newjerseynewsroom.com

Pot expected to be ready for eligible patients by summer

BY TOM HESTER SR.

NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM

Six nonprofit organizations have been selected to grow and sell medical marijuana for use by New Jerseyans approved to take part in the state’s medicinal marijuana program, the Department of Health and Senior Services announced Monday.

More than a year ago, the state adopted a law allowing marijuana to be sold to people with certain medical conditions but its implementation has been delayed as health officials and legislators set the standards on how the program would function.

The selection of the six growers is considered a major milestone in actually providing the drug.

The law mandates that so-called alternative treatment centers operate in northern, central and southern New Jersey.

The successful applicants are:

Breakwater Alternative Treatment Center Corp. of Ocean Township will grow for the central region. The officers are: Richard Lefkowitz, CEO and Alexander Zaleski, COO. The center will be located in Manalapan, Monmouth County.

Compassionate Care Centers of America Foundation Inc. of Jersey City also will grow for the central region; The officers are David Weisser, Michael Weisser and Anastasia Burlyuk. The center will be located in New Brunswick.

Compassionate Care Foundation Inc. of Ewing will grow for the southern region. The officers are William J. Thomas, David Knowlton, James C. Herrmann, Ann Marie Hill, Jeffrey Warren, JoAnn Lange and Mark Dumoff. The center will be located in Bellmawr.

Compassionate Sciences, Inc. of Sea Cliff, N.Y. will also grow for the southern region; The officers are CEO Richard Taney, Dr. Steven Paterno, CFO Jack Burkolder and Webster B. Todd Jr. The location of the center is undetermined, but will be located in either Burlington or Camden counties. Todd is a brother of former Gov. Christie Todd Whitman and served as a Republican Assemblyman from Somerset County from 1968 to 1970. He was chairman of the National Safety Transportation Board and at onetime served on a White House staff and director of the state Commerce and Economic Growth Commission. He was also president of Frontier Airlines, founder of Princeton Aviation Corp. and senior director of air safety for the Airline Pilots Association.

Foundation Harmony of Cliffside Park will grow for the northern region. The officers are Maria Karavas, Ida Umanskaya, Margarita Ivanova and Dmitri Bajanov. The center will be located in Secaucus.

Greenleaf Compassion Center of Montclair. The center also will grow for the northern region. The officers are Joseph Stevens, president and CEO; Jordan A. Matthews and Robert J. Guarino. The center will be located in Montclair.

The regional breakdown is:

• Northern Region: Bergen, Essex, Hudson, Morris, Passaic, Sussex and Warren;
• Central Region: Hunterdon, Middlesex, Mercer, Monmouth, Ocean, Somerset and Union;
• Southern Region: Atlantic, Burlington, Camden, Cape May, Cumberland, Gloucester and Salem.

The six growers were selected from among 35 applications submitted by 21 applicants. Several applicants applied to operate multiple centers in multiple regions. The applications were scored by a five-member selection committee comprised of three Health Department employees and one each from the departments of Agriculture and Community Affairs.

“This is pioneering territory for the state of New Jersey,” Health Commissioner Poonam Alaigh said. “We are now one step closer to providing patients with debilitating conditions relief from chronic pain. The department anticipates that these ATCs will be operating this summer in the northern, central and southern Regions of the state. The successful applicants presented comprehensive and high quality proposals including sound financial plans and appropriate security measures.

Alaigh said the key components of the plan outlined in the Request for Applications required applicants to have:

• A three-year financial operations plan;
• A detailed description of safety and security measures including a plan for an enclosed, locked facility that would be used in the cultivation of medicinal marijuana and assure coordination with local law enforcement;
• A plan for inventory, record keeping and protection of personal health care information;
• A plan to track and analyze data on patient outcome, use and trends;
• A plan to provide counseling and educational materials on methods of using medicinal marijuana and promote research studies on health effects;
• A draft operations manual and staff training plan;
• A quality control program to ensure the quality of the medicinal marijuana, including purity, potency and consistency of dose;
• A plan to dispose of unusable marijuana.

For additional information on New Jersey’s Medicinal Marijuana program: visit the DHSS Medicinal Marijuana website.