Ohio Joint Committee on Agency Rule Review - 6-22-2026

Good afternoon. I'd like to call the Joint Committee on Agency Rule Review to order. I'd like to recognize our substitute member for today's hearing, Senator Steve Huffman, for Senator Brenner here today. Welcome to JCAR. Would the clerk please call the roll? Senator Gavron? Here. Representative Callender? Here. Senator Lange? Here. Senator Huffman? Here. Senator Craig? Here. Senator DeMora? Here. Representative Matthews? Here. Representative Santucci? Here. Representative Brennan? Here. Representative Brown-Pigel Antonio? Here. Quorum is present. Let the record show we have a quorum present. Members, on your iPads, you'll find the minutes from the June 1, 2026 JCAR meeting. Are there any corrections or additions to the minutes? Seeing none, let the record show the minutes were approved as presented. Director, would you please read the no change agenda? Thank you. The no change agenda for this afternoon includes item one, attorney general, peace officer training commission, 15 rules. Item two, department of agriculture, plant industry, eight rules. Item three, department of job and family services, unemployment compensation, one rule. Item four, department of taxation, one rule. Item five, public utilities commission, utilities, four rules withdrawn. on item six, Attorney General Peace Officer Training Commission, one rule. This completes the reading of the no change agenda. Thank you, Madam Co-Chair. Thank you. Are there any questions by members about items on the no change agenda? Are there any comments from the public? All right, Director, would you please read the regular agenda? Thank you. The regular agenda for this afternoon includes item one, Department of Agriculture, Animal Industry, 11 rules. Items two through five, the Department of Behavioral Health, 72 rules. Item 6, Department of Children and Youth Adoption Services and Supports, 5 rules. Item 7, Department of Children and Youth Early Care and Education Eligibility, 9 rules. Items 8 and 9, Department of Children and Youth Licensing and Certification, 15 rules. Item 10, Department of Commerce Division of Securities, 13 rules. Item 11, Department of Development Office of Community Services, 5 rules. Item 12, Department of Development Priority Investment Area Designation, 1 rule. Item 13, Department of Developmental Disabilities, one rule. Item 14, Department of Health, four rules. Items 15 and 16, Department of Job and Family Services Division of Food Stamps, two rules. Item 17 through 19, Department of Job and Family Services Division of Public Assistance, three rules. Item 20, Department of Public Safety, Bureau of Motor Vehicles, one rule. Item 21, Department of Public Safety, four rules. Items 22 through 24, Department of Rehabilitation and Correction, 11 rules. Item 25, Department of Medicaid, one rule. Item 26, Environmental Protection Agency, one rule. Items 27 and 28, Public Utilities Commission, utilities, 14 rules. Items 29 and 30, the State Board of Pharmacy, Terminal Distributors of Dangerous Drugs, two rules. Item 31, Treasurer of State, one rule. To be refiled, item 32, Department of Developmental Disabilities, seven rules. Item 33 and 34, Environmental Protection Agency, 46 rules. and we have a policy to rule discussion item 35 with the State Board of Pharmacy. This completes the reading of the regular agenda. Thank you. Are there questions from members about items on the regular agenda? Are there any comments from the public? All right. Those agencies that do not have items on the review portion of the agenda may exit the room at this time. All right. As our next order of business, pursuant to Ohio Revised Code Section 101.352, we'd like to call the Ohio Board of Pharmacy forward for a policy-to-rule discussion. The Board of Pharmacy has been called in today to discuss a guidance document that was issued in late May of 2026 that listed various forms of natural leaf kratom that were now effectively being scheduled under a variety of statutory and rule citations. It's the committee's understanding this guidance document has changed. However, the question remains which statutory authority or purported rules the Board relied on when issuing this guidance and to clarify what forms of kratom are subject to the existing rule. The suspected policy relates to a guidance document, again, which attempts to create binding law by banning certain types of kratom in its natural vegetation form. The Board's original and revised guidance documents are available for review on your iPads. And I'd like to start with a question. The Board of Pharmacy previously came before JCAR on May 19, 2026, regarding OAC 429.9-1-01.1. As part of this rule, there was an explicit exemption for D. mitragynine in vegetation form, including natural kratom leaf and ground natural kratom leaf, in accordance with Chapter 3715 of the revised code. Under this exemption, can you help us rectify how previous guidance was able to include natural Kratom products, such as teas and capsules? Sure. To the co-chair, to the members of the committee. So the retailer guidance was initially intended as kind of a catch-all that included both Ohio Department of Agriculture's guidance related to the sale of Kratom products in food, as well as the board's rule. after a review and voluntary settlement agreement, we obviously revised the guidance to ensure that the Kratom in its natural form is no longer considered a Schedule I controlled substance. And so we made sure that our guidance