Understanding the Certificate of Occupancy Process
Hey, Oklahoma medical marijuana business owners. I’m Katrina Lucas, and I’m a Tulsa medical marijuana attorney with Wirth Law Office.
Those of you who do not have certificates of occupancy from the State Fire Marshal, you are in the same boat with a lot of other MMA and OB&DD license holders. The laws on this have been erratic, backwards-facing, and not proper, but we still have to face the reality of business today—making sure we keep our licenses and keep functioning.
Working with Third Parties for Expedited Approval
The Oklahoma State Fire Marshal has approved medical marijuana businesses for the expedited process with third parties. If you have an engineer or a firm that you’ve worked with to submit drawings, work through that process to see if they believe you could expedite through CSG.
There are some costs: it’s $750 to CSG, which is a California entity, and they are much more communicative than the State Fire Marshal. They will go through your plans, talk to you about what things are, and get information from you for the plan review. They will also get the information from the State Fire Marshal’s office after you’ve submitted it.
Benefits of Expedited Approval Process
The State Fire Marshal requires you to pay a per-square-foot fee to anything that is going to CSG. There’s a cost for them to do it. They are batch processing, so it’s taking them a little bit of time to send it over to CSG, but it’s only 10 days from the time CSG gets it to when they approve your plan and send it back to the State Fire Marshal. Once it’s approved, the Fire Marshal will say that your plans are approved and will set you up for inspection. So, you will be much further along in your COO process than if you continue to wait for the State Fire Marshal.
Those of you who are facing hearings because you don’t live in Oklahoma County, Tulsa County, or any of the other counties that have a fire marshal at that level—or cities that have a fire marshal available—I encourage all of you to do this. It will assist you a ton in your defense with the state and put you in the same place as many of those who made the safe harbor dates.
Get Help Today!
This is Katrina Lucas and I’m a Tulsa medical marijuana compliance attorney with Wirth Law Office in Tulsa, Oklahoma. I am ready to help you out on your OB&DD issues with your certificates of occupancy, and if you have any other questions about this or any other law, reach out to us at (918) 932-2879 for a consultation. We would be happy to help.