Cannabis: licenses: criminal records.

(1) The Control, Regulate and Tax Adult Use of Marijuana Act of 2016 (AUMA) , an initiative statute approved as Proposition 64 at the November 8, 2016, statewide general election, authorizes a person who obtains a state license under AUMA to engage in commercial adult-use cannabis activity pursuant to that license and applicable local ordinances. The Medicinal and Adult-Use Cannabis Regulation and Safety Act (MAUCRSA) , among other things, consolidates the licensure and regulation of commercial medicinal and adult-use cannabis activities. MAUCRSA generally divides responsibility for the state licensure and regulation of commercial cannabis activity among state licensing authorities depending on the type of license classification sought by the applicant. MAUCRSA authorizes licensing authorities to create new state licenses relating to commercial cannabis activity that the licensing authorities deem necessary to effectuate their duties under MAUCRSA by adopting regulations to that effect. MAUCRSA requires an applicant to electronically submit fingerprint images to the Department of Justice for the purpose of obtaining information as to the existence and content of a record of state or federal convictions and arrests. Existing law requires the Department of Justice to provide a response to the licensing authority, as provided. This bill would specify that the Bureau of Cannabis Control, the Department of Food and Agriculture, and the State Department of Public Health may obtain and receive, at their discretion, criminal history information from the Department of Justice and the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation for an applicant for any state license under MAUCRSA, including any license established by a licensing authority by regulation pursuant to the authority described above. The bill would require the Department of Justice to forward all requests for federal criminal history record information to the Federal Bureau of Investigation for these purposes and to review the information and compile and disseminate a response to the licensing authority. This bill would appropriate the sum of $10,700,000 in augmentation of Item 8570-001-3288 of Section 2.00 of the Budget Act of 2017, from the Cannabis Control Fund to the Department of Food and Agriculture for state costs in the 2017–18 fiscal year to supply proprietary plant and package radio-frequency identification tags, to be used by licensees to track cannabis and cannabis-related products, as specified. (2) AUMA authorizes the Legislature to amend by a majority vote certain provisions of the act to implement specified substantive provisions, provided that the amendments are consistent with and further the purposes and intent of the act. This bill would declare that its provisions implement specified substantive provisions of AUMA. (3) This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as a bill providing for appropriations related to the Budget Bill.