Montgomery County Circuit Judge James Anderson issued a temporary restraining order Wednesday on the Alabama Medical Cannabis Commission issuing licenses to integrated companies, which was scheduled to happen on Jan. 9.

The court order and the issues raised by unsuccessful license applicants raise new doubts about when the commission can issue the licenses needed to start the state’s new medical marijuana industry, an effort stalled now for six months.

Anderson noted the need to move the process along and get medications to patients. Twice before, in June and in August, the commission has awarded and then rescinded license awards.

The judge also acknowledged the arguments by companies scheduled to receive licenses and that oppose further delays. But he said the legal questions justify another pause.

“While the court understands those parties’ frustrations, the court also notes that all three rounds of awards have been challenged as legally infirm: the first two rounds of awards were abandoned by action of the commission itself, and now there is a serious question as to whether the third round is also invalid,” Anderson wrote.

The Alabama Legislature legalized medical marijuana in 2021 and created the commission to oversee the new, fully intrastate industry. Patients with qualifying conditions such as chronic pain as certified by a doctor will receive a card allowing them to buy the gummies and other products in dispensaries.

Officials say products could be available within several months of the start of cultivation.

On Dec. 29, the commission issued licenses for cultivators, processors, secure transporters, and a state testing lab. The commission was scheduled to issued dispensary licenses that day, too, but Anderson put those on hold.

The temporary restraining order issued Wednesday applies to licenses for integrated companies, which will perform multiple functions, cultivating, processing, transporting, and dispensing.

The law limits the number of licenses that can be awarded in some of the categories, including a maximum of five integrated licenses. There were more than 30 applicants for integrated licenses.

The temporary restraining order issued Wednesday came at the request of six of the unsuccessful applicants for integrated licenses, including some that were awarded licenses during at least one of the first two rounds of license awards in June and August but passed over on the third round of awards made Dec. 12.

For that third round of awards, the commission discarded scores compiled by anonymous, third-part evaluators. The use of the scores had been one of the most disputed parts of the first two rounds of license awards. The commission agreed to discard them as part of a mediated settlement with companies that sued the commission.

But some companies that were awarded licenses during the first two rounds, when the scores were used, but passed over in the third round, are objecting to the discarding of the scores. The commission also faces allegations of violating the state Open Meetings Act, the Alabama Administrative Procedures Act and its own rules and regulations.

Along with the temporary restraining order, Anderson granted a motion for expedited discovery, which means that the companies suing commission can take depositions and request documents from the commission and its staff. Those must be completed by Jan. 19.

Anderson has scheduled a hearing in the case for Jan. 24 in the lawsuit, which is a consolidation of much of the litigation against the commission.