now formally reflects the rule instead of trying to incorporate a bunch of different statutes that are sort of outside of our purview at this point. Thank you. Are there questions? Yes, co-chair calendar. Oh, where to start? I believe, and correct me if I'm wrong, that historically, as the legislature began working on Kratom and Kratom regulations, the governor asked for an emergency rule, and you guys, your agency, complied and presented a rule. That rule is no longer in place. Maybe it wasn't in place, but was promulgated as an emergency rule. Concurrently or shortly thereafter, you all presented a pair of rules regulating Kratom, one for the synthetic and one for the naturally occurring. Is that correct? That's correct. members of JCAR, myself included, brought to your attention that we felt that that was outside of your authority to issue and that we had legislation we were actively working on, the number of members in both chambers that are diligently working, exploring, educating themselves and the public on the issue. As part of that, you agreed to meet, and we had a group of folks at this table along with attorneys for both the caucuses from both chambers. And we reached an agreement that because of the urgency of the situation, if you agreed to pull the rule and not pursue the naturally occurring, that we would not object to the synthetic rule going through. Am I correct in all of that? I do not believe, to the co-chair, I do not believe that we agreed to pull the rule. I believe we believed to have a discussion with the governor's office as well as with the board regarding the future steps of that rule. In talking to all the folks in the meeting, I think everyone else had a different agreement, a different belief as to what the agreement was. so imagine our concern when it showed up as a non-rule interpretive document that you were trying to do without going through rulemaking what you had just pulled from the rules and agreed to the one half, the other half you tried to put in the document now you've since amended that document, is that correct? Yes For those of us sitting here, that seemed like a way to get around an agreement we had, and that was rather frustrating for us. So thank you for pulling that. But to continue to pursue the other rule while we're pursuing legislation, likewise, feels like a... Last time I saw something like that, it was the Department of Education doing it. I think I can congratulate you on finding a bipartisan issue in this chamber where we have pretty broad-based agreement on an issue during an election year. It takes a particular skill. However, what are your intents with that rule? I spoke with a lot of folks over the last couple of weeks and have gotten some mixed answers. So while you're here in a public forum, what is your intent with that rule? I know it's in CSI now. Correct. Are you going to pull that rule or are you going to continue to pursue it? So we are going to have a discussion to the co-chair. We are going to have a discussion at the next scheduled meeting to determine the future steps of the rule. As we have to have these discussions in open session and make those determinations in open session, we are committing to having that conversation at the next scheduled meeting. Other than that, I can't read the tea leaves on what would happen, but we have to wait until our next scheduled board meeting, which is in July, to talk about next steps related to the rule. And the rule has not left CSI's jurisdiction. So that's where the board has not formally rescinded that, and so that's what we would need to do in order for them to pull consideration. Follow-up? Several. Proceed. So you're not intending to rescind the rule now. You're waiting until there's another meeting of your board. Yes. To the chair, that's correct. Okay. Are the members of your board aware of the discussions you'd had with JCAR members in the past and that we would intend to, I think, you can't speak before the vote, but I think we would intend to move to invalidate such a rule So to the co we intend to have that conversation with them in July as a result of the meeting that we had last week with you all What about the meeting a couple of months ago where we had what everyone else believed was an agreement? To the co-chair, we had conversations with both the board and the governor's office. I think the desire was to let the CSI process play out and determine next steps from there, because it has not gone to JCAR yet. And so that's what the discussions will be in the coming month. Follow-up? I'll let other people ask questions and then come back to me shortly. Okay, sounds good. Yes, Senator Huffman? Sure. Thank you, Chairman. So you guys had this eight-point analysis on natural kratom, and it didn't line up with anything with the FDA, the DEA, or any other health organization. Should the Board of Pharmacy be the one that regulates this, or is it a food additive for the Department of Agriculture, or is it food for other people? How do you find your jurisdiction on doing this since it's not really a drug? To the co-chair, to Senator Huffman, that's the issue that we find ourselves with, and we have been dealing with this issue since 2018, is where this lands. So is it a supplement? Is it a food additive? Is it a drug? I think when you talk to a number of the advocates and you talk to folks like the Cleveland Clinic, they'll say it's a drug, whereas other folks will say it's harmless like caffeine. And so that's where I think it's a little confusing