Manhattan received only one of the new 38 adult-use retail cannabis licenses handed out statewide on Feb. 16, which were announced by New York Governor Kathy Hochul. They were included as part of an immense package of 109 licenses, which are also granted to the other relevant cogs of the cannabis industry: cultivators, processors, and distributors.
The Office of Cannabis Management, the state agency responsible for the licenses, told Straus News that Blue Forest Farms Dispensary LLC was the lucky recipient. It is unclear where the dispensary will be located, although the LLC does share a name with an existing hemp and CBD “gallery” located on Madison Ave., near Rockefeller Center and Grand Central Terminal. (Hemp, a variety of cannabis distinct from marijuana, does not contain enough THC to create a psychoactive high).
Manhattan has 12 legally licensed cannabis stores, a number which will now seemingly tick up to 13. The number of unlicensed and therefore illegal dispensaries in the borough, however, reportedly reaches into the thousands.
The governor’s office proudly noted that the state had tripled the amount of “operating cannabis retailers in the last two months.” The state reportedly now has 70 adult-use dispensaries, whether delivery-only or storefront-oriented.