A pot shop on hold

It’s been 18 months since the Board of Selectmen issued a special permit to Sanctuary Medicinals to locate the first retail marijuana business in Saugus, but company officials don’t know when they will be able to open their store

By Mark E. Vogler

SAUGUS – It’s been more than a year since a state Land Court judge dismissed part of a lawsuit against the town which challenged the legality of the special permit (S-2) obtained by Sanctuary Medicinals to locate a retail marijuana dispensary in Saugus. “Sanctuary is free and clear from litigation now, so we’re happy with this ruling,” Saugus Attorney Peter Flynn told The Saugus Advocate last June.

“Our clients are just looking forward to setting up a host community agreement with the town manager and moving forward on this soon and hope to take this to the town manager within days,” said Flynn, who had been working as a legal consultant for Sanctuary.

But representatives of Sanctuary said during a Community Outreach meeting at the Saugus Public Library on Monday (June 16) that the meeting that Sanctuary officials hope to have with Town Manager Scott C. Crabtree still hasn’t taken place and they don’t know when it will. “The process to get a license from the Cannabis Control Commission takes months,” Sanctuary’s Director of Security, Mike Allen, said.

“But we can’t do anything until we get the Host Community Agreement. It is holding us up,” Allen said.

It usually can take up to eight months from the time a company obtains its S-2 permit from the municipal licensing authority, according to Allen. But it’s taking much longer in the case of Sanctuary’s plans to locate a retail marijuana business at 181 Broadway (the southbound lane of Route One) in Saugus. Sanctuary obtained its special permit (S-2) in December of 2023 from the Board of Selectmen. That was about 18 months ago.

“We’re hoping that the end of the line is coming very soon,” Allen said.

“I had a brief conversation with him. I was encouraged by the conversation I had with him,” he said.

But Allen and other Sanctuary representatives attending Monday’s Community Outreach meeting said they don’t yet have a date with the town manager to sign the Host Community Agreement and they don’t know the specific reasons for the holdup. The Saugus Advocate reached out to the Town Manager’s Office for comment and was awaiting a response at press time.

In his interview last year, Attorney Flynn explained that Sanctuary being named as a defendant in a lawsuit against the town “sort of froze things up,” creating an environment that wasn’t conducive to negotiations with the town – and about a six-month delay. “Judge Vhay was very clear in his ruling that this was a baseless lawsuit. And it set us back a quarter of a million dollars, when you consider the time lost, legal costs and having to pay rent at the location where we want to start our business,” Flynn said.

Four people, in addition to The Saugus Advocate, showed up Monday for what was the third Community Outreach meeting hosted by Sanctuary since first expressing an interest in operating a retail marijuana business in town at the location where Ninety-Nine Restaurant & Pub closed in the spring of 2022. A 20-minute PowerPoint demonstration briefed the public about Sanctuary and its team, location details, security plans, steps to be taken to prevent diversion to minors, how the location will not constitute a nuisance, the company’s “positive impact plan,” its hiring commitment and local benefits.

Here are the highlights of how the Sanctuary business, once opened, will impact Saugus:

• In addition to property taxes, Saugus can receive additional tax revenue through the adoption of a local sales tax of up to 3 percent on each retail sale to consumers. A company official estimated that Saugus stood to receive $300,000 to $400,000 a year based on annual sales of $10 million to $15 million at the Route One location.
• Sanctuary anticipates hiring 35 to 40 local residents “for well paying careers with access to a living wage, benefits and comprehensive workforce training initiatives.”
• Sanctuary will provide eligible consumers 21 years of age and older with access to consistent, high-quality marijuana and marijuana products that are regulated and tested for cannabinoid content and contaminants.
• Sanctuary has a proven track record of being a partner in local public health initiatives, whether it be through funding vape sensors in local public schools or contributing to COVID-19 relief efforts.
• Annual charitable giving budget, commitment to local volunteer hours and rotating charity fundraisers in store to provide regular support to organizations of importance to local Saugus residents.

Sanctuary calls its future 8,816-square-foot building at 181 Broadway “state of the art,” accompanied by more than 117 parking spaces and a secured loading area. The facility is not located within 1,000 feet of the property boundary line of any lot in use as a public or private preschool, primary or secondary school, licensed day-care center, church, library, park, playground or other marijuana establishment or medical marijuana facility.

Sanctuary Security Chief Allen said he’s ready to develop and expand a comprehensive security plan in partnership with the Saugus Police Department. The security plan bars on-site consumption or loitering within or outside the dispensary. “The system is set up to keep fake IDs from getting through,” Chief Allen said.

“We don’t want product diversion to minors. Video surveillance is a big part of it. We’re required to maintain 90 days of video storage,” he said.

The security plan includes exterior and interior continuous IP video monitoring systems.

Extensive measures are being taken to make sure that none of the product gets diverted to minors or anyone under the age of 21. Employees who divert the product intentionally or negligently will be terminated immediately and reported to law enforcement, according to Chief Allen. Any consumers that divert the product will be banned from the facility and reported to law enforcement, he said.

“Everything is on video,” Chief Allen said.

“Nobody wants to be recorded doing illegal activities,” he said.

Sanctuary Medicinals describes itself as “a licensed, vertically integrated company” with a state-of-the-art multi-level cultivation and processing facility located in Littleton, Mass. It has three medical dispensaries and three adult-use dispensaries operating in Massachusetts. It also has operations in Florida, New Hampshire and New Jersey.