Pubdate: Sat, 20 Dec 2014 Source: Sun-Sentinel (Fort Lauderdale, FL) Copyright: 2014 Sun-Sentinel Company Contact: http://drugsense.org/url/mVLAxQfA Website: http://www.sun-sentinel.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/159 Author: Scott Powers Page: 6B MEDICAL-POT RULES TO BE REWRITTEN; HEARING SET The Florida Department of Health will not appeal a judge's ruling that it must write new regulations for medical marijuana and instead announced a public hearing on the matter for Orlando on Dec. 30. The hearing will be held from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. - or perhaps later - at the Florida Department of Health in Orange County, 6101 Lake Ellenor Drive in Orlando, officials said. At stake is how and when the state will begin allowing companies to produce a medicine informally known as "Charlotte's Web" that's extracted from a non-euphoric strain of marijuana. The extract became legal this spring when the Legislature approved SB 1030 and Gov. Rick Scott signed it. The Florida Department of Health was to come up with rules and regulations by Sept. 30 and the program was supposed to start by Jan. 1, 2015. The agency proposed such rules and regulations, but the program got hung up in legal challenges. The delay happened after several of Florida's leading plant nurseries, upset with the department's proposed rules, challenged them - particularly the requirement that licenses would be decided by a lottery. That sent the matter into court, and Administrative Law Judge W. David Watkins in Tallahassee threw out 13 of the key proposed regulations. The Department of Health had until Monday to appeal, and officials had said nothing until Monday night when it release a statement about its decision. The "Charlotte's Web" extract is a specific brand of medicinal oil introduced in Colorado that showed remarkable success in alleviating seizures. Yet there reportedly are at least 21 cannabis strains nationally that could qualify under Florida's new law. Medical experts say about 125,000 people in Florida with epilepsy that has not responded to other drugs or therapies could be helped by the oil. - --- MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom