I've been doing a lot of research and over the past few months have become really interested in how much variety there is from state to state. Are you aware of how the Compassionate Use Program is actually set up in the Lone Star State? I think this is information worth knowing before the next session in Austin, because in Texas, the legislature is the only way any of these numbers change. There's no petition you can sign to put it on a statewide ballot.

Patients can't grow at home. Only state-licensed dispensing organizations can grow, process, and dispense. Recreational use is still illegal, full stop.

Health & Safety Code ch. 487 tells DPS to issue 15 dispensing licenses statewide. For about eight years there were only three, and as far as I can find, those same three are still the only ones selling. DPS conditionally picked 12 new companies in two rounds (December 2025 and April 2026), then redid the scoring in May 2026 after finding a tabulation error. Three companies got bumped and three others moved up. A conditional license doesn't let anyone grow or sell a thing, and once a license is final the company has up to 24 months to start dispensing.

What you can get is still tightly boxed in. "Low-THC cannabis" now means no more than 10 mg of THC per dosage unit (it used to be 1% by weight), with a 1-gram THC cap per package or inhalation device. Smoking is banned. Vaping is allowed only if your doctor decides it's medically necessary. Prescriptions cover a 90-day supply with up to four refills.

Who qualifies: epilepsy and seizure disorders, MS, spasticity, ALS, autism, cancer, incurable neurodegenerative diseases, PTSD, and, since September 2025, chronic pain (severe, lasting more than 90 days), traumatic brain injury, Crohn's and other inflammatory bowel disease, and terminal illness or hospice care. You also need one of the roughly 800 doctors registered with the program, out of about 80,000 board-certified physicians in the state.

How did it become law?

2015: SB 339 created the program, for intractable epilepsy only.

2018: The first legal sale happened in February, an oil for a patient with epilepsy.

2019 and 2021: The legislature added conditions a few at a time, and in 2021 raised the cap to 1% by weight.

2025: HB 46 took effect September 1. It added chronic pain and other conditions, swapped the 1% cap for 10 mg per dose, allowed inhalation, raised the license count from 3 to 15, and allowed pickup locations across the state's 11 health regions.

Every one of those steps was a bill. None of them were a ballot measure.

Why does it look this way? The structure behind it:

Texas has no statewide citizen initiative. In Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Florida, voters gathered signatures and put medical cannabis on the ballot themselves. In Texas, even a constitutional amendment has to pass both chambers by two-thirds before voters ever see it.

So the program grows exactly as fast as the legislature lets it, and the legislature only meets in regular session every other year. That's why it took a decade to get from "epilepsy only" to chronic pain. It's also why the registry has topped 160,000 sign-ups since it started while the number of companies actually selling hasn't moved.

The same legislature handles hemp too. In 2025 it passed SB 3, a total ban on THC hemp products. Gov. Abbott vetoed it and called a special session, lawmakers couldn't agree, and he issued an executive order that September banning hemp sales to anyone under 21. All of that came from Austin, and none of it went to a vote of the people.

Bottom Line:

Texas sets its cannabis limits in statute: 15 licenses (3 actually selling), 10 mg of THC per dose, no smoking, no home grow, medical only. With no ballot initiative, you can't fix any of that at the voting booth. Your state rep and state senator write these rules, so they're the ones to call before the session starts in January 2027.

So what would you ask your rep for first: more licenses, a higher THC limit, home grow, or something else? And has anyone here actually gotten a response when you called?

Sources: Texas DPS Compassionate Use Program; Texas Occupations Code ch. 169 and Health & Safety Code ch. 487; The Texas Tribune (Jan. 12, 2026)