Lakeland city staff has carved out about 1,000 acres of highway commercial and light industrial zoned areas that medical marijuana dispensaries would be allowed to move into if ultimately approved by the City Commission.

Four of the seven city commissioners supported the staff's proposal in a meeting Friday, while others want to see some changes before it goes to the Planning and Zoning Board in May and the commission for a vote in June. 

Staff is proposing medical marijuana dispensaries:

• Be located within C-2 and I-1 zoned districts with 500-foot separation from schools, daycare centers, park and recreation centers, playgrounds, libraries, churches, synagogues and other houses of worship.

• Be limited in size to 4,000 square feet.

If you hear the word “cannabis,” do your thoughts turn to edibles or a debate about the merits of Premium Jack versus Grape Stomper?

Sure, years of popular movies, TV shows and music have elevated the stoner stereotype to the top of the pop culture heap. But cannabis is making its mark in another arena, and the utterance that caught your attention may have pertained to hairstyling products, soaps or body lotions.

The beauty world is embracing cannabis like never before.

Often these products include hemp seed oil, which has been used in folk remedies for centuries and is said to ease dry skin, reduce inflammation and alleviate skin issues such as eczema.

The male marijuana plants are much maligned but they have their own special worth. Before binning your next males the moment they sex. Maybe consider their usefullness and get the most out of your males.

WHAT TO DO WITH MALE CANNABIS PLANTS

The male cannabis plant is much maligned and often misunderstood. Most growers will identify and terminate male plants on sight, which is fair and reasonable in a sinsemilla garden. However, before uprooting those males the moment their balls are showing, you may wish to consider these following few things that might pleasantly surprise you.

Colorado lawmakers have backed off plans to regulate marijuana clubs, saying the state would invite a federal crackdown by approving Amsterdam-style cannabis clubs.

The state House voted Thursday to amend a bill that would have set rules for how the private clubs could work.

It was a dramatic reversal. Bring-your-own-cannabis clubs had bipartisan support in the Legislature, and the measure had already cleared the GOP Senate.

But lawmakers bowed to Democratic Gov. John Hickenlooper, who repeatedly warned lawmakers that he would veto a club measure if it allowed indoor smoking. The governor also warned that clubs, and a separate proposal to allow cannabis delivery, might invite intervention from the U.S. Department of Justice.

In our Previous Analysis we covered mainstream Marijuana Stocks. Next we move into the OTC Marijuana Stocks section and I cannot overemphasise the risks involved. Regulation is light, fraud more likely and total losses possible, although get one right and the returns can be vast as long as you are nimble and follow the rules of the studies. As they are OTC Marijuana stocks there is no comment on what or how they do their business.

Ever since Australia moved to legalize medical cannabis, dozens of Australian companies have bloomed and boomed, with shares climbing in value as Australian state governments continue to relax regulations.

But what about the risks still lurking in the nascent market? To succeed, these companies rely heavily on continued government reform. To avoid getting burned, investors should do their homework. Here are a few questions to get started.

The Colorado Senate passed a bill Wednesday to allow pot growers and retailers to reclassify recreational pot as medical marijuana in the event of a federal crackdown.

The bill is seen as the boldest bid yet by a U.S. marijuana state to avoid possible federal intervention in its pot market. But critics say nothing guarantees that reclassifying pot as medicine would stop federal action.

Marijuana is illegal under federal law, and the Trump administration has given mixed signals on its policy toward U.S. marijuana states.

U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions has been skeptical of pot's medical value. President Donald Trump has suggested the handling of marijuana should be up to the states.

Dozens of medical marijuana dispensaries are sprinkled in cities across the state, and Detroit has 61 pot shops open for business. But come this time next year, the landscape for weed around the state could be completely different.

That’s when the state will begin officially handing out licenses to growers, testing facilities, transporters and dispensaries.

The state Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs (LARA) is beginning to gear up for the task of regulating a new, and potentially very lucrative, business in the state. The medical marijuana business is projected to generate revenues of more than $700 million, and if a ballot proposal goes to voters in 2018 and the market is opened for recreational use, too, those revenues will easily surpass $1 billion.

Insiders at two of Canada’s largest marijuana companies are cashing in on the industry’s reefer madness before the country introduces its plans for legalized recreational pot.

Since March 1, five directors, officers and board members with Canopy Growth Corp. sold 3.2 million shares worth at least C$7.5 million ($5.7 million), including Chief Executive Officer Bruce Linton, who sold C$3.7 million worth of his holdings, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Between March 1 and April 10, eight executives and the chief cultivator for Aurora Cannabis Inc. sold a total of 4.9 million shares worth C$11.8 million, data show.

Organized crime groups, including the Hells Angels, have managed to obtain legal personal production licences for medical marijuana, only to turn around and illegally sell the product across the country, CBC news has learned.

Several sources described to CBC how organized crime groups have obtained personal grow licences and are using them to try to hamper police attempts to shut down their operations.

CBC is not naming the sources, who fear reprisal from criminal groups or worry about interfering in criminal investigations. 

"We often don't have the the resources to chase down the true identities behind the licences," said one source.