State regulators rolled out more details for Ohio's new medical marijuana program Friday, prompting members of a panel advising the process to question the high fees proposed for marijuana business owners. 

Under the proposed rules, medical marijuana product manufacturers, called processors, would pay $100,000 a year for one of 40 available licenses. Large-scale marijuana growers would pay $200,000 a year for a cultivator license. And retail dispensaries would pay $80,000 every two years to be licensed.  

In 2016 Ohio legalized Marijuana. Now in 2017 we are hoping to learn more about what that really means.

It won't be until at least September of 2018 before the program is expected to be in full swing.

The Medical Marijuana Advisory Committee has already had it's initial meetings, and it's addressing several issues right now, including if 40 dispensaries is enough to serve Ohioans in 88 counties.

Democrat Joe Schiavoni is the Senate Minority Leader, "Now the Department of Pharmacy has actually made recommendations about how many dispensaries and who can dispense medicinal marijuana, and where it's going to be grown."

When Ohio Gov. John Kasich effectively legalized medical cannabis in Ohio, with a stroke of a pen, the state became the 25th in the U.S. to legalize a very comprehensive medical cannabis program. This week the Ohio Board of Pharmacy has rolled out several new sets of rules for the evolving program.  Finally clearing the smoke with Ohio’s medical cannabis program with some sort of focus in rules now proposed for cultivators, doctors who recommend it for patients, and for dispensaries.

Ohio's medical-marijuana program is coming into focus with rules now proposed for cultivators who grow it, doctors who recommend it for patients, and dispensaries that sell it.

The latest development came Thursday when the Ohio Board of Pharmacy recommended that 40 dispensaries be scattered around the state to sell medical marijuana to qualifying patients. That number is far fewer than the 1,150 dispensaries proposed in a medical-marijuana ballot issue defeated by Ohio voters in 2015.

A second set of state rules rolled out Thursday details how Ohio physicians can recommend but not prescribe medical marijuana for patients.

Statewide efforts to legalize marijuana in Ohio failed at the ballot box last year, but several cities pressed ahead, voting to decriminalize cannabis within their city limits. This takes a solid first step toward effectively nullifying prohibition in practice.

Voters in the Ohio cities of Bellaire, Logan, Newark and Roseville all approved marijuana decriminalization measures in the November election.