“If somebody can feel better (using medical marijuana), they ought to be able to get it,” Gould said. “I will fight to my death to make sure that happens.”
He’s driven by people he’s seen who have epilepsy, cancer and any number of other afflictions and illnesses who experience almost instant relief from pain and other symptoms when using medical marijuana. Gould is friends with Montel Williams, who uses a strain of cannabis that helps him deal with the effects of multiple sclerosis.
By Lisa Bernard-Kuhn posted Sept 8, 2016
Updated Sept 9, 2016
“Without ResponsibleOhio and our gang of investors, we would not have the law we have today,” said 67-year-old Gould, whose resume boasts lucrative tenures as a professional sports agent, big deals with Donald Trump and a recently founded holding company Green Light Acquisitions that has investments in cannabis startups in Nevada and California.
“None of this would be happening today if we hadn’t paid our dues, scorched earth and moved the conversation in Ohio from if to when,” Gould said.
On Thursday, less than a year after Gould offered up his concession speech for Issue 3, Ohio’s new medical marijuana laws are officially hitting the books. It’s not the plan that Gould or his business partner at Green Light, Ian James, originally envisioned, but their fingerprints and influence are there.
“On Election night, we said we’ll be back,” Gould said. “We didn’t say how. We didn’t say with who. We just never quit.”
How we got here, according to Gould
Until Gould and James came on the scene, few Ohio politicians were eager to broach the topic of marijuana legalization, says Doug Berman, a professor at The Ohio State University who teaches a marijuana law class.
“They definitely helped the legislature understand that if they keep holding their nose at this issue, they’re all but inviting a less desirable actor to fill that regulatory space,” Berman said. “The reality is marijuana reform is a very complicated, challenging regulatory space – and probably the worst place to be fighting over the rules is in the state’s constitution.”
The campaign created attention and influence in other ways too.
“Then, they went out and collected $20 million to move this forward,” Berman said. “I’m sure some in the legislature said, ‘Wait, that’s a lot of money that could be used to leverage campaigns here.’”
After voters rejected Issue 3 last November, Gould said he immediately went to work.
Within a week, Ohio’s Speaker of the House Cliff Rosenburger (R-Clarksville) made a visit to Gould’s office.
“I reached out to him – I know – they had just bloodied us badly,” Gould said, referring to legislature-led amendment that banned monopolies from being written into Ohio’s constitution. “But it was clear the voters cared more about the process of how this got done, and it was also clear they wanted medical marijuana. I knew we had to convince the Republican leadership to support this.”
That meeting led to more over the next two months with Ohio’s top officials: Secretary of State John Husted; Rep. Kirk Shuring (R-Canton); Sen. Bill Coley (R-West Chester); and Sen. Kenny Yuko (D-Richmond Heights), Gould said.
“As we came together, we saw a merging of a lot of different interests -- a lot of different opinions -- but we all agreed to listen,” Gould said.
By January, Gould was asked to be among a 16-member Medical Marijuana Task Force, which included Republican and Democratic state representatives, physicians, law enforcement and business trade groups.
“I told them, I will sit on this task force and I was very clear to say that ‘Yes, I will be one of the people who wants to apply for a full cultivation license and build this industry in Ohio,'” Gould said. “Look, with our investment in ResponsibleOhio and in other states that were with (Green Light) -- I’ve forgotten more about this industry than most people will know. We’ve seen where states have gone wrong, what they’ve done right.”
Through May the task force studied the issue, listening to testimony from hundreds of medical marijuana patients advocates and other pro- and anti-marijuana groups.
“All the members -- we’re dedicated to trying to find common ground,” Schuring said. “But make no mistake, Jimmy Gould (was) a very important part of this work and came to this with a very pragmatic approach.”
Simultaneously, leaders in Ohio’s Senate took up the issue, too – hosting town halls across the state.