as regulators to figure out where this lands because it is in that gray area and has not been settled by both FDA or at the state level. Follow-up? Don't you think it would be best for the advocates, the industry, and the general body for the administration to make that decision so that there can be construct—it seems like the administration may be looking down at the pharmacy. Well, maybe they failed. Let's go shop this over to the ag, and maybe they can push it through from their aspect. But don't you think it would be best for all of us to settle on one direction so we can all have educated decisions on this? To the senator, absolutely. And we're more than willing to have conversations about what the future state of this looks like. But as you may recall, there's been efforts to sort of get your hands around this issue in the past, and it not necessarily has come to fruition. And so when we have parents come to us saying, hey, my kid purchased a gas station and I'm concerned about other children, or hey, I purchased this supplement thinking it was an energy drink and it's ruined my life and now I'm in rehab and I've lost my family and my home, I think we, you know, as regulators and as people who have to safeguard the public have to take a long, hard look at that and decide, you know, what authority we have to try and safeguard folks. One real quick. Follow up. So when you speak of those people that have come, are they truly speaking about just natural kratom? Because a lot of it have additives of fentanyl and the synthetic point, which is causing the trouble and not actually natural kratom. Through the co-chair to the senator, so the mother who spoke at the last J. Carr hearing, her son only ingested natural ground leaf kratom. There's also kratom products on the market that are just, quote-unquote, natural products that have warning labels to tell you not to take it more than five days in a month, warning about seizures, death, not to take it with antihistamines. So I think there are certain products there that are widely available, particularly to kids, and that is concerning about their access to what is essentially a partial opioid agonist. Thank you. Senator DeMora. Thank you, Madam Chair. My first question is, and I don't know who can answer this, but you've said there have been several conversations, but I know that my colleague and I and my legal caucus, my legal counsel never was participated in any of these so-called meetings, So I don't know what meetings are being referred to when there's there was some kind of deal at a meeting. But my second question is, and unless I'm mistaking, the legislature hasn't passed any bill on regulating Kratom yet. Have they to the chair to Senator DeMora? No, they have not. Because I know we have a bill in the Senate that I support that would do a lot of things. But how do you guys get to make rules just because you decide to make them and we haven't done anything legislatively? I mean, I don't understand how that works. I mean, you guys decided to do something because a couple of people and I sympathize with people that had issues with this. But I mean, people die of peanut allergies or strawberry allergies, you know, one every 100 or 200. So and are you regulating strawberries or peanuts just on your own? I mean, it kind of is confusing to me that the legislative body hasn't acted on stuff yet. And, you know, it took this body a long time to finally come to an agreement with marijuana and hemp and things like that after a debate, a lengthy debate on committees in session. But you guys now just decide to make your own rules and we don't get to say any. Is that basically what you guys are doing? Through the chair to Senator DeMora. So the governor had asked us to look at this issue. And so, obviously, as being part of the executive branch of government, we took his request and we have been looking at it. You know, and we wanted to essentially, you know, our response to CSI is what we found in terms of our information and our data that we, all the studies that we've pulled, to try and provide a clear picture of, you know, the totality of the evidence around the availability of this product. So we haven't necessarily taken the steps to, you know, file this rule with JCAR yet. And, you know, we're happy to work with the legislature on, you know, how they want to proceed with this. But, you know, as far as we're concerned, we were just following, you know, the lead of the governor and taking a look at this issue and studying this issue as he asked us to do in December of last year. One quick follow-up. Follow-up. So, I mean, this is going to be a hypothetical Bill DeMora question, but if the governor told you to ban fireworks for the Fourth of July, would you just go ahead and do that without having any input from the legislature? Through the chair, Senator DeMora, the banning of natural leaf kratom is going through the legislatively developed process. So it still has not gotten to this body for deliberation. And so we're following the standard process that's set before you in statute. And so we don't think we're trying to run anything around you. As we've been told today at this hearing, you can invalidate the rule or re-refer to CSI. There's a number of options that you have if you feel like we have not met the standard of evidence that's laid out in the statute. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Representative Michael Antonio. