Organizers Clarify Role of Recreational Cannabis at Ohio Cannabis Festival

The Stargazer Cannabis Festival in Meigs County, Ohio, is gearing up for its first year, promising “three days of love and weed” from July 26 to 28. Despite legal challenges and changes to its website, the festival’s organizers spoke to NBC4 to clarify how recreational cannabis will be featured at the event.

Festival’s Initial Advertising and Legal Compliance

An earlier version of the festival’s website, preserved by the Wayback Machine, advertised a farmer’s market selling baked goods, seeds, flowers, seedlings, and other cannabis products. However, Chad Thompson, the agent for the company behind the festival, explained that the advertised products are legal and derived from hemp, containing less than 0.3% THC.

Clarifying Legal Products

“Everything that we talked about there is all available in legal products,” Thompson told NBC4. He emphasized that the products are made from legal cannabinoids from hemp plants, which comply with state laws.

Misunderstandings and Website Changes

The initial advertisement did not explicitly mention hemp, CBD, or Delta-8, leading to some confusion. As a result, the organizers decided to remove the farmer’s market advertisement to avoid further misunderstandings.

“We had some backlash from the event site just based on what they thought came from us,” Thompson said. To prevent any more misunderstandings, they adjusted their website content.

Ensuring Legal Compliance at the Festival

Jason Shambo, a spokesman for the Wisteria Campground where Stargazer is being held, confirmed that only cannabis products legal under the U.S. Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018 will be sold at the festival. This act legalized industrial hemp and its products at the federal level.

Challenges from State Authorities

Some products featured at the festival may face future legal challenges. Governor Mike DeWine has expressed intentions to ban “intoxicating hemp,” such as Delta-8, highlighting incidents where minors purchased Delta-8 candy from gas stations.

Presence of Recreational Cannabis

Despite these hurdles, recreational marijuana will still have a presence at the festival. Vendors will be allowed to sell cannabis seeds, legal under federal law, and Ohioans can grow up to six plants for personal use. Attendees will also be permitted to use their homegrown marijuana at the campgrounds.

“I’m sure that there will be attendees that have legal cannabis with THC and will be consuming it, but there’s going to be no person-to-person sales,” Thompson said.

Festival Activities and Legal Considerations

The festival will also host a joint-rolling contest, allowing participants to use their own marijuana. “It’d be completely legal to be homegrown cannabis, or they may roll it with hemp or they may not, I’m not gonna ask,” Thompson noted. The contest will focus on the art of rolling rather than consumption.

Ticket Sales and Popularity

As of Friday, ticket sales for the Stargazer Festival have surged. “It really kind of caught fire throughout the state. … I definitely think that we won’t even make it to get to sell tickets at the gate,” Thompson said.

Ohio’s Recreational Cannabis Market

The festival’s announcement comes as Ohio prepares for the start of recreational marijuana sales. Cresco Labs in Yellow Springs has planted its inaugural crop for recreational use, and medical marijuana shops like Sunnyside in Chillicothe plan to apply for dual-use dispensary licenses.

Anticipated Start of Sales

The Division of Cannabis Control has proposed that medical dispensaries could apply to sell recreational marijuana by September 7. Lawmakers have hinted that licenses authorizing sales could arrive sooner, potentially by mid-June.

The Stargazer Cannabis Festival aims to celebrate the cannabis plant while navigating the complexities of legal compliance. As Ohio moves closer to legalizing recreational marijuana sales, the festival represents a significant cultural and economic moment for the state’s cannabis industry.