“ResponsibleOhio, one could say, definitely woke us up to the issue,” said David Burke, (RMarysville). “We no sooner got passed the ResponsibleOhio vote, and all we kept hearing was – no – people still want medical marijuana.” Meanwhile, Ohioans for Medical Marijuana marched forward with its own plan early this to take a constitutional amendment to voters this November. “They were out there circulating petitions, and polling showed about 80 percent of people in Ohio supported medical marijuana,” said Sen. Bill Coley. “It became clear – this thing was going to pass in some form, and it was a question of whether we wanted a law written by our legislature or were we going to sit back and let something get written into our Constitution?”
As petition gathering ramped up, the group approached Gould, he said, looking for financial support.
“I told them no – I had made a promise to the task force not to fund any other effort as long as they were genuine in their approach,” he said.
To the extent that Gould or other members of his family and close business associates have made campaign contributions or promised of financial support to members of Ohio general assembly who helped usher the bill through, Gould offered this:
“I’m an independent voter – but I will always get behind a candidate that I think is moving the state in the right direction, and when I decide to support people who I think are doing what’s right for the state – that is my right,” he said. “I would love to see campaign finance reform, but that’s not the system we have, and if people don’t like the system, then change it.”
By May, Ohio’s Senate and House had passed their fast-tracked bi-partisan bill. In June, Gov. John Kasich signed the bill into law. “What’s beautiful about this is that a whole bunch of people who think very differently were able to come together on this during a national election and get something done,” Gould said. More rule making, business opportunities ahead Where Ohio’s cannabis market may be headed next, well, that’s a story that Gould and his business partner, James, want to play a lead role in, too. For now it’s unknown just how many business licenses the state may issue for those looking to grow, process, test and sell medical marijuana. But Gould said he’s eager to be “one of the leading people” to apply for a cultivation license. “We’re staying heavily engaged,” Gould said. “To me this is about building a very strongly regulated industry and one that makes good economic sense.”
Under Ohio’s new law three state agencies will be charged with writing the rest of the state’s rules governing the new program.
They include:
Ohio's Department of Commerce, which will be in charge of licenses and compliance of cultivators, processors and testing labs
Ohio's Medical Board, which will certify physicians who recommend marijuana to patients
Ohio's Pharmacy Board, which will oversee how patient registration and licensing of medical marijuana dispensaries. Under the law, epilepsy, cancer, chronic pain and Alzheimer’s Disease are among the list of more than 20 conditions that would qualify patients for medical marijuana use.
The agencies are charged with getting Ohio’s medical pot program up and running by September 2018.
The process can “make or break” investment opportunities, said Chris Walsh, editor of Denver based Marijuana Business Daily. “Ohio could be one of the largest markets in the country, but there are a lot of unknowns until the ruling-making process plays out,” he said.
As for Gould, he said he’ll be keeping close watch on the decisions ahead as he tinkers with business plans.
“We’ve just kept moving forward without any guarantee of anything,” he said. “If, for some reason, the rules don’t come together to support a well-regulated program and Ohio doesn’t get a good economic model, then I won’t invest.”
Copyright 2016 Scripps Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
On a cold day in January 2014, political strategist Ian James rode the elevator with two lawyers to the 11th floor of the Scripps Center to arrive at the office of a Cincinnati wheeler-dealer. The four men sat down, made some small talk. Then James took a deep breath and made his pitch for an Ohio revolution.
"I had not met Jimmy Gould before," James recalled, "so I just asked if he were interested in the legalization of marijuana for personal use or for medical use. I didn't know how this was going to go over. But no sooner had the words come out of my mouth, Jimmy said, 'I'm in.' "
The first of 10 investors in a statewide marijuana issue to be made public is James Gould, a Cincinnati sports agent, businessman, and member of the board of directors of numerous organizations, including Build-A-Bear Workshop.
Gould will be "utilizing his 25 years of work in private equity and 30 years of development experience to secure accredited investors to fund the campaign," according to a statement released today by ResponsibleOhio, the group backing a marijuana issue for the November statewide ballot.
Gould has represented a number professional athletes and also serves on board of the Korey Stringer Institute, named after the former Ohio State University All-American and star with the Minnesota Vikings of the NFL who died from heat stroke in 2001.