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thanks for being here today. Can you maybe fill us in on a little bit of the history of when you at the pharmacy board became aware that there were incidents out there that were serious incidents that caused the board to start paying attention to natural and synthetic kratom? Sure. Through the chair to the representative. So we've been looking at this issue since 2018. So we had a rule proposing to ban kratom in 2018, and we were asked by members of JCAR to pull back and allow for legislative study of the issue. And so that's really when this sort of hit our radar was around 2018. Since then, obviously, we've been hearing from advocates and parents who've lost loved ones. I'm also hearing about people that Kratom has, according to them, has helped them. And so we've been trying to navigate this issue, hoping there may be some clear guidance put in by the legislature to try and address sort of this gray area of the lack of Kratom regulation. Follow-up? Follow-up. Thank you. And just for sake of having this full conversation on the record, what power do you have at the pharmacy board to encourage or make the legislature do our job and pass legislation regulating substances that you identify or the governor identifies as potentially seriously? harming, including minors? So through the chairs to the representative, you know, obviously we have the ability to add it as a scheduled drug. And so that's the authority that's given to us, very similar to DEA's authority. And I laid out in 3719 are all of the requirements that we have to meet legally to demonstrate, you know, the risk of the drug and whether or not it has medical use or not. And so that's the tool we have in our toolbox. You obviously have a lot more available to you all as well. So that is something that, you know, we would very much ask you to consider as we move forward on this issue. One more follow-up. Thank you. You partially answered my next question. But would it be helpful for you to have clear legislative guidance from us as you are trying to figure out how to get your arms around an issue that is coming to you from around the state related to minors and adults using this substance? Through the co-chairs to the representative. Yes. Any guidance you want to provide? is more than welcome. I think we're all trying to work together to safeguard the citizens of the state. And so, again, we welcome working with you and to discuss our concerns with the availability of these products and how we can move forward on this issue. Representative Brennan. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thanks, Mr. McNamee, for being here today. Appreciate it very much. I share the governor's frustration. I mean, I wasn't here in 2018, 19 and whatnot, but I am aware that this issue keeps coming up for the General Assembly and the General Assembly has not acted on it. We probably not going to be back again until maybe November December And God knows if it get done then In the meantime people are dying and I don want people dying on my watch if we can do something about it And I won't even get into how we rushed through this ballot issue to get it on the ballot in November when we could have been working on an issue important like this as a General Assembly. So I commend the governor for taking the bull by the horns and trying to do something to age-gate this and put other restrictions on it to protect particular minors, and the inadvertent person that walks into a gas station thinking it's an energy supplement and not really knowing what they're ingesting into their body. So my question is somewhat similar to what Rep. Piclantonio just asked, just asked, and that is, you know, if the General Assembly, if we're looking at at least six or eight months of us not doing anything and potentially not doing anything at all, what can be done by your agency or maybe other state agencies in the meantime to at least protect children from this stuff that there are a lot of question marks about? I mean, People are dying from this stuff. I think it's pretty clear. It's not like cannabis where, you know, I'm not hearing about people overdosing on cannabis. I don't think that's a good comparison. So any further thoughts on that? Through the co-chairs to the representative, I think, you know, when we were talking with some of the proponents of the rule last or when we met in April, you know, they were talking, highlighting the fact that, like, a lot of medical providers don't even know. They don't look for it on drug screens. They don't ask questions about it. And because there's potential interactions, and even the warning labels from all of the manufacturers say, hey, talk to your doctor before you use this. I think, you know, at least from the very least, we can work with our health care regulatory boards to try and educate folks, as well as work with some of the other associations that do more community-based prevention work, the Department of Behavioral Health, engaging with them as well. and just trying to educate folks so they can understand the risks associated with it. Follow-up, if I may, Madam Chair? Follow-up. Thank you. So that's where my brain goes on a lot of issues around here in educating the public. I mean, has there been any thought of maybe doing some PSAs to educate folks on the dangers of Kratom? To the co-chairs, to the representative, there have not been, to my knowledge, any discussions regarding PSAs, but happy to talk to the good folks at the Department of Behavioral Health and see if maybe there could be some opportunity there. