July 2025 Psychedelic Law Update
Denver Local Natural Medicine Licenses Now Available
The City of Denver is requiring a local license fornatural medicine healing centers that allow original facilitators to practice as a result of Denver City Council unanimously approvingCouncil Bill 25-0132in March. Healing centers with only clinical facilitators are exempt from the local licensing requirements. Natural medicine cultivating, manufacturing and testing facility businesses do not require a city license. Healing centers are not allowed within 1,000 feet of child care centers and schools. The license is only available online throughDenver’s Permitting and Licensing Center.If you are a business owner wanting to apply for the city license for a natural medicine healing, the main required documents and information include (but are not limited to):
- A lease orpossession of property certificatefor the business.
- A floor plan of the proposed licensed premises showing administration areas, restricted areas and security camera placement.
- Azoning use permitor an acknowledgement of zoning use permit.
- A state license number for the healing center and any other co-located licenses.
- A Business Tax Account ID foroccupational privilege tax.
A full list of required documents can befound on Denver’s website.There is a one-time application fee of $100 and the license fee is $100. Licenses must be renewed annually. If you have questions about this process, contact Sean McAllister for more information.
Recap of MAPS Psychedelic Science 2025
Sean was honored to participate in the MAPS Psychedelic Science 2025 event. Sean was the lawyer for the event in the lead up to it, handling many of the contracts and other legal work in prep for the event. McAllister Law had a booth at the event and Sean presented three panels on psychedelic churches, indigenous rights in the US, and the law around parents and psychedelics. Overall, Sean felt the events was an improvement on the 2023 event, with more focus on indigenous people, spiritual use, and fewer vulture capitalist circling the space than in the past. Anyone who attended Psychedelic Science can get a 20% discount on the first paid consult with Sean. Here are some photos from the event:
More churches receiving protections under state and federal law, including a mushroom church. McAllister Law suing DEA over the petitioning process.
In May 2025, the Church of Gaia in Washington state became the fifth ever federally recognized ayahuasca religious practice. This is the first ayahuasca practice recognized through the DEA voluntary petitioning process. After nearly three years of negotiation, and also not practicing while their application was pending, DEA granted this exemption. Seeherefor more details. Despite this success, the DEA petitioning process remains fundamentally flawed, including the requirement that applicants stop practicing while awaiting approval. Based on these deficiencies, Sean is happy to join the legal team for the Sacred Plant Alliance in its lawsuit against DEA over the broken petitioning process. For more information on the lawsuit, see here.
In addition, in February 2025, a Utah federal court granted a first ever temporary injunction to a mushroom church prohibiting the state government from interfering with this practice. See the decisionhere. The religious organization, Singularism, is important for several reasons. The church does not provide practitioners with a meaning in advance, but instead believes that divine meaning is found through the ceremonies and practitioners record these messages through journaling. Despite concerns that practices without pre-set meaning might have a hard time being recognized, the Utah federal court found this group engaged in sincere religious practice. Moreover, the Court pushed back on concerns about money in the religion by noting that even for profit businesses in the US can have religious beliefs. While the case is not final, it is ground breaking for the future of religious mushroom practices.
Contact Sean if you have questions about these cases or want to explore their impact on your practices.
Connecting Facilitators with Healing Centers
McAllister Law is offering a free service to connect Facilitators and Cultivators/Manufacturers with Healing Centers. If you are interested in connecting with Healing Centers, please send an email with your qualifications and interests in working with Healing Centers. McAllister Law will pass these on to several healing centers looking for connections.
NMHA Applications, SOPs, Consent Forms, and Liability Waiver Forms
McAllister Law is helping applicants in the Colorado Natural Medicine program develop the numerous standard operating procedures, consent forms, and other plans required by the rules. Sean has developing flat fee SOPs and forms at an affordable cost to help satisfy all the requirements under the rules. For more information, see these lists of forms and cost: for healing centers/facilitators click here, for cultivation/manufacturing SOPs click here.
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