OCR opens second-round license window with a September 15 deadline; manufacturing and R&D open for the first time

As of July 17, 2026. The Office of Cannabis Regulation opened a new cannabis license application window on July 16, giving applicants until September 15, 2026 to file. The window runs 61 days. It is the first application intake OCR has posted since the February 24 supplementary cultivation notice, and it lands after Director Joanne Moorehead’s March 13 pledge to reopen commercial cultivation applications in June. The pledged June window closed without a posting. The reopen posted July 16, 16 days into July.

What is open, by island

The available license categories differ by island:

• St. Croix: Cultivation, Manufacturing, Dispensary.
• St. Thomas: Cultivation, Manufacturing.
• St. John: Cultivation, Manufacturing.
• Territory-wide: Micro-Cultivation, Research and Development.

Applications are filed through the OCR online licensing portal at ocr.vi.gov. Prospective applicants seeking assistance may contact OCR at info.ocr@ocr.vi.gov or 340-714-9755.

Per OCR, the cycle provides qualified individuals and businesses with “an opportunity to participate in the continued development of the Virgin Islands cannabis industry.”

What is new in this window

Manufacturing and Research and Development applications are opening for the first time. Both categories were listed as still closed when the first dispensary window opened in June 2025, alongside Third-Party Vendor and Agent Registration. Third-Party Vendor and Agent Registration remain unlisted in the July 16 notice.

The dispensary category is open only on St. Croix. That tracks with the merit-round math from January. The January 16 dispensary round filled two of the seven statutory dispensary slots the Virgin Islands Cannabis Use Act reserves for St. Croix under § 787 of title 19, leaving five St. Croix slots unfilled. The January round awarded eight of the ten conditional dispensary licenses to St. Thomas and St. John. Whether the residual St. Thomas dispensary vacancy was filled through the OCR May 19 Limited Amendment Opportunity is not restated in the July 16 notice.

Cultivation is a second round on all three islands. The first round produced 14 conditional Commercial Cultivation License awards (eight on St. Croix, five on St. Thomas, one on St. John) against a 35-license territorial cap, leaving 21 slots that a second-round window can address. Micro-Cultivation has no statutory cap.

The 61-day window

The July 16 notice sets a 61-day filing window. The first Commercial Cultivation window ran roughly 88 days (March 31 to June 27, 2025). The first Cannabis Dispensary window ran a minimum of 60 days from the week of June 30, 2025. The July 16 window is closer to the dispensary precedent than the cultivation precedent, and it is the shortest posted window OCR has run so far. Applicants who missed the June expectation now have a fixed calendar to build against.

Every application is scored against the merit rubrics codified in the 2024 Cannabis Rules and Regulations: Section 777-12 for cultivation, Section 777-15 for dispensary. Fee tiers remain as approved at the October 21, 2024 Cannabis Advisory Board meeting for cultivation, running $2,500 to $7,500. The July 16 notice does not restate the fee schedule and does not publish fees for Manufacturing or Research and Development. Those are new categories, and the merit rubric and fee tier for each are not established in the public record OCR has posted to date.

What is unclear

Whether OCR intends to publish separate scoring rubrics and fee schedules for the Manufacturing and Research and Development categories before the September 15 deadline, whether the Cannabis Advisory Board approved the window at its June 25 sitting or a later meeting, and whether the second-round dispensary intake on St. Croix will be scored under the same Section 777-15 framework used in January are all questions the July 16 notice does not answer.

What to watch

• Any OCR posting of scoring rubrics or fee schedules for Manufacturing and Research and Development applications.
• Any Cannabis Advisory Board meeting notice or agenda covering the new window, and any minutes that record how the window was approved.
• Any second-round applicant filings on St. Croix’s five open dispensary slots.
• Any OCR statement on the September 15 close-out schedule for administrative review, given the fall 2026 target for the first regulated retail sale.
• Whether Third-Party Vendor and Agent Registration categories open before the September 15 deadline or wait for a later window.