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Senator Lang. Thank you, Madam Chair. Director, thank you for being here. Where co-chairman Jamie Callender was hesitant to express either, I'm not sure if he was expressing an opinion or a concern on behalf of the board. He modified it to make it on behalf of himself, but I share his either opinion or concern regarding this. My question around the rule is kind of a follow-up on what everyone else has kind of asked. What enforcement ability does the Department of Pharmacy have? To the co-chairs, to the senator, our enforcement authority is rather limited in terms of, let's say if there was an entity like a pharmacy that was selling the synthetic formulations of kratom that are still banned under the rule, we would be able to take administrative action and potentially build a criminal case against those entities. A lot of the enforcement really happens at the local level. So, for example, local sanitarians, the health departments, local law enforcement, They're the ones that have been actively enforcing these, because obviously we are a home rule state. So there's limited enforcement options that we have unless the entity is licensed with us, and we don't see pharmacies selling these products. Follow-up? Do you see enforcement potentially leading to a growth of government? to the co-chairs to the senator um i don't believe so we've we've banned other products so for example there is an un unapproved tricyclic antidepressant called tnpt that has been ravaging like the state of alabama and people have been getting hooked on it um it goes by like zaza red it's another term they used we actually banned that in december of 2023 um and you know you haven't heard of the issues here in Ohio that we've seen down in Alabama. So we've done these actions before, and it has not sort of grown government, as far as I can tell. Senator Huffman. Thank you very much. First, I agree with Representative Brunnen. We're here because of the inactivity of the General Assembly over the last six to eight years. Do you agree with that? we have not passed any laws to give you direction. To the co-chairs, to the senator, I'll defer to your expertise. Well, I'm just trying to tell you. We're at fault ourselves, too. But my question is that, you know, in my practice of medicine, I've seen many more deaths from Tylenol and aspirin. Much more common. You're not trying to regulate that to those even to a prescription. But my question is concerning natural kratom in these deaths. You gave the example that the one bottle said don't take it with this, don't take histamine, don't take it. Did the Board of Pharmacy ever go out and start analyzing these things and say, yes, this is pure kratom, this is where it comes from, or manufactured, and look into that to see if it is true natural kratom or is it being adulterated? Through the co-chairs to the senator. So the statements we took are off of either websites where they sell it, and then they have the laboratory analysis included with it. So, I mean, the industry has focused on a lot of self-regulation through laboratory testing and requiring it to be in CGM facilities. And so through their own acknowledgement, what they're selling is reportedly natural kratom, but the warning labels come, you know, come with a laundry list of things to be concerned about. And so that's, I mean, they're providing their own information to inform us of what's in their product. Follow up. So you're going on just what they report rather than going and analyze it and saying, well, this is added to it or this is synthetic kratom. So you're just relying on what somebody's selling. I mean, we've looked at it, to the co-chairs, to the senator. I mean, we've looked at a whole host of products, both natural and synthetic, and the warning labels run the gamut and include death and seizures and, you know, a whole laundry list of concerns from the manufacturers themselves. And so that is concerning to us that anybody, you know, any child with a developing brain can walk in off the street and take this. I'm sorry, Representative Brennan. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thanks for those questions down there. It made me think, what's to prevent a company from just putting natural on all of their Kratom products? To the co-chairs, to the representative, there's nothing. I mean, there's ways that they try and get around federal regulation by saying not for human consumption, which is always a real popular one. However, obviously we've been working with the crime labs, and they've been able to develop standards for detecting the synthetic compounds. Because working with the crime labs, if the crime labs can't detect it, the rule is not worth the paper that it's written on. So we've worked with them to try to make sure that they can detect the difference between your natural kratom and your synthetic formulations that the rule is targeting. I'm trying to develop my follow-up. I think I've got one, if I may. One more. Yeah, thank you. So the question is, this definition of natural is so, there is no definition. So why can't you just simply use the rule that you have now regarding synthetic and apply that to all of the so-called natural kratom products that are being sold out there in these gas stations? and whatnot? To the co-chairs, to the representative, currently we're enjoined in a TRO in Franklin County from doing partially that. So there's one reason. I think the other reason is obviously there are just so many different varieties and formulations of metragenin-related products that I think as we focus on, If you're looking at 901.1 or .2, sorry, that does sort of target all of mitragynine. So that would look at all of kratom. This obviously needed to, you know, split the difference and just focus on the synthetics, which is why that rule is spelled out the way it is. Thank you, Madam Chair. Representative Pickle-Antonio. