On Aug. 16, the Bloomfield Township Council unanimously approved an ordinance allowing for the sale of cannabis in town.
BLOOMFIELD, NJ — The Bloomfield Township Council unanimously approved an ordinance permitting cannabis retail establishments in town at its Aug. 16 meeting, a move that comes after New Jersey voters approved a ballot measure that legalized the sale of cannabis in November 2020. Gov. Phil Murphy signed the legislation on Feb. 22, and municipalities in the state have until Aug. 22 — 180 days after the law went into effect — to either permit or ban marijuana sales within their borders.
Six cannabis retailers will be permitted in Bloomfield; two will be allowed north of Bay Avenue, two south of the Norfolk Southern Railway line and two between those two points.
“The state created and the township is formalizing three micro licenses, which allows for small businesses to be created throughout the township,” Mayor Michael Venezia said at the meeting. “So we’re allowing a total of six licenses, but three of them are going to be micro licenses. We can always go back in the future if we see a huge interest and change that.”
The state law created six marketplace classes of licensed cannabis businesses: cultivator, for facilities involved in growing and cultivating cannabis; manufacturer, for facilities involved in the manufacturing, preparation and packaging of cannabis items; wholesaler, for facilities involved in obtaining and selling cannabis items for later resale by other licensees; distributer, for businesses involved in transporting cannabis plants in bulk from one licensed cultivator to another licensed cultivator, or cannabis items in bulk from any type of licensed cannabis business to another; retailer, for locations at which cannabis items and related supplies are sold to consumers; and delivery, for businesses providing courier services for consumer purchases that are fulfilled by a licensed cannabis retailer in order to make deliveries of the purchased items to a consumer.
Some people, such as resident Joe Nucci, are not in favor of allowing dispensaries to open in town.
“I’m totally against it. I just don’t think it’s a good thing,” Nucci said at the meeting. “I’m concerned about the kids, their access, and I don’t think this could be helpful to any town except for revenue and taxes.”
According to Venezia, more than 70 percent of voters in Bloomfield voted for the legalization of marijuana. Laura Genna, who was one of them, sent an email to the council to be read during the public comment portion of the meeting.
“I am all for allowing businesses to sell recreational marijuana in Bloomfield,” Genna said. “Bloomfield should prioritize black-owned businesses and businesses run by groups that have been adversely affected by the so-called war on drugs.”
Venezia said that the small business licenses would be reserved for social-equity businesses. In the cannabis industry, programs that promote social equity work to assist businesses owned by those who have been previously incarcerated for doing cannabis business.
“Cannabis creates living-wage jobs,” Hugh Giordano, a representative from the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, which represents workers in the cannabis industry, said at the meeting. He explained that cannabis-related jobs can often require highly educated employees. “These workers have degrees in botany, horticulture, chemistry; (they are) even pharmacists. It creates an educated middle class that will pay taxes and be a part of the community.”
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