Cannabis buds at a retailer.
The cannabis industry continues to blossom in Mount Laurel, with the first recreational marijuana store officially opening on Saturday and two other businesses going before the Township zoning board next week.
Daylite Cannabis, the town's first store of its kind, will hold a grand opening on Saturday, September 30, at its store at 1136 Route 73, on the southbound side before the Church Road intersection.
Owner Steve Cassidy told 70and73.com his soft launch was on September 12 and "we are getting busier and busier every day as awareness of our business grows."
The Township has supported the application of another recreational marijuana retailer to open in the former Boiling Seafood restaurant next door to Cassidy's shop and another a few hundred feet south on the same side in the former Sage Diner. Another was approved to open on Church Road, near Fellowship Road.
These operators await a license to open from the New Jersey Cannabis Regulatory Commission, which meets October 19 when commissioners are expected to award more licenses.
Meanwhile, two other new cannabis entrants — a manufacturer and a retailer — that have been supported by Township Council are scheduled to go before the Zoning Board of Adjustment next Wednesday, October 4, to get their locations approved.
A Fellowship Road view of the building proposed for the recreational cannabis store by Higher Leaf LCC.
Higher Leaf LLC, which received its license to operate from the state this month, applied to the zoning board to operate a retail store in office/commercial space at Fellowship Road and East Gate Drive. The address is 813 East Gate Drive.
Mira Ilyaguyev is listed as Higher Leaf's owner on the zoning application as controlling 95% of the business. Ilyaguyev, of Bellevue, Washington, also is listed as the license holder by the state.
Township Council in October 2022 supported the Higher Leaf license and "determined the proposed location to be appropriate for the retail cannabis use," board engineer Drew E. Pavlick, of CME Associates, wrote in his engineering review letter.
Higher Leaf seeks approval for a minor site plan and a use variance to operate a 4,411-square-foot store in the industrial zoning district. The only changes to the site will be interior renovations, the application notes.
Kushi Labs LLC, which lists an Atlantic City law firm as its mailing address, also is on the agenda next week to open a 7,774-square-foot recreational cannabis manufacturing operation at 2000 Crawford Place. An address check shows that two breweries also operate from the commercial building.
A conditional license issued to Kushi Labs by the state in September 2022 lists the owner as Ajay Patel of Sewell, New Jersey. Kushi Labs won support from Township Council at a meeting last December.
The applicant is seeking minor site plan approval and conditional use approval, because manufacturing is considered a conditional use in the industrial district, according to application documents.
Plans show cannabis manufacturing rooms on the site, including a "vape filling and capping room."