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. So we were having some conversation about other kinds of products, Tylenol, other kinds of things that we think of that may cause problems for people depending on their chemical makeup or what else they may be taking. I guess, can you talk about how does the pharmacy board sift through the kinds of reports that may be coming to them about incidents related to substances and make a decision, like what makes it rise to the level that you feel that additional regulation is needed? Sure. To the co-chairs, to the representative. So the Tylenol issue is one that's monitored by FDA. And even in 4729-9101.1, it has exceptions. So if the FDA makes a determination that it's a food additive or a dietary supplement, the rule defers to that. That has not occurred in this space, but it's occurred in a lot of other spaces, like with OTCs and things of that nature. And so that, I think, is the fundamental difference that we're looking at here between your OTC products and Kratom, which kind of exists, again, in that really gray area. May I ask one more? One more follow-up. Thank you. So what about not over-the-counter medications, but just, I don't know, I'm trying to think of something like the bath salt situation or just other substances that are out in the world that somebody may figure out how to do something with so that it can be ingested. How does the pharmacy board evaluate when something rises to the level that it needs regulation Through the co to the representative So we work a lot with the crime labs We actually have a working group with them So we talk about new and novel substances that we see all the time. Because a lot of the scheduling actions we take are to identify those compounds so that when they identify it in sort of like a fentanyl or they have a drug trafficking case, they're more easily able to prosecute drug traffickers and things of that nature. So we work very closely with them. The governor's office has been very helpful as well, you know, in helping to coordinate that forensic lab group. So that's primarily who we work closely with. But obviously we reach out to Department of Health to look at sort of the vital stats data as well, if the coroners are identifying it on their death certificates. So there's a number of different avenues. But the crime labs are the ones that will tell us we'll see it first, I guess is what I will say. Thank you. Senator Callender, or Representative Callender, Co-Chair Callender. Anything else? Thank you for your coming in and appearing today, even though we kind of ordered you to. We appreciate you showing up. I have a number of questions in series here. I'm not even sure exactly where to start. So let's start with the three branches of government and checks and balances. You've had the judicial branch put a stay on these rules and the enforcement, correct? A restraining order, I believe is the right word? To the co-chair, they've put a restraining order on determining whether or not natural vegetative of creatum includes it mixed with in a beverage form. Traditional branch is one of the three branches? Yes. And you've had discussions with members of this board and of the legislature expressing their concern or dissatisfaction with their roles? To the co-chair, yes. You talked when you were speaking with Senator Huffman about the best policy and coming up with good policy. Do you feel it's the Board of Pharmacies or the Department of Pharmacies' purview to set public policy dealing with medications and pharmaceuticals? To the co-chair, I believe we do have the authority to regulate the distribution of dangerous drugs in the state of Ohio. But you used the word policy. Is it your role to make policy? To the co-chair, when requested by the governor, we will engage in rulemaking authority, yes. I would suggest that it's not the governor's role either to make policy, that that is exclusively reserved to the legislative branch and the Constitution. You might take a look at that at some point. But since you are making policy here and you believe you're in your right to do so, despite both the judicial and legislative branches and the Constitution suggesting otherwise, one of our JCARs dictates is that we need to make sure that rules come before us, first of all, have legislative authority, which this does not. We are considering legislation and have been for a while, maybe slower than we should, but sometimes the legislature is slower because there's a lot of inputs. There's a lot of interested parties. There's a lot of data to work through, but that's the legislative process. And we also have a House and Senate that don't always agree on issues. We sometimes have to work through those differences. but again constitutionally that's in the purview of the legislature one of our prongs has to do with whether this is the correct agency you talked earlier about the department of health we've talked about the department of agriculture uh what made you decide that you were the superior correct agency here since you've decided you were the right branch What made you decide you were the right agency? To the co-chair, we were requested by the governor to look at this issue, as we have looked at other issues related to compounds or substances that may be harmful to the public. I think, again, the legislature would probably argue that they're the ones who determine which agency covers what items and that we do that through the legislative process, not through an executive branch dictate. going to Representative Brennan's questions and you talked about the inability to necessarily distinguish at your current state the difference between synthetic and naturally occurring I'm not on one of the legislative committees considering this but it seems to me if you can pick it in your backyard it's naturally occurring and if it's gone to a chemist to be created it's synthetic but maybe the snow really simplified. But you just testified earlier that you couldn't really tell the difference? Oh, to the co-chair, that might have been a misstatement. We could certainly tell the difference using the – because we've developed laboratory standards with the crime labs. Okay, because I think you had made a statement similar to the fact that for enforcement purposes, that there might not be any way to stop someone from simply labeling their product as naturally occurring rather than synthetic. To the co-chair, I think the issue is that sometimes they'll sell it as powdered form, but it will clearly say it will actually be an extract because they'll advertise that it's much stronger than what occurs in nature. So there are some variations when you see a powdered form that it's not. that you just don't see a powdered form and say, oh, that's natural. I think that's the distinguish I was attempting to make. So are you arguing that the rule that went through a few weeks ago dealing with synthetic is not sufficient on its own to regulate that which was intended to be regulated? To the co-chair, no, we think that the rule is sufficient to prohibit what we consider the worst of the worst, which are the 7-OH, the mitragynine, pseudonoxil, those products that have significantly higher rates of impact when compared to morphine. Okay. We did not have a real full hearing on that issue when the other one went through, but since you've kind of shed some doubt on that, I'm going to ask the director if, even though the rule has gone through, if we can put it for an early five-year review, I guess it would be to pull that rule back and look at it at the next JCAR meeting, the synthetic rule? The synthetic rule? Mm-hmm. We could ask them to bring it in early. Okay. If not, I'd like to have a hearing on it because it may be that it's not sufficient by itself, and it would be on us to have allowed that through last time. We could file it to get it in our jurisdiction. Let's figure out a way to bring it up. Okay. So you're making the public policy here and believe you have the right to make public policy here. I vehemently disagree with that. But assuming that's the case, tell me about this eight points to schedule something or schedule something as a level one drug. To the co-chair, so the eight-factor analysis mirrors the DEA, the federal DEA standards. And so they are the same requirements that DEAs are hard to look at when scheduling things. Similar requirements are in other state laws where they do administrative scheduling via or they do rules or scheduling via administrative rule. But yeah, that's been laid out in Section 3719-44. And that involves pulling together data or research to back up the positions you're taking? Correct, yes. And on this one in particular, what kind of sources did you use? We used a variety of sources, including peer-reviewed journals. We used online reports. We used items from the FDA, data from the Department of Behavioral Health, from the European Center for Monitoring, and a lot of third-party studies. In a very cursory review, I saw articles and items from the website Reddit used to back up. Correct. Do you consider that a reputable scientific resource? To the co-chair, so that Reddit study was actually a study looking at, there's been studies examining the Reddit forums. So the answer is yes, you do consider it? Well, it was part of the totality of evidence. So, for example, there are forums that have over 10,000 individuals who are having difficulty navigating the substance. I've seen Facebook articles with many more, and I may take umbrage with the scientific basis for some of that. Sure. And I'm not sure I'm pleased with an agency using Reddit as a resource for a medical decision. I think that covers most of what I wanted. I think the key takeaway for me is that you believe that you all are right to make the public policy here rather than the legislature. To the co-chair, I don't believe that that's the statement we're making. I believe that we have this rule at CSI and we're still following that process. Again, we're happy to work with you all on addressing this issue. Again, I think we're just trying to navigate all of the competing interests and the concerns that we have around the public health impacts of these compounds. Thank you. All right. Seeing no further questions, thank you for coming in today. Thank you. Are there any additional questions or comments from members or the public? All right, the next JCAR meeting is scheduled for Monday, July 13th, 2026 in this room, the finding and hearing room. Please note that this meeting will begin at 2.30. And is there a motion to adjourn? We are hereby adjourned.