Austin hemp entrepreneur Shayda Torabi is looking at a year filled with uncertainty. For the six years they’ve been in business, Torabi and her two sisters have operated Restart, a hemp dispensary in a modest neighborhood in North Austin, within an entirely lawful framework — evolving as the laws changed while staying comfortably and legally off the radar of state lawmakers who authorized the sale of consumable hemp in Texas in 2019. That’s about to change.
Here are the marijuana possession laws in Texas and Bexar County. The state does not limit the number of dispensary registrations or hemp licenses it allows. Health officials conduct random testing for the presence of heavy metals, pathogens, pesticides, solvents and the concentration of THC. Retailers must pay an annual fee of $155 per location. License holders are on the hook for additional required state fees.