If you think it’s high time cannabis retail stores opened in New West, you’ll likely have to wait until spring.
To date, the city has completed rezonings for five stores: MUSE Cannabis at 532 Sixth St.; Westcanna at 710 12th St.; B.C. Cannabis (a government store) at Queensborough Landing shopping centre at 805 Boyd St.; Queensborough Cannabis Co. at 540 Ewen Ave. in Queensborough; and Maple Leaf Greenery at 71 Sixth St.
After getting zoning approval, applicants must still get a series of approvals from the city and the province before their shops can open. Those steps include: getting Liquor and Cannabis Regulation Branch approvals in principle; receiving city building permits for things like signs, etc.; having a business licence; and getting LCRB’s final approval of the application.
Rezonings for two New West stores were approved in June, leaving some to wonder when they’ll open.
Mike McKee, director of real estate and finance for JAK’s Beer Wine and Spirits, told the Record in June that the goal was to open MUSE Cannabis on Oct. 1.
“Currently, our application is still in with the city for the building permit. We are still waiting on the city for them to approve the building permit,” he said. “I think they are just taking extra time for that. We are not sure exactly how long that is going to take.”
In addition to getting a building permit and various inspections from city officials, he said the province will also inspect the store to ensure it looks exactly like it does on the plans.
“After that, it is permitted to open,” McKee said.
McKee said he has no estimated opening date for the Uptown store. Once a building permit is issued, he said the Uptown space will undergo several months of construction.
“We have been through the same process in other municipalities. It’s just one of those things that we just learned that that is part of the way this industry is evolving. It’s taking time. It’s jumping through the hoops,” he said. “It’s not that different than liquor. Liquor takes a lot of time too in terms of these types of things. We are used to it. We thought the building permit process would be a little faster, but it’s just taking longer than we had expected.”
Christy Mereigh, the city’s manager of inspections, said the city is waiting on some information from the applicant.
“Usually we are looking at between four and six weeks. This one came in in July but our last point of contact was Oct. 18. Usually we wait on the client to supply the information, so we have three items we are waiting on,” he said. “Then they also need to get health approval if they have edibles.”
According to Mereigh, the type of products being sold in store has no bearing on the process, which is about enforcement of requirements in the B.C. Building Cote. This relates to items such as floor plans and fire separations.
MUSE Cannabis continues to field inquiries from members of the public.
“Everyday. People are looking for work. People are looking to find out when we are opening, what products we will be selling, all of that,” McKee said. “There certainly has been a groundswell of interest.”
Mayor Jonathan Cote said there’s one more public hearing to be held as part of the first round of stores in the city.
“The original strategy was to open up in the five locations across the city, in the main-street commercial districts. After that we wanted to see some shops open to see how they fit into the community, to see what the demand was, to see if there was any other impacts we had to look at there, before deciding what next step or next process we might see if we were to consider any additional shops or not.
In addition to the five cannabis stores that have completed the rezoning process, a sixth store is being considered as part of the initial intake of applications for cannabis retail stores. The city is still awaiting the results of financial integrity and security checks from the Liquor and Cannabis Regulation Branch regarding the proposed Herb Co. Cannabis Store at 451 East Columbia St. in Sapperton.
