* Sun-Times…

State officials on Friday announced that a fourth lottery for cannabis dispensary licenses will now be held to give six applicant groups a chance to win additional permits after they were wrongfully excluded from drawings in an earlier lottery.

The latest development in the convoluted and acrimonious pot shop licensing process came just before the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation announced the final list of winners of the next 185 permits, which still can’t formally be issued due to a Cook County judge’s order.

Toi Hutchinson, Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s senior adviser on cannabis control, explained in a call with reporters that a “clerical oversight” led to some groups having less chances than they deserved and others having more shots in the July 29 lottery. The errors affected the drawings for five of the 17 regions where the licenses are designated.

The new lottery aims to give the affected firms the same odds of winning they would have had in the initial drawings, although it wasn’t immediately made clear how those odds will be determined. Additional licenses will be issued to the winners, but officials didn’t say how many could be dished out.

* Tribune…

At each step on the way, as regulators discovered errors, they acted to correct them, Hutchinson said, describing the process as a marathon, not a sprint.

“It’s been painful to watch how long this has taken,” she said. “As we move forward. this could get better every single year.”

* From a state press release…

Only six applicants did not receive the correct number of entries. The additional lottery will not impact applicants who were selected for the opportunity to be issued a conditional license in the previously held lotteries.

…Adding… Center Square…

Cannabis sales for the month of August dipped $5.8 million from the month before, bucking a consistent trend, but the governor’s lead advisor for the industry said things will continue to evolve.

In July, nearly $128 million of adult-use cannabis was sold. The following month, $122 million was sold. The only other declines month to month were in February 2021 and 2020, and a slight decline from October to November 2020.

It’s unclear if demand has peaked. Before Augusts’ sales numbers were revealed, Toi Hutchinson, the senior advisor for cannabis control to Gov. J.B. Pritzker, said that is something the law she helped craft as a state Senator requires review.

“The biggest thing is we designed this to study at every step of the way so that we could try to make the best policy decisions we could make with no breadcrumbs from any other state,” she said.

She couldn’t say what the ceiling was for sales.

“I could not even begin to tell you,” Hutchison said. “I will tell you that in February we surpassed liquor tax money.”