Marijuana regulators in Massachusetts voted Thursday to grant a license to a recreational dispensary now slated to become the first retail pot shop within the city of Boston.
The Massachusetts Cannabis Control Commission voted to grant a final license to Pure Oasis, paving the way for Boston’s first legal recreational dispensary to open its doors.
Massachusetts voted to legalize recreational marijuana in November 2016, and the Bay State’s first retail dispensaries began doing business roughly two years later.
Boston proper has been without a licensed pot shop, however, meaning residents of the state’s largest city have had to make a trek out of town to legally purchase retail weed.
In addition to being the first Boston dispensary to receive a final license from regulators, Pure Leaf is also the first shop in the state to successfully apply to operate under the commission’s economic empowerment program, a social equity program reserved for racial minorities, individuals with drug convictions and people who reside or work in areas disproportionately affected by marijuana prohibition.
“This is an important milestone,” Commission Chairman Steven Hoffman said following Thursday’s vote. “I’d like to wish Pure Oasis the best of luck.”
Kobie Evans and Kevin Hart, local black entrepreneurs who applied to open Pure Leaf, said they expect to begin doing business as soon as next month, MassLive reported.
“It’s been a tough road. My partner and I, we’ve literally spent hundreds of hours at the shop getting ready for where we are now,” said Mr. Evans said, according to MassLive. “I think it speaks to the fact that we’re breaking a barrier based on some of the economic functions of setbacks in the city and the state and I think that for us it means a lot to be the first. Hopefully, we can break some barriers and create opportunities for others like ourselves.”
More than 30 marijuana dispensaries are licensed to conduct retail sales in Massachusetts, but only one – New England Treatment Access in Brookline – currently services the greater Boston region.
Recreational marijuana sales in Massachusetts during 2019, the first full year of retail dispensaries doing business, totaled more than $420 million, regulators said previously.
Nine states including Massachusetts currently allow licensed and regulated marijuana dispensaries to sell pot to adults, flying in the face of longstanding federal prohibition.
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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