Legal marijuana has arrived in the South End. The neighborhood’s first medical dispensary, Affinity Boston, will likely be opening at the end of the month or beginning of December, and a proposal has been submitted for another, recreational dispensary in the neighborhood.
Affinity Boston, located at 591 Albany
Street, will be the second dispensary opened by the company, after its
other location in West Springfield, which is also medical-only.
The
company’s president, Vin Giordano, said he hopes the Massachusetts
Cannabis Control Commission will vote to allow the store’s opening in
its November 19 meeting.
“Our key to success has always been working very closely with the community,” Giordano said.
Giordano
said that Affinity, which is owned by Liberty Compassion, Inc., began
the process of opening the South End store at the beginning of 2018.
They
worked with the community and the city to ensure that the store was
accepted by the neighborhood, including using a construction company
with headquarters nearby, Sleeping Dog Properties.
The store will
only be open to medical marijuana customers, although Giordano did leave
the possibility open for opening up to adult-use customers in the
future.
“I never say never,” he said.
“Provided that we operate safely and successfully, and we have the support of the community, it might be a logical next step.”
Meanwhile,
a different company, Redemption Boston, has submitted a proposal for a
recreational dispensary at 29-31 Stanhope Street, the former location of
The Brahmin Bar.
Geoffrey Reilinger, the proponent of the
application, said that this is his fifth attempt since 2014 to open a
marijuana dispensary in the Boston area, and hopes that this time he
will be successful.
His previous attempts have included Compassionate
Organics, at 331 Newbury St., and another store under the Redemption
name in downtown Quincy Market.
“Boston gets all these national companies. They don’t
get small operators because it costs too much and it’s too time
consuming. It’s very hard for the local guy because you have to survive
the double process,” Reilinger said, referring to the approval process
for dispensaries, which have to go through first the city’s Cannabis
Board and then the state’s Cannabis Control Commission. Reilinger was
diagnosed with multiple
sclerosis in 1996. While trying marijuana to help with sleep issues
soon afterwards, he noticed that his MS flare-ups stopped, and has had
no problems with the disease for 18 years now. His experience with
marijuana inspired him to get into the business.
If the store is allowed to open, Reilinger said that Redemption will offer medical card
holders a 15 percent discount to offset the higher tax rate on
recreational cannabis. That way, the store will still pay the taxes, but
they won’t be passed along to patients. Stacy Koeppel, executive
director of the Ellis South End Neighborhood Association, declined to
comment until the community group learns more about the application.
