality
After the counseling session, patients are ready to buy from a sort of pharmacy counter. There, they can examine samples of different marijuana varieties before going home with a quarter or eighth of an ounce of the drug. New Jersey patients can take home up to 2 ounces per month. Reminiscent of a head shop, there’s also a selection of colorful glass pipes, vaporizers and other memorabilia for sale.
In southeastern Pennsylvania, which includes Philadelphia, Franklin Labs and Prime Wellness of Pennsylvania, also in Berks County, received the two growing and processing permits for the region. Franklin also applied for a dispensary permit, but was not among the 27 companies in the state that were awarded one last week.
In the 10-county region that includes the Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania Medical Solutions expects to open a facility in Scranton and Standard Farms plans to operate a warehouse in White Haven, Luzerne County.
On Thursday, the state Department of Health announced the first 27 companies to receive dispensary permits, including two in the Lehigh Valley: Mission Pennsylvania II, which will open a dispensary in Allentown; and GuadCo, which plans to open one in Bethlehem Township.
It is expected to take until 2018 before the first patient is able to walk out of a Pennsylvania dispensary with medical marijuana. To date, 29 states have approved the plant’s use to treat various conditions, contributing to an industry that, according to published reports, generated $6.7 billion in sales in North America last year and is projected to top $20 billion by 2021.
News Moderator: Ron Strider 420 MAGAZINE ®
Full Article: Breaking news around The Lehigh Valley - The Morning Call
Author: Michelle Merlin
Contact: Morning Call Staff Contact List - The Morning Call
Photo Credit: Harry Fisher
Website: Allentown, Lehigh Valley & Pennsylvania News - The Morning